4. The Religious Huckster.
The religious huckster manipulates the beautiful message of the gospel for personal gain.
Taking advantage of many new, young or pre-believers, the huckster takes familiar biblical principles and stories out of context and makes them into inspirational, self-help nuggets bent on twisting emotions for monetary gain. Truth is exchanged for greed.
Much like Judas, hucksters have little — or nothing — invested in the spiritual truths they market, and at the end of the day it’s about the popularity and prosperity — not the prosperity of others, but their own. In reality, the religious huckster is a form of atheism — belittling the powerful message of grace with no real belief in a sovereign God.
To these people, Jesus has a special and politically “incorrect” message: It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea, than that he would cause one of these little ones to stumble (Luke 17:2 NIV).
The Lesson: The Gospel message was never meant to be peddled or performed as a pyramid scheme. The simple message of Christ is available, free of charge, to anyone — even repentant religious hucksters — if they just simply believe.
