According to Britannica, the prosperity gospel is the teaching

‘that faith—expressed through positive thoughts, positive declarations, and donations to the church—draws health, wealth, and happiness into believers’ lives. It is also referred to as the “health and wealth gospel” or “name it and claim it.” Central to this teaching are the beliefs that salvation through Jesus Christ includes liberation from not only death and eternal damnation but also poverty, sickness, and other ills. Adherents believe that God wants believers to be richly blessed in this life and that physical well-being and material riches are always God’s will for the faithful. Illness and poverty are seen as curses that, through atonement, can be broken with faith in Jesus.’

The Book of Proverbs certainly has many passages which teach that wise living is rewarded with health, longevity, happiness and prosperity.

So, should we conclude that Proverbs teaches the prosperity gospel?

David P. Murray says ‘No’, for the following reasons.

1. By reason of our fall into sin, we lack wisdom of our own.  We must, therefore, rely wholly on God’s revelation to teach us God’s wisdom.

‘As no amount of research, experimentation, or reasoning will make us spiritually wise again, God has revealed His otherwise inaccessible and unattainable Wisdom to us. In the Old Testament, God reveals that wisdom largely in principle form (e.g. the Moral Law, the Proverbs). However, Proverbs also personifies Wisdom, giving a hint of a future revelation of Wisdom in human form, a revelation we now know is Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 1:24; Col. 2:3).’

2. The acquisition and practice of God’s wisdom is neither quick nor easy.  Therefore, God graciously gives incentives in the form of multiple rewards.

‘As sinners find it so difficult to seek, keep, and do Wisdom for its own sake, throughout Proverbs God promises spiritual, physical, intellectual, financial, social, relational, and eternal rewards for seeking, remembering, and doing it. Yet even these rewards are of grace, because God is not obliged to reward what we should do anyway, and any spiritual diligence is itself His gift.’

3. In the Old Testament, wisdom’s rewards are often material and temporary.  In the New Testament era, they are more spiritual and eternal.

‘The Old Testament manifested spiritual blessings in a much more material form, mainly because the church was still in its infancy. Although God still blesses in material ways, the focus of Christ and His Apostles is much more on spiritual and eternal blessings (e.g. John 7:17; 14:16,21; Rev. 3:7, 11).’

‘The Prosperity Gospel puts prosperity before the Gospel, and seeks prosperity above all else. Gospel prosperity puts the Gospel first and gratefully accepts any spiritual and material blessings as the overflow of a Gospel-centered life.’

4. The connection between godliness and its rewards in this life reflects a general truth, and is not without notable exceptions.

The practical wisdom of Proverbs is in the form of ‘simple, optimistic, popular, and pithy truths’.

The philosophical wisdom of Job and Ecclesiastes faces up to the complexities of life, and

‘reflects on the reality that things do not always go as they ought, that there are sometimes enigmas, mysteries, and exceptions to Practical Wisdom’.

It’s like learning a language:

‘You start by learning all the basic rules and regular patterns (Practical Wisdom), and once you’ve mastered them, then you consider the irregular verbs, the qualifications to the rules, etc., (Philosophical Wisdom).’

5. Seek wisdom for its own sake, not merely for its rewards

While the rewards are powerful incentives, it is better to look back on them with thankfulness, rather than constantly looking forward (‘If I do this, then God will reward me thus.’)

‘Don’t seek the gifts but the Giver, not the rewards of Wisdom but the Rewarder who is Wisdom. Remember what God said to Abram: “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward” (Gen. 15:1 NKJV).’