by Tad Lindley
There is a fair amount of shadow hate speech on social media targeting Christianity. One of those posts that I will try to reproduce here for you goes something like this:
The Top 10 Highest Wealthiest Pastors in the World*
1. Kenneth Copeland- $300 million
2. David Oyepodo (Nigeria)- $150 million
3. Pat Robertson- $100 million
4. Joel Olsteen- $100 million
5. Enoch Adeboye (Nigeria)- $100 million
6. Uebert Angel (Zimbabwe/UK)- $60 million
7. Benny Hinn- $60 million
8. Chris Oyakhilome (Nigeria)- $50 million
9. Creflo Dollar- $27 million
10. Rick Warren- $25 million
Again I tell you it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. (Matthew 19:24)
*These figures are from pulse.com on the internet, and are current as of 2024. Unless otherwise mentioned these men are from the United States.
Now the goal of the social media post is to discredit Christianity as a hypocritical money hungry industry that is completely ignorant of the words of Jesus. If the data points above are all that you have, it would be easy to assume that this is the case.
But…
If the folks that are trying to discredit the pastors of the planet were in touch with the actual data, they would see a very different story. They would see the pastor or pastors in your village who preach three times a week, perform funerals and weddings, visit the sick, and console grieving families who put more money and time into the church than they ever get out of it. There are a number of pastors in our region who to the shame of untithing, ungiving churches are on food stamps and other forms of welfare. This should not be! Those that are not on welfare in many cases are fortunate enough to have a job outside of the church that they use to help support the church.
For every David Oyepodo…
…in Nigeria, there are thousands of men trying to scrape together enough money to buy a bicycle so they can travel from African village to African village to preach the gospel. For every televangelist in America begging people to give more and more money to keep their program on the air, there are thousands of men and women teaching home Bible studies to the broken and hurting with absolutely no financial compensation.
For every Rick Warren…
Who has become quite wealthy through books he has written, there are tens of thousands of “tentmaker” pastors who like the apostle, Paul, work long hours at a secular job (his was making tents, see Acts 18:1-4) so that they can raise up a church without being a financial burden to it.
What about the top ten wealthiest NBA players?
1. Michael Jordan- $3 billion
2. LeBron James- $1 billion
3. Magic Johnson- $800 million
4. Junior Bridgeman- $600 million
5. Vinnie Johnson- $500 million
6. …I will let you look up the rest
The point is that nobody is ever going to suggest what a scam that basketball is because a handful of men have become very rich off of it. And while many do complain that LeBron James is grossly overpaid, no one ever connects those strings to their local high school basketball coaches, men and women who make less than minimum wage to help young athletes pursue their passion.
How much should your pastor get paid?
Your pastor is the one who will marry you and bury you. If he follows the Biblical pattern, he will probably be the one who baptizes you in Jesus’ name. He will be the one who calls out your name in prayer when you are too weak in sin to pray for yourself. He will be the one who teaches the word to the congregation three or more times a week, and in between is going from house to house teaching home Bible studies. A true man of God will do it with or without pay, but my question is, What is a pastor like that worth?
Reverend Tad Lindley is a minister at the United Pentecostal Church in Bethel, Alaska.
