Joel Osteen
This morning as I opened my emails, my eyes went immediately to one which was sure to surprise me. Without using the woman’s name, here is what the email said (my comments to the reader are in italics):
“The pastor begins every service holding up and exalting the Bible: “This is my Bible, I am what it says I am.” The pastor ends every service: “Make Jesus your personal Lord and Savior.” The words of Satan? No. The words of Osteen!
How about the Words of Christ?
In between is a Bible-based WONDERFUL message like I was reminded again this weekend. Seated is the mother and wife of his dad, the founding pastor, who is testimony of HEALING Jesus. Love and healing abound. Sin is gone and WHO would even kill a fetus surrounded by such ABOUNDING HOPE!
I would love to know how many of Joel’s congregation is pro-choice. And about John Osteen (Joel’s father) – I watched him as a young woman. Solid Bible teacher.
So I wonder, no longer having a decent church anywhere around, and as Jan Markell points out: Most people in the remnant church have nowhere to go. WHY? Because God planned it that way at the end of the Days of Noah.
The signs of the end are clear. Were it not the end, God would have raised up more Osteens because he GROWS believers.
Oh, so Joel “grows” believers? How can he grow believers (true believers), when he does not stress to his congregation that SIN separates them from God; and that the ONLY way to the Father is through God’s Son, Jesus Christ?
“Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6).
Calling Osteen satanic is a sure end-time sign when judgmental bitter religiosity takes of “Christianity.” NO ONE IS DRAWN TO THE LATTER! Ironic; Satan won the battle! Calling GOOD EVIL IS SATANIC!”
Here is my email response to the woman:
“I’m very sorry that you do not realize or discern that Joel Osteen is a motivational speaker at best. Have you ever seen people being called to the altar to repent of their sins and be saved? Does Osteen ever PREACH about sin and how it separates us from a Holy God? NO. He doesn’t preach this from the Bible, which is the only way in which a person can be saved from their sins.
Osteen was interviewed by Larry King years ago. King asked him if Jesus was the only way to heaven. Osteen balked but then said that he couldn’t be the judge of that. WHAT? Jesus clearly tells us in His Word:
“Jesus said unto him, I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life: No man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6).
So, Osteen is not agreeing with Jesus about how one gets to heaven.
Have you written to Jan Markell about how you feel about Osteen?
I really do wish that you would.” – end of my email.
Itching Ears
“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables” (2 Timothy 4:3-4).
Jesus IS Truth. The fables of which Scripture speaks are “feel good” sermons about how Wonderful we are, and how God wants us to be free of persecution and to be affluent in this life.
Think “Your Best Life Now” written by Joel Osteen. Why do you think that his congregation is so incredibly large?
“Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it” (Matthew 7:13-14). (Emphasis added)
“For you were once darkness but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of the spirit is in all goodness, righteousness and truth), finding out what is acceptable to the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them” (Ephesians 5:8-11). (Emphasis added)
Brethren, notice in the Scripture above, that it clearly says to have no fellowship with unfruitful works of darkness, but that we should expose these teachings and the teachers by whom these teachings come.
Now you may say to me, “But Joel is so positive in his sermons and he does speak occasionally about Jesus.”
I ask the readers this question: “Why did Jesus come to earth?” Was it to give us our “Best Life Now?” This is so far from the Truth, that it amazes me that even the “itching-ear crowd” accepts it!
If we could ask all of those who have been martyred for their faith in Christ, if they thought that Jesus came to give them their “Best Life Now” – I believe that each of them would say something like this:
Jesus came to earth in human flesh to live out a perfect and sinless life and then to be crucified on the Cross of Calvary as payment for all sin, for those who would repent and trust Him for their Salvation. He was resurrected from the dead and is now seated at the right hand of His Father in heaven.
“For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:21).
Jesus Christ came to earth to give sinners a chance to be reconciled to His Father in heaven. That’s why he was born. And that’s why those of us who have repented of our sins and trusted in the finished work of Christ on the Cross will be in heaven when we die.
I am not writing these things about Joel Osteen to hurt him. I pray that his eyes will be opened by the Father and that he will see clearly that he has not been preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Can you imagine how many of his congregation and online audience could be saved if Joel told them the true Gospel?
Yes, he would likely lose followers, but how glorious it would be if even a part of his congregation would be convicted of their sins and would repent and receive the forgiveness of their sins!
We should pray for Joel and his wife. Pray that both of them will have their eyes opened to the true Gospel and will preach it boldly!
Shalom b’Yeshua
MARANATHA!
Articles at grandmageri422.me