Danson Ottawa

Only a cross-shaped faith can transform a glory-hungry continent. The African church stands at a crossroads. Across pulpits, airwaves, and revival tents, the gospel has often been repackaged as a message of success and self-fulfilment. It’s a message that’s less about Christ crucified than man glorified. In many ways, this gospel mirrors what Martin Luther identified as the ‘theology of glory,’ a…

In my previous article we saw that prosperity gospel teachers root their claim for blessings in the Abrahamic Covenant. These blessings, according to those teachers and preachers, include: health, wealth, and all-round victory in life. Linked with that, heralds of the prosperity gospel often claim that Jesus’ death and resurrection guarantees a suffering-free life of abundance. But is that true? My aim in…

The prosperity gospel teaches that God wants his people to be wealthy and healthy. At its core is often the idea that in Christ God has restored to us the blessings of the covenant made with Abraham. These blessings are understood in a primarily material way, including good health, economic prosperity, and an all-round victory in most areas of life. Prosperity gospel…

In the first article of this three-part series, we confronted the glory-seeking tendencies of African Christianity by recovering Martin Luther’s biblical insight: God reveals himself not in human strength or success, but in suffering and the scandal of the cross. Now we turn to the lived expression of that faith. Framed as a question: What does it mean to live a life…