When God Corrected My Theology: From Prosperity Gospel to True Joy in Christ
There are moments in life that don’t feel loud when they happen.
They don’t arrive with drama.
They don’t interrupt your day in obvious ways.
But over time, you begin to realise that something shifted in those moments something foundational.
This morning as I’ve been moving through my day I’ve had Desiring God: Meditations from a Christian Hedonist by Pastor and Author John Piper playing through my headphones on Spotify.
Not constantly.
Not as background noise.
But intentionally.
And I didn’t expect it to affect me the way it has.
Because as I listen, I’m not just hearing theology.
I’m being taken back.
Back to a time early in my faith.
Back to the beginning of something that, at the time, I didn’t fully understand—but now I can see clearly.
I remember when I was first saved.
Everything felt new.
Raw.
Unsteady.
Alive.
There was a hunger in me.
A desire to understand God.
To know Him.
To make sense of what had just happened in my life.
And it was around two years after my conversion that something began to shift more deeply in my understanding.
Learning.
Growing.
Trying to find my footing.
And during that season, I came across the teaching of John Piper.
At the same time, Matt Chandler had stepped into leadership at The Village Church in Texas.
I didn’t realise it then, but those voices became anchors in a moment where I could have easily drifted.
Because if I’m honest
My theology at that time was not grounded.
It had started to move subtly at first toward something that looked like truth, but wasn’t.
Not in a loud or obvious way.
Not in a way where I would have said, “this is what I believe.”
But in the quiet assumptions.
The subtle expectations.
The idea that if God was with me, life should begin to align in ways that made sense to me.
That blessing should look like ease.
That favour should look like success.
That faith should produce visible outcomes.
And it’s dangerous how quickly that thinking can settle in.
Because it doesn’t feel like error.
It feels like hope.
But over time, that version of the gospel begins to distort something essential.
It slowly shifts the focus away from God
and places it onto the self.
My soul was in a dangerous position
What can I receive?
What will God do for me?
How will my life improve?
And without realising it, the cross begins to lose its weight.
Because the cross was never about comfort.
It was never about convenience.
It was never about building a life that feels easier to carry.
It was about redemption.
And somewhere in that season around two years into my walk God, in His mercy, began to correct me.
Not harshly.
Not all at once.
But steadily.
Through Scripture.
Through teaching.
Through voices that pointed me back to something deeper.
And one of the things that began to reshape my understanding was this:
“So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”
That verse didn’t just sit on the surface.
It began to reframe everything.
Because if life is ultimately about the glory of God
then it cannot be centred on the comfort of man.
That changes how you see everything.
It changes how you see suffering.
It changes how you see success.
It changes how you interpret seasons that don’t make sense.
And slowly, I began to realise something that I hadn’t fully grasped before:
God is not a means to an end.
He is the end.
And that’s where something deeper began to form.
Because what Piper articulated so clearly—and what I’m hearing again now as I listen—was not just a correction of bad theology.
It was a reorientation of the heart.
God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.
That statement didn’t land fully the first time I heard it.
But now
it carries weight.
Because satisfaction in God is not built on circumstances.
It’s not dependent on outcomes.
It’s not shaped by whether life is going the way I would choose.
God is not some magical genie in a bottle and i make my three wishes and everything is granted
It is rooted in something far deeper.
And that becomes especially real when life does not align with expectation.
Because the prosperity mindset cannot survive in suffering.
It collapses under pressure.
But the true gospel
it holds.
It doesn’t promise ease.
It doesn’t guarantee outcomes.
It doesn’t remove difficulty.
But it anchors you.
And I can look back now and see how necessary that correction was.
Because my life has not followed a straight line.
There has been pain.
There has been confusion.
There have been seasons where things felt unresolved, unfinished, unclear.
And if my faith had been built on the idea that God exists to make my life work
I don’t know if it would have held.
But because it was slowly being rebuilt on something stronger
it did.
Not perfectly.
Not without struggle.
But it held.
And as I listen now, years later, there is a kind of gratitude that sits with me.
Gratitude that God didn’t leave me in that early misunderstanding.
Gratitude that He corrected me before those foundations became fixed.
Gratitude that He placed voices in my life that pointed me back to truth.
Because not every correction feels good in the moment.
But some corrections save you from building your life on something that cannot support you later.
And that matters more than comfort.
There’s another Scripture that keeps coming to mind as I reflect on this.
“For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.”
That verse brings everything into alignment.
Because it reminds me that life is not ultimately about what I can build.
It’s not about what I can gain.
It’s not even about what I can understand.
It’s about Him.
From Him.
Through Him.
To Him.
And when that becomes the centre
everything else begins to find its place.
Even the things that don’t make sense.
Even the seasons that feel unclear.
Even the questions that don’t have immediate answers.
Because the goal is no longer control.
It’s alignment.
And I can feel that shifting in me again now.
Not in a dramatic way.
Not in a way that changes everything overnight.
But in a quiet, steady recalibration.
A return to something foundational.
A reminder that God is not distant.
Not transactional.
Not waiting to meet expectations.
But present.
Sufficient.
And worthy of everything.
This isn’t a new revelation.
But it feels like a renewed one.
And maybe that’s part of the journey.
Not constantly discovering new things
but returning, again and again, to what is already true.
Letting it sink deeper.
Letting it shape you more fully.
Letting it correct the areas that have slowly drifted.
Because drift doesn’t always happen dramatically.
Sometimes it happens quietly.
It's a very slippery slope
And carries internal significance
And it’s only when you stop and listen
that you realise something needs to be brought back into alignment.
That’s what this moment feels like for me.
Not a restart.
But a return.
A return to the God who is not a means to an end…
but the end itself.
And in that
there is a kind of joy that doesn’t depend on everything being resolved.
A kind of peace that doesn’t require full understanding.
A kind of steadiness that isn’t built on circumstances.
But on Him.
And maybe that’s what I needed to be reminded of today.
Not something new.
But something true.
And that feels like enough.
About the Author
Dylan Verdun Sullivan is the founder of Refined by Fire Press and an Australian author indexed in the National Library of Australia. As a Level 7 Local Guide with over 1.7 million views on Google Maps, he documents the intersection of faith, recovery, and the light found in ordinary places.
- Read the Memoir: Kissed by Death on Amazon
- Explore the Journey: Follow Dylan on Google Maps
- Connect on Instagram: @porkysparadise
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