The conclusion of all this is up to you, the reader. There are so many verses, teachers and teachings that could be examined point by point that literally volumes could be written. All we have hoped to do is spark some investigative initiative on your part to stop spiritual gullibility and spiritual experimentalism within the Body of Christ.

      The words of scripture are the ultimate answer to any question. But without the guidance of the Spirit and an open heart and mind, truth will never take root. "He that is of God heareth God's words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God" (John 8:48) is as straight forward as anything Jesus ever spoke.

      We must never forget that God alone is Lord of everything. He brings sunshine and rain, harvest and famine, and healing to whom He will or will not. He chose to not heal the great mass of people at the pool of Bethesda except for one man.

      All the people there had come in faith wanting to be healed and differed from none of the other masses of people who Christ came in contact with. Yet Christ chose to walk away leaving them there in their pain and disease! In fact, it was because of that mass of people that Jesus left so hurriedly (John 5:14). They had all come to be healed and had Jesus stuck around after healing the one man, He would have been thronged with people crying for healing!

      Jesus left hurriedly because the Father did not want Jesus healing anybody else there, EVEN THOUGH THEY HAD ALL COME IN FAITH FOR A HEALING TOUCH FROM GOD THAT DAY.

      God is God and His salvation, healing, ability to create, sanctify, fill us with His grace, and satisfy are totally in His sovereign power, mercy, and divine will to mete out as His wisdom, timing, and pleasure see fit. "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away" (Job 2:10). "For unto you it is given in behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake" (Phil. 1:29). The things of this life, as health, may or may not come by faith, or they may come by simple divine providence.

      I would advise going back at this time and rereading the first part of this monograph on faith, realizing that faith can be true of false depending on its spiritual source. Nothing, however, is a greater key in seeing false doctrine and theology than the understanding of the nature of Sin. Those who follow the gospel of self-interest do so because of Sin deep in their hearts that has not come under the Lordship of Jesus Christ and been replaced by His love and grace.

      In II Chronicles 18 Micaiah prophesied disaster for King Ahab, but Zedekiah prophesied victory. When Micaiah, God's prophet, told Zedekiah that he was a liar, Zedekiah got mad and punched Micaiah in the face! Zedekiah thought he was right, but he was just deceived by false faith and self delusion. Today's prosperity and confession teachers are no more than modern false prophets and Zedekiah's.

      The god of the gospel of self-interest is self. Its purpose is to fulfill the carnal, earthly desires of self gratification. Its goal is to have heaven on earth (dominion theology).

      We know we have left many questions unanswered. We pray that if any of this has been a "Cinderella slipper" to you that you will not remain in any of the aforementioned "Charismatic traps." We pray you fundamentalists will realize that not all tongue talking Pentecostals are the same! We pray that this will, even in its apparent harshness, bring some balance and unity back to the Body of Christ.

      Yet, we also know that the word of God is true and he that will be ignorant will be ignorant still (I Cor. 14:38), and that in the last days apostasy is sure to come as a tidal wave over the Church.

      This paper then is for the remnant who have ears to hear what the Spirit is saying to His Church in these last days. It is for those who seek the Kingdom of God and His righteousness solely, whose delight and desire is to die to the gospel of self-interest and come alive to the surrendered, sacrificial, and selfless gospel of Jesus Christ. It is prophetic, for if it is true, then there are vast hordes of pseudo-Christians, wolves in sheep's clothing, slithering about like rot infesting the harvest of souls in the earth that is ready to be reaped.

     EVEN SO, COME LORD JESUS.

      THE GOSPEL OF SELF-INTEREST was first published in 1981 at a time when the prosperity health-and-wealth teachers were at a zenith. Many of our readers were advocates of the doctrines we exposed as lies and rejected our message. Others were helped out of their confusion by receiving the message.

      In that first publishing, we listed some books for further reading currently on the market which presented the same message and exposed false doctrines. These books included: FROM THE PINNACLE OF THE TEMPLE; RICH CHRISTIANS IN AN AGE OF HUNGER; THE GOLDEN COW: MATERIALISM IN THE 20TH CENTURY.

      Today at this second publishing, the need for this message has not diminished. These teachers and their doctrines still run rampant over their own TV satellites and "Bible schools." We are grateful that more and more well-known preachers are taking national stands against these heresies and there are more books we can add to our list:

• SET THE TRUMPET TO THY MOUTH by David Wilkerson--Assembly of God preacher and founder of World Challenge and Teen Challenge
  
• THE SEDUCTION OF CHRISTIANITY by Dave Hunt & T.A. McMahon
  
• BEYOND SEDUCTION by David Hunt
  
• HYPER-FAITH by Jimmy Swaggart--Assembly of God preacher
  
• THE DISEASE OF THE HEALTH & WEALTH GOSPELS by Gordon D. Fee --New Testament professor at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary; published by The Word for Today, Costa Mesa, CA.