Hagin maintains that he received the doctrine about economic prosperity by a revelation … “It was the Lord Himself who taught me about prosperity — I received it directly from heaven,” Hagin says. He perceives this as a new doctrine saying that, “In January 1950, this was something totally new to me — a revelation!” 69
This new revelation includes urging people to speak to the devil instead of praying to God regarding financial needs. According to Hagin, the Lord continued by telling him, “You must say to Satan: ‘Get your hands off my money!’ Because it is Satan who is hindering the money coming to you — it is not me who is doing it.” 70
After telling his audience this story, Hagin tells his listeners that they must send out ministering spirits to get the money. He tells them to say: “Satan, get your hands off my money,” and then they must say: “Go out, you ministering spirits and make sure the money is brought to me!”
While I was in the Faith movement, a friend sent me an article in which the writer refutes Hagin’s teaching on financial prosperity. The writer said that Hagin’s Jesus apparently did not know the original Greek of Hebrews 1:14 because, grammatically, it could not possibly mean that anyone except God was sending out angels. I realised that if that were the case, it could not have been the Only Begotten Son of God who had spoken to Hagin. But the implications of this would have had too far-reaching consequences for me at the time, therefore the article landed in the wastepaper basket! After all, it had to be God Who was working at our meetings, which was the main thing, I reasoned. After a while, I successfully repressed this unwelcome information with its implications.
According to this doctrine, prayer is a matter of you, yourself, addressing both Satan and the angels in order to get what you want. It is the same fundamental thought as in Hagin’s teaching on the authority of the believer. God is left out of the picture.
Doctrines such as these are the reason why some people who listen to them end up having a fixation on the devil, and some eventually get an acute psychosis and become suicidal.
As a contrast to this type of teachings, we read that when Jesus was teaching about prayer in Matthew 6:5-13, it was about communicating with God, and not with Satan. The Apostle Paul writes in Philippians 4:6, that we should make our requests known to God, not to Satan. The Bible is full of examples showing that it is God we must pray to. Seeing that Hagin is well able to talk for hours about praying to God, it shows that he actually knows this very well. Therefore, it makes it even more strange that he, nevertheless, accepts a revelation in which his Jesus tells him to speak to Satan — rather than to God — about his requests.
There are situations in the Bible where Jesus addresses Satan and commands him to depart. These cases involve things like temptations to perform miracles, and to receive power and glory without going the way of the cross and suffering (Matthew 4:1-11, and 16:22-23). When Jesus communicated with Satan regarding riches, He said “No” to the offer of earthly gain (Matthew 4:8-10). Jesus never asked the devil for money.
In the Gospels, Jesus often cast out evil spirits, and it is a task He delegated to His disciples. But this is something quite different from addressing the devil about our financial needs.
I have not found any place in the New Testament where the believers themselves command the angels to perform any tasks. Not even Jesus Himself did this during His earthly life. He said that He was able to ask His Father, and that the Father would send angels to help Him (Matthew 26:53). Jesus said that He will one day send out His angels in judgment (Matthew 13:41 and 24:31). But there is no example whatsoever in the New Testament of believers sending out angels.
Footnotes
69. Word of Life Newsletter, August 1986, page 4, translated from Swedish.
70. Word of Life Newsletter, August 1986, page 4, translated from Swedish.
