It gives me no joy to defend Joel Osteen on any matter, but truth is truth and right is right. You wouldn't think piling on a public figure would be something that could take hold when the flood waters are still rising and people need to be rescued. But this is America 2017, and this is what we do.
Osteen is an easy target for the simple reason that almost everyone on all sides can find a reason to dislike him. Many Christians don't like him because what he preaches isn't, uh, the Gospel. We'll get to that. Non-Christians don't like him because he self-identifies as a Christian, and he's rich, and he leads a megachurch, and he's everything they imagine the smarmy cartoonish celebrity pastor to be.
So when the story started circulating that Osteen has refused to open his gigantic church - the converted arena that once was home of the NBA's Houston Rockets - that was simply too appealing for too many people not to share on social media and squawk about. Remember, people are still losing their homes and fighting for their lives, but no matter. Once a public figure becomes the chosen target for a nationwide pile-on, there's no time like the present.
But the attacks this week on Osteen are unfair for multiple reasons, which go beyond the mere facts on the ground. Let's deal with them one by one:
Osteen was criticized for not opening his church as a shelter for storm refugees. Osteen offered two rejoinders to this criticism. First, the City of Houston initially asked Lakewood to serve as a distribution center rather than as a shelter, because the city (or so it thought) had sufficient shelter facilities. Later, when capacity became taxed, Osteen says the city asked the church to provide shelter and they did so. His other defense was that the church was flooded and it wasn't safe.
My purpose here is not to parse the criticism or Osteen's reactions to it, but to ask a more fundamental question: Who has the right to tell anyone they're obligated to do a particular thing in a particular situation, and to attack them publicly if they do not? I am not an expert on emergency measures during a hurricane. I don't imagine you are either. It's easy to tell yourself that if you've got a big building that isn't flooded, you should provide shelter. But it's not your prerogative nor your decision. The clear agenda of the critics is to call out someone known as a Christian for hypocrisy. The problem with that is that no one can say with authority that Osteen or his church have a moral obligation to make their building a shelter. It could be a good thing to do if you so choose. It's no one else's business to say it's a bad thing if you don't.
Osteen was criticized for not making his own home available for refugees. Yeah, Osteen's home is reportedly gigantic. I don't know if it's flooded but let's operate on the assumption that it isn't. In addition to everything I said above about how no one can tell you you're obligated to do a particular thing, let's think of some practical matters. Just because you have lots of room doesn't mean you're equipped or prepared to host gobs of people in an emergency situation. Room is one thing. Beds are another. You also have to feed them, provide them with showers/bathrooms, clean linens, places to sit. I have no idea how much of that Osteen has in his mansion. I'm sure it's big, but do you have the facilities or the manpower to prepare all that food or get people pillows or make sure there's enough toilet paper?
Which is more comfortable? Staying at a friend's house or staying at a hotel? Maybe some prefer the former but I think most would decidedly prefer the latter, cost aside. Hotels are staffed and equipped to make sure all this is taken care of for you. A guy with a big house is not. He just has a big house. Anyone can sit there and say the guy with the mansion should make it a shelter, but there's a lot more involved in doing that than just opening your doors. Bully for him if he decides to, but it's no one's place to attack him if he doesn't.
Osteen was criticized for being too rich. I guess this one is pretty garden-variety in the culture war of our times, but it fits with a general notion people have that preachers aren't supposed to have much money. Maybe some of that stems from the large number of people who grew up in Catholicism, where you're told that priests take a "vow of poverty." People get suspicious if their pastor has a nice house or car, perhaps because they think he must be skimming from the collection plate and taking the money for his own personal enrichment. But no one has the right to object to another person's wealth if it consists of money that was come by honestly. Osteen has sold millions of books and videos, and no one has been forced at gunpoint to buy them. His wealth is none of your business, and it's not hurting you that he's rich.
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These were the main lines of attack against Osteen this week, and I have to defend him on them because the attacks are completely without merit.
Now, having said all that, we can't ignore one of the main reasons people tend to leap at the opportunity to find fault with Joel Osteen. Just because someone does wrong doesn't mean everything he does is wrong, but there is much to rebuke about what he does do.
Osteen is commonly derided as preaching the "prosperity gospel," which is usually described as the idea that positive thinkers are in line for lavish blessings of wealth and material goods from God, and that this should be your main focus in your relationship with God - seeking these things because God wants to bless you.
This is criticized by a lot of people, but especially by those in the Christian world who find untoward the whole idea that Christians can or should possess much in the way of wealth.
I think both factions get it wrong in their own ways.
The Bible is replete with stories of people God blessed with wealth, including Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, Solomon and even Job. Malachi 3 talks about God making your storehouse overflow if you don't rob Him by withholding your tithes and offerings.
God doesn't bless people with wealth just for the sake of wealth, or to give them a cushy and comfortable life, but to provide resources for them to live out the purpose He has for their lives. One thing that frankly irritates me about some Christians is that they take a poverty mindset into the work of ministry. They're constantly begging for nickels and dimes, whereas some entrepreneurial initiative and some hard work could net them much more abundantly the resources they need to do what God has given them to do.
I don't know why people think it was God's idea to give His people work to do, but to put them at a constant financial disadvantage vis-a-vis the world, which controls all the money while God's people scrimp and beg. I understand that we need to rely on Him, and perhaps you think possessing money is the antithesis of this. I don't. I think earning money in the manner God proscribes for you is part of his provision for you as you do what He is calling you to do.
So I have no problem with the idea that Christians should obtain wealth, provided they don't let it become their god and provided they use the wealth as God intends. (Oh, and can we dispense with the idea that "giving to charity" is the only Christian thing you can do with money? That can be a good thing to do, but so can building a successful for-profit business that employs people and makes good products it can sell at a fair price. If God blesses you with resources, He will tell you what to do with them, not the opinion leaders in modern American culture.)
I am also a very big believer in positive thinking, and in keeping our mind focused on the envisioning of success. I believe in solving problems. I believe in being relentless. I believe in praising God during trials, and have seen Him elevate people who show Him they can do so. These are all things Osteen talks about, and it is not all wrong by any means.
But none of this excuses Osteen's glaring apostasy: He is a Christian pastor, or so he calls himself, who does not preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And no, I have not heard every Osteen sermon, but from what's been observed by myself and many others who share this criticism, it's clear that Osteen puts little if any focus on Christ in his preaching, and virtually none on sin or the need for repentence, or the need to receive grace as forgiveness for sin. I have yet to see an Osteen defender provide an example of Osteen preaching these things, and even Osteen himself has said he prefers to avoid icky issues like sin because he thinks people get deluged with too much negativity.
I also personally know of people who have been blocked from Osteen's Twitter feed for asking him about it, after searching extensively through his many tweets and finding virtually nothing exalting the name of Christ as Lord.
Osteen does not do what a pastor is supposed to do. A pastor is supposed to preach that people are sinners and need to receive the grace that only comes from the sacrifice of Christ on the cross. A pastor is supposed to preach the reality of Hell if you do not. A pastor is supposed to show you that the world is dark and demonic and that the heart is desperately wicked, but that God can deliver us from these evils.
I don't care in the slightest how much money he has, or how nice his house is. But by preaching a pseudo-gospel that leaves out Jesus Christ, he makes himself an apostate every time he steps to the podium and presumes to preach.
Osteen does not do this. He is a motivational speaker who uses God as a prop when it suits his purposes, and attracts people to his church by telling them how to live their "best life now," without emphasizing that the real purpose of life is to serve Jesus Christ. This is a very popular message and because of it his 20,000-seat auditorium is packed every week. He says what itching ears want to hear. He tells you how to behave so you can be rich and happy.
And I have no problem with anyone being rich and happy. Those are good things to be. But they are only good if attained in the context of a life that's submitted to Jesus Christ. I do believe that God wants to bless and elevate His people, but only after they've found their way to grace and salvation through Christ. Any Christian pastor who doesn't preach extensively and constantly on this is not a Christian pastor at all.
If Osteen wants to take his show on the road and do motivational speeches in which he talks about God and mentions Scripture, fine by me. But as it is he's presuming to pastor a church without putting Jesus at the center of the ministry. That means tens of thousands of people are showing up every Sunday for what they think is church, but they are not hearing the Gospel preached. That is 100 percent on Joel Osteen, and it is the height of irresponsibility for anyone who presumes to be a pastor.
I don't care in the slightest how much money he has, or how nice his house is. But by preaching a pseudo-gospel that leaves out Jesus Christ, he makes himself an apostate every time he steps to the podium and presumes to preach. That is the real problem with Joel Osteen, and while I'm willing to defend him against attacks that are stupid and wrong, his innocence in the matters mentioned above do not in any way excuse his real dereliction of duty as a so-called pastor.
