Rod Parsley is the pastor of the World Harvest Megachurch in Columbus, OH. He’s an odious man who is big on the prosperity gospel (give us your money and one day god will reward you). It’s a scam that every week bilks a swath of gullible people.

So, of course, I’m on his mailing list.

Yesterday I got this one.

ACT NOW! Give expression to your faith today! Sow a NO WEAPON seed as an act of faith that you believe God has given you power to oppose every spiritual, mental, physical, and financial attack loosed against you. And I’ll rush my DVD teaching and study manual to you.

I don’t know how you have been attacked, what has been stolen from you, or what weapons have been formed against you. I just know that there’s a power available to you today to defeat every scheme, plan, strategy and attack of the enemy… a power to lead you into victory on every side!

Let me teach you how to break free from the relentless assault of the adversary! Demonstrate your faith in Isaiah 54:17 by sowing a NO WEAPON seed of $54.17 today. If you are under severe attack – or if you need a double blessing – sow a double seed: $108.34.

And I decided to write him back.

Pastor Parsley,

Hallelujah!

Thank you for your blessings and for your tireless work on behalf of JESUS!

I admit, I’m writing to you as a bit of a humble beggar. I have $21.69 in the bank right now. I tithe every week what pittance I can, and I know rewards are coming if I keep the faith and continue to deliver what scraps I’m able, but I wish the prosperity you promise could just come sooner. I wish my poverty could be enough to move GOD to rain blessings down on my life instead of how much of my impoverished wage I’m willing to part with on behalf of your multi-million dollar ministry.

And now your words ring truer than ever, Pastor Parsley, because there is a devil at work in my life. I feel his attacks every day. I’ve prayed and read my bible, but it just doesn’t seem to be enough. I wish GOD would vanquish the dark one now, but I know he has a reason. He is undoubtedly testing my resolve which, admittedly, is faltering. It’s two more weeks until my next pay day and this devil is cursing my four children more and more hunger. To say that I am merely under severe attack would be a grievous understatement. So I was wondering if you would tell me how to conquer this devil without a love offering of $108.34? I asked my local grocery store if I could have a loaf of bread without making a love offering of $1.99 plus tax, but they refused. You, Pastor Parsley, are my only hope.

I know you can help me. Although you humbly asserted in your email that you don’t know in what way I’ve been attacked, you knew I had been attacked. My last pastor was very similar. My first week at my old church, even though I had never met Pastor Basil before, he told me straight to my face that I was troubled. He didn’t know that I had lost my favorite set of earrings earlier that week, but he knew that something out of the millions of possible reasons I could be troubled was active in my life. I believe you have that same gift, only more powerful, which is undoubtedly why you require over a hundred dollars before showing me how to ease my torment. Pastor Basil worked for free in my interest, but I continued to be plagued by the common, everyday sorrows which almost every human has come to expect in life. It just goes to show that in life you get what you pay for.

I know it’s not that cash is more important to you than the suffering of a faithful follower. After all, your ministry has so much money while I have so little. I realize you would teach everybody how to fight the devil for free if you could, but that you do not make the rules, and in order to be healed I have to be willing to display my faith, not through prayer or penitence, but by giving you more of my money. Sometimes I fear that my children are getting bitter that on some days they only get Ramen noodles twice a day. They’ll understand when they’re older that sowing financial faith seeds is an investment in the ONE TRUE GOD, and they’ll thank me when our family can afford to all wear suits like yours. What use is food when that money could go toward making sure that the man doing GOD’s work is wearing Armani?

You always tell us to be more like JESUS, and I feel I am. If the devil continues his assault on my wages (which he is undoubtedly doing to ensure that I will be unable to afford to have you teach me how to stop him), I will soon have none left to give to you, and no place to lay my head. The thought of being like JESUS in that regard comforts me, though it does little to cure my diabetes or to deliver the insulin shots I need. Perhaps you could give me and my children a room in your mansion, or perhaps its garage, until GOD sees fit to deliver the reward you promised for the seeds of faith I dutifully deposit into the collection plate every Sunday? I also remember back in 2010 when your BLESSED ministry needed a new private jet and you admonished us to, once again, demonstrate our faith by sending you funds immediately. The LORD moved me and I did so (my wife left me when she found out what I had done, but it was all part of GOD’s plan – she told me I was gullible, but I know it’s that her faith wasn’t strong enough)! After we get evicted later this month, perhaps you could just give me and my children a few seats on your private jet in which to sleep every night? I work two jobs, so I won’t be there much, and my kids can play in the park while I’m working.

I know GOD’s promises of greater wealth in exchange for monetary contributions to the church are true, because I see that you and your family are affluent. You make a point of it often and assure us that it’s because GOD has rewarded you. Some would think it’s because you have a congregation full of thousands of people willing to give you 10% of their income every week, on top of all the additional faith offerings you request in your emails, on the premise that giving their money away will someday result in them being rich. But I know that it’s because of your tremendous trust in the LORD.

Blessings to you and yours. Thank you for the CHAIN! I don’t want to impugn the LORD’s generosity, but could you ask the LORD if next time, instead of a spiritual CHAIN, I could get a tangible CHAIN that I could maybe sell or trade for some rice?

JT