Jesse Duplantis, one of America’s most popular prosperity preachers has his eyes on a new $54 million Dassault Falcon 7X private jet, but he wants his followers to pay for it.

Duplantis, who runs a ministry and a church in Destrehan, Louisiana, just outside New Orleans, already owns a private jet, in fact it’s already his third one. All of them have been paid for in cash with donations from his faithful flock, but he now wants them to once again come through for him so he can buy the three-engine Dassault Falcon 7X private jet which would allow him to fly “anywhere in the world in one stop,” increasing his global reach and reducing fuel costs, because he has his own fuel farm…

Photo: Dmitry A. Mottl/Wikimedia Commons

“I want you to believe in me for a Falcon 7X,” the 68-year-old prosperity gospel preacher said in a video appeal to his flock. “Now, some people believe that preachers shouldn’t have jets. I really believe that preachers ought to go on every available voice, every available outlet, to get this gospel preached to the world.”

He then goes on to tell viewers how he managed to buy his three previous private jets with donations from his followers, and explain how he could just use his current jet, which he bought in 2006, but that the $54 million Dassault Falcon 7X would actually help his ministry spread the gospel more efficiently, by reaching far away places on a single fuel stop.

In the video, Duplantis claims that God told him “I want you to believe in me for a Falcon 7x”, and when he asked how he was going to pay for it, the preacher said that he remembered what God told him back in 1978 – “Jesse, I didn’t ask you to pay for it, I asked you to believe for it.” So he’s now asking his flock to “pray about becoming a partner for to it”, which basically means donating money to his ministry.

“So pray about becoming a partner to it, if you’d like to,” the preacher says. “And if you don’t, you don’t have to, but I wish you would, because let me tell you something about it – all it’s gonna do is touch people, it’s gonna reach people, it’s gonna change lives, one soul at a time.”

 

“I really believe that if the Lord Jesus Christ was physically on the Earth today, he wouldn’t be riding a donkey,” Duplantis added. “He’d be in an airplane flying all over the world.”

Now, if that last line doesn’t convince you to donate a bit of money for this man’s new private jet, you must not be a true believer…

As you can imagine, Jesse Duplantis’ unusual crowdfunding efforts have attracted a lot of criticism from more conservative Christians, many of whom argued that the tens of millions of dollars in donations could be put to much better use than a new private jet. Some asked why Duplantis and other preachers needed private jets in the first place, when they could just jump on commercial flights instead. But the preacher clarifies that three years ago, when along with fellow televangelist Kenneth Copeland, he defended the need for a private jet.

 

“You just can’t manage that today, in this dope-filled world,” Copeland said. “You get in a long tube with a bunch of demons, and it’s deadly.” Both Copeland and Duplantis agreed that private jets were essential to fulfilling their ministries’ mission.

So there you go…