Michael Todd and the false paradigm of the prosperity gospel
Michael Todd is a pastor over Transformation Church based in the Tulsa, Oklahoma area. He has gained a large following through social media, tends to reach the trendier audiences in modern church circles, and recently become a published author.
With this type of platform, Todd has willingly accepted a position that puts him in a place of higher standards than an average believer.
As a teacher, God holds him to a higher standard because of the fact that he is teaching from the Bible and the doctrines that come from his pulpit have a ripple effect that — if it goes unchecked — can cause more confusion than clarity.
Since the Bible clearly teaches that God is not the author of confusion, there are several essential doctrines that pastors who claim to be biblically sound or accurate must hold to without fail.
There can obviously be room for discussion or agreeing to disagree on non-essential things, but that is an entirely different conversation.
The essentials can include things like the nature of God, who they say Jesus is, and what it requires to be saved (to go to heaven). This is by no means a full list, but if you don’t have these right, chances are you’re already deep down a dark path.
This article is aimed at shining light on Michael Todd’s view on Jesus and what he says as a pastor about salvation. We’ll also be looking at the company of pastors he keeps around or appreciates and why that is just as much if not more of a problem.
Michael Todd’s Definition of Salvation
Whenever there is a miscommunication of an important concept — especially when it is deemed essential — there should always be a chance provided to clear the air.
Maybe it was a terminology issue where things were defined differently by different people and a clarification conversation quickly can fix it.
Maybe it was an environmental misunderstanding and someone was influenced by a bad group of friends or simply made poor judgment calls.
Whatever the root issue, chances are that most of the time there is just a few puzzle pieces needing a place to be and that’s where how it’s handled comes into play.
This might be true for someone in Transformation Church, but there is little room for someone who makes claims to be a pastor and to talk with God on a continual casual basis to be wrong about salvation.
Without salvation, there is no point in meeting a church building, equipping people to talk about what Jesus did for us with others, or donating any amount of money to a tax-exempt charity case.
If we get salvation wrong, we’ve got it all wrong and nothing else matters.
That being said, let’s take a look at how pastor Michael Todd defines salvation to his audience.
The church currently has a hidden statement of faith and it is neither labeled accurately nor easy for a first time user to find. To get to it, you first have to select “About Us” and then scroll down past a bio of Michael Todd and his wife/co-pastor Natalie and then selected the “Concrete” tab.
Normally, a statement of faith would be something you would want to have be open and easily accessible to the general public — so what gives?
Buried in their statement of faith is a segment that reads like this:
We believe that, as part of Christ’s work of salvation, it is the Father’s will for believers to become whole, healthy, and successful in all areas of life…
These areas of life were described beneath it as spiritual, mental, emotional, physical, and financial.
Let’s be clear about something — there is nothing wrong with having good health, a strong spiritual walk and emotional state, or even securing the bag.
The issue is when those things become more of a priority than God and our focus is on pleasure and trusting in those things more than God.
Also, the Bible is clear that salvation changes our eternal destination, but does not automatically solve or heal all of the problems we are going to deal with in life — in fact, it promises the opposite.
It doesn’t mean that God won’t or can’t bless us, but it also doesn’t mean we reach a peak where everything is bliss before heaven.
We are still carnal and have a battle between our flesh (which wants the desires of the world) and our new man received through faith (which walks with the fruits of the spirit).
By including these benefits as part of the work of salvation, Michael Todd and Transformation Church are guilty in the first-degree of preaching the prosperity gospel.
Made infamous by Joel Olsteen, it is a gospel that teaches that God will make you whole in finances and other features of a lavish lifestyle. It’s a dangerous doctrine of devils because it manipulates people into feeling like the end result of salvation is to be healthy, wealthy, and wise when that’s not biblically accurate.
By teaching a prosperity gospel, Todd has to keep a certain circle of preacher friends to maintain a similar or an identical audience — it helps keep the machine that is the business-model church going.
More on that below, but before that let’s talk about how Michael Todd views Jesus Christ.
Who Michael Todd Says Jesus Is
In the Bible, Jesus asks Peter at one point to answer a very direct question:
“Whom say ye that I am?”
This conversation between Jesus and Peter is recorded in Matthew 16:13–23 and Mark 8:27–33.
In Mark, Peter first answers a question about who others say Jesus is by noting that they believe Jesus is just one of the prophets with specific references to John the Baptist and Elias before declaring “Thou art the Christ.”
From Matthew’s account, we see more detail in Peter’s answer, which directly calls Jesus “the Son of the living God.”
Why is this important and what does this have to do with Michael Todd and Transformation Church?
The reason it matters is because it provides a baseline for who we need to be sure to identify Jesus Christ as. He wasn’t just a prophet, teacher, or good person — He’s the Son of God in the flesh.
God is complete and perfect in every way, with no need for self-improvement.
In a message to VOUS Church in Florida, Michael Todd preached that Jesus didn’t reach His potential.
Yes, you read that right — and yes, there is a video of it.
If Jesus didn’t reach His full potential, then He isn’t God now and wasn’t God when He died on the cross.
This flies in the face of the correct view of the biblical Jesus.
The reason Todd is not bothered by what he said is because he is trying to overly humanize Jesus. He wants the audience to buy into his message about self-reflection and realization of purpose and fulfilment instead of pointing to the finished work of Jesus.
Saying that Jesus did not reach His full potential also robs anyone who trusts in Him for salvation of eternal security.
Ephesians 1:13–14 is clear that we are sealed until the day we are redeemed by the Holy Spirit once we believe in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross.
If Jesus failed to reach his potential, He is not a sacrifice that is able to save us.
This sleek way of introducing prosperity gospel philosophy has allowed Todd’s massive audience to receive and believe an obvious deception and introduces them to another Jesus that cannot save.
To go even more explicit on this topic, John 3:16 is one of many verses that clearly defines the purpose for Jesus Christ being sent to die on the cross. In order to define the “full potential” of Jesus, we should only use clear scripture and not read ourselves into the text.
Here’s John 3:16:
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life
By this verse, we can define the “full potential” of Jesus as achieving the goal of whoever believing in Him receiving eternal — or everlasting — life.
Since we know this was accomplished, to say that Jesus did not reach His full potential is point-blank blasphemy.
Wolves of a Feather Flock Together
If you haven’t noticed the trend, heretical preachers tend to be best buds on and off stage — or at least give the appearance of constant fellowship and connection.
This can be demonstrated by letting said pastor come speak at their church or vice versa (up to and including cross-promotions for newly released materials, etc.).
Michael Todd has spoken to the congregation of Joel Olsteen and has also not hesitated to show love and public approval of Olsteen’s predatory ministries.
In addition to praising the father of the prosperity gospel movement, Todd has grown into a connected relationship with Steven Furtick and Elevation Church.
Furtick deserves his own article soon, but he is directly responsible for preaching the heretical view of modalism. This is briefly defined as the view that Jesus is not eternally distinct from God the Father or the Holy Spirit.
Specifically, this wrong theology stems from another false gospel father T.D. Jakes. Furtick has openly shared the stage with Jakes and has been rather candid about the fact that he looks at Jakes like a mentor.
The fact that Michael Todd has a blossoming public relationship with these men shows you who he really wants to be associated with. These aren’t his only false teacher connections, but they are the bigger names worth mentioning to prove the point.
And no, we can’t just all agree to get along — false doctrine is worth dividing over every single time.
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