The Distracting Law of Attraction

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen 

It was pointed out some time ago that it is perplexing why people who practice New Age, Buddhist, Hindu, and other philosophies to improve themselves are blind to how little they benefit practitioners worldwide. Various forms of the supposed Law of Attraction are major example.

Centuries ago, I was a follower of Kenneth Copeland, Jerry Savelle, Frederick K.C. Price, and several others of the Word of Faith movement. Based on what I heard and read, they seemed to believe the gospel message, did not have a false "translation" of the Bible — but some things made me uneasy.

Background image: Pixabay / Okan Caliskan

At the time, I was willing to learn. Mayhaps churches had it wrong and some of the message of the Bible had been shelved, so Copeland and friends might be onto something. I would watch his messages on TV and had a contraption hooked up so I could record them on cassette tapes (this was the 1990s). Something that made me defensive of Copeland was when some Christians misrepresented him, but I also argued from ignorance because I never heard him say the "you are little gods" stuff. It's been documented elsewhere, however.

Tongue-talking for all these jaspers is an All-Access Pass; it "proves" you are led by the Holy Spirit and have God's imprimatur. They were teaching their own peculiar doctrines, and I was also trying to learn valid biblical material from other sources. It did not go well for me.

Sometimes I would learn from the prosperity/Law of Attraction folks because I trusted the Bible and wanted to see if I could support or refute their teachings. Interesting that I didn't say that it had more error than value and walk away. It could be (prepare the fainting couch) that I did learn a few things from these guys — but not in the way they intended. For example, fear is putting faith into something or someone and not in God. Also, what they called "negative confessions" about doubt, fear, and other negative words are supposed to work against someone's faith. Instead, I think keeping fear, doubt, death, and so forth out of someone's vocabulary is helpful. Further, I think dwelling on and speaking positivy things helps program one's mind for negativity and failure. I'll let y'all study on that.

But don't be disunderstanding me, I'm not saying their out-of-context faith affirmations are valid.

What's this about faith being a force, or even "stuff"? Prosperity preachers seem to focus on using the King James Version, and its language is easier to manipulate than that of newer translations. Hebrews 11:1 KJV (and NKJV) calls faith a substance. Newer versions use words like assurance and certainty. Somehow, faith is portrayed as a force and a substance at the same time.

Although I didn't want to listen, these health-and-wealth sidewinders were using the Law of Attraction in their health-and-wealth message. I found the same teaching from other people who were not making a pretense at orthodox Christian doctrine, such as the book You'll See It When You Believe It by Wayne Dyer. No emphasis on Bible verses taken out of context for meditation, no pseudo-Christian affirmations — but the same life-improving results were professed from secular sources.

If this attraction thing is a law, shouldn't it work the same for everyone, everywhere? The only ones who improve their lives are the fleecers of the sheep and the ones who sell merchandise. Also, shouldn't this only work for Christians? I remember hearing that the unsaved of the world would be coming to us because we were doing well, then we could present the gospel. I wanted to be like that, but it was not working. Nor was it biblical. I didn't have good discernment or critical thinking skills.

When I saw a Facebook post by Why?Outreach on the subject, I was curious. The article is rather long, but makes a good case. A few things I knew were mentioned, but most of the material was enlightening to me. F'rinstance, people are using a kind of cause-and-effect fallacy, and even conditioning themselves. In a way, they believe in luck! Professing Christians need to get out of this heresy mill which has occult roots and teachings, examine themselves to see if they really are in the faith, and repent.

In this article, we are going to cover one of the most prominent philosophies in the New Age movement, a philosophy that has even began to work it’s way into the Christian church; the well-known “Law of Attraction”. 

Could it be the case that the Law of Attraction is actually a deception, and if so, how do we explain apparent success stories? And doesn’t the Bible confirm this philosophy saying things like “the power of life and death are in the tongue”, “seek and you will find”, and “ask and it will be given unto you”?

We are going to go over all of this, but before we do, let’s define this philosophy first.

May as well set up camp, this is long but worth it. To keep going, head on over to "The Law Of Attraction Explained and Debunked."