Good old fashioned sermon review of the master of greasy grace, Joseph Prince.

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Why should the name of our father be taken away from his clan because he had no son? Give to us a possession among our father's brothers. "Moses brought their case before the Lord. And the Lord said to Moses, "The daughters of Zelophehad are right. You shall give them possession of an inheritance among their father's brothers and transfer the inheritance of their father to them. And you shall speak to the people of Israel, saying, 'If a man dies and has no son, then you shall transfer his inheritance to his daughter. - Numbers 27:4-8 (ESV)

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In operating a discernment ministry, we can often be led by the heresy du jour or the obvious distraction of politics in an NAR dominionist dominated church. Sometimes it is good to reset with a good old fashioned sermon review from a known heretic, such as Joseph Prince. A recent sermon clip is posted above. It is not the entire sermon but rather a ten-minute portion of a larger sermon. The clip is sufficient for two reasons. First, his ministry only posts ten-minute fragments to lure you into buying his full sermons and I will not support ministries that hinder the work of the Gospel. Secondly however, he always seems to provide more than enough heresy within the ten-minute segment to comment on. There is no saving this sermon, as you will soon see. Let us reason together once more beloved.

"Now we go to this story and not many believers even know about this story but it is found in Numbers 27. This happened during the time of Moses when they had come out of Egypt. And the bible says there were some women called the daughters of Zelophehad. Their father has just died and the father had no sons. Usually, the sons would take after the father and the first born would receive the double portion of his inheritance but here this man had no sons. Just five daughters and they came to Moses because what happens when you have no son?" - Joseph Prince

Prince then recites the key verses for today quoted above. He absolutely gushes though at the line that says the daughters said, "Give us a possession." He equally gushes at the answer of the Lord - the daughters speak what is right. What Prince does next though is turn this story from a historical narrative into a prescriptive text for you and I. He claims that God loved their faith to ask for the blessing and so rewarded it. Is that what the text reveals? Of course not. Under that pretense what about the faith of the brothers of Zelophehad, who were due this inheritance under Mosaic Law? The bottom line here is that Prince preaches a sugar coated, greasy grace gospel that saves no one but tastes so sweet going down. In pursuit of proving his false gospel as correct, Prince scours the bible for stories such as these that he can rip out of context and warp into his feel-good theology. Does God love faith? Sure but that is not what this story is about. When God says that the daughters are right, He is merely saying that their request was just and reasonable. This is simply from the deceitful heart of Joseph Prince:

"I love what the Lord says about them. They speak what is right. In other words their words give us a possession. Let the possession fall on them. He is so pleased because faith always glorifies God and God always honors faith. Every time you have a good opinion of God. Every time that you pray as if God is hearing you, as if God is answering your prayer - when you have that posture and attitude - God is pleased. Hebrews 11:6 says that without faith it is impossible to please God. It also says that He is a rewarder. He is not a taker! He is not a punisher! Even the angels in the field declared in Luke 2:11 the announcement of the birth of the Savior. Not a judge. Not a lawgiver. A Savior. - Joseph Prince

Where do we begin? The words the daughters spoke did not give them a possession. That sounds eerily like word faith doctrine. They simply inquired about a portion of the law and God agreed with them. Not because of some secret sauce of faith but because what they requested was reasonable and made sense. Do not miss what Prince is selling here. If you want something, ask God and have faith that He will say yes and voila! He will give you what you want. Who is God in that scenario? You are! God is not here to fulfill our will! We have a good opinion of God because of what He has already done on Calvary! Not because we want Him to grant us our blessing wish list. Do not miss this because Prince's theology is so wrong and leads straight to hell. Praying petulantly, as if you fully expect God will answer yes, does not please God. We have faith that He CAN answer yes to anything we ask but like Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane - not my will but yours be done. True faith accepts the answer of "no" as an equal blessing to the answer of "yes." Of course Jesus is our Savior but if you think He is not the lawgiver, punisher and judge than you have been seriously misled. Do not fall for the devil-tongued Prince here. He continues:

"It's like Caleb who at 85 years old in Joshua 14 said give me this mountain and he conquered it. Just like the daughters of Zelophehad had said, give us a possession. God says possess your possessions. Deuteronomy 11:24a says that every place upon which the sole of your foot touches shall be yours!" - Joseph Prince

This is just an assault on scripture. Prince leaves out that the land Caleb referred to was already promised to him for standing in faith 40 years earlier. Prince however pretends this is just like the daughters of Zelophehad demanding their possessions as well. Prince's god? As any good cosmic bellhop, he gets the bags as ordered. What is more egregious however is superimposing Deuteronomy 11 over this false theology. This verse fragment is not God saying to us today that wherever we walk is ours. It was God promising to Israel about their promised land - assuming they kept Him as the Lord their God and kept the law. Spoiler alert! They could not do this within their own selves. This was why God needed to send His only Son to save us. For Joseph Prince however this all gets reduced to a transactional Christianity that gives us whatever we want in this life but ignores the eternal life with God and leads to our eternal demise. Still, he persists:

"Lets' look at Caleb's daughter, Achsah. The bible tells us in Joshua 15:18b-19 that she is asked, what do you wish? She answered, "give me a blessing" - I love that spirit! You know there are a lot of Christians who pray bless me prayers and people disparage that. Let me tell you this - God loves bless me prayers because unless you are blessed you cannot be a blessing. If you are sick all of the time or broke all of the time you cannot help anybody. So God wants to bless you first. God sent Jesus to bless you! To turn you away from all of your sins. God has promised for you and your families days of heaven upon the earth in Deuteronomy 11:21 - it's a family blessing." - Joseph Prince

Once again Prince finds a story in the bible that fits the narrative he was looking for - somebody asking for a blessing. The context Prince ignores is that this chapter is specifically dealing with the allocation of land to each of the tribes. Since the portion given to Achsah was known for being dry, she asks for springs and her father gives these to her. This is not some deep dark gnostic secret hidden in the text that grants us the right or ability to ask God for anything and expect the answer will always be yes! Then we see into the dark heart of Prince's theology. It is all about money. I know people who are sick who bless people with their support and understanding. I know people every day who bless people wo do not have two nickels to rub together. Did Jesus have money? Did the Apostles have money? Jesus teaches us over and over again how difficult it is for a rich man to find eternal life and that the love of money is the root of all evil while Joseph Prince teaches you that you can't even bless someone without money. As for Deuteronomy:

that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land that the LORD swore to your fathers to give them, as long as the heavens are above the earth. - Deuteronomy 11:21 (ESV)

Notice what Prince does here. The verse does not claim that God will give you, or even Israel, days of heaven upon the earth. All this is saying is that the promises God makes are valid as long as the heavens are above the earth. A great promise yes but not this mystical creation Prince has concocted.

"Back to Joshua 15, she not only says give me a blessing, but give me springs of water. Notice - give me, give me, give me - and God loves it! In 1Chronicles 4 we see Jabez cry out that God would "bless me and enlarge my territory." God loves it when His people want more from Him." - Joseph Prince

Give me, give me, give me - and God loves it. No beloved, He does not. This is nothing more than a spoiled brat Christianity. Entire books were written about the error of praying the prayer of Jabez. This was once again a text that comes from historical narrative hijacked by a charlatan who wants you to believe it is a prescriptive text for you today. I do not need to hear anything more. These ten minutes suffice for us to know it cannot be redeemed. Prince believes that we should be greedy little Christians and sets out to find any biblical story where God gave people what they asked for. The problem is he ignores the individual context of each occurrence to pretend God wrote it just for you. Listen, petitioning God for what we might want is a perfectly appropriate part of prayer. In the end however, it is His will that matters. His answer of "no" is for a reason we cannot even fathom and may never know. THAT is faith. It is knowing that God always answers for our best interest and His grand plan. That should be enough for any professing Christian.

Reverend Anthony Wade - March 31, 2021

Authors Bio:
Credentialed Minister of the Gospel for the Assemblies of God. Owner and founder of 828 ministries. Vice President for Goodwill Industries. Always remember that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.