Jim Jones profiles Lakewood Church’s Joel Osteen in an AP article that quite a few publications have picked up:
The Rev. Joel Osteen is a rising star among America’s TV evangelists. He is the pastor of the 30,000-member Lakewood Church in Houston, the fastest-growing church in America last year.
And he seldom utters a discouraging word.
He reminds me of one of my favorite aunts, who would always take up for us if we had done something wrong. “He didn’t go to do it,” Aunt Allie would say kindly, and perhaps we really didn’t mean to do something bad — on that particular occasion.
Osteen, 41, has a similar forgiving touch, telling people not to dwell on past shortcomings and to pick themselves up after misfortune and move on. Millions respond to his message of forgiveness. Others criticize him for not focusing enough on sin.
I admit that when Osteen comes on the tube, telling us to put our bad experiences behind us, that God loves us and that our future is bright, it’s a hard-to-resist message. While on vacation, I decided to drive a few extra miles to see what Osteen was like in person.
We were greeted by some of the 7,800 worshippers attending a Sunday-morning service, just part of the more than 20,000 people who attend Lakewood Church on any given weekend.
Lakewood Church will shortly move to the Compaq Center, once home to the Houston Rockets. The growth of the church under Joel Osteen has just been phenomenal, as the article points out.
