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Lakewood Church At 3700 Southwest Fwy.


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Joel Osteen's upbeat message is in high demand

07:13 PM CST on Monday, December 13, 2004

By Jeremy Desel / 11 News

Click to watch video

He's a preaching phenomenon. He's a minister who is no longer walking in his father's footsteps.

Joel Osteen has risen to national stardom and turned Lakewood Church into the largest church in America.

KHOU-TV

Joel Osteen talks about the success of his new book as he travels to a book signing in Arkansas.

His upbeat message is in demand, as evidenced by selling a million of his books in seven weeks.

After preaching to thousands on Sunday, Monday should be a day of rest.

It is anything but that for Joel Osteen. For him, it's time to pack the bags and fly.

Jets, a national tour and a million-selling book are still amazing to this pastor who wasn't even a pastor five years ago.

"I wouldn't have believed it. I would have said 'you're kidding, that's not me'. I didn't even think it was necessarily in me. I couldn't even have dreamed that up and I would have said 'no way'," Osteen says.

The first stop is Little Rock, Arkansas, where his first book autograph is for the receptionist at the television station where he is making an appearance.

The big show is down the road from the station, where hundreds wait for him at Wal-Mart.

Before Victoria and Joel Osteen's day began, Beverly Johnson was on the road. She got up at 5 a.m. and was the first person in line to have his book signed.

Johnson's cart was full of books and one beverage bottle. "It's his charisma. It's his wisdom that he's giving us for everyday living," she says.

The line wound through the store and took two minutes to walk from the front to the end of the line.

"It's the way he breaks it down to us. It's so simple, but it's attainable goals. It's things that we can do every day," says Tennessean Denise Bradley.

For the signing, 1,000 copies of the book were brought to the Wal-Mart. Events such as this have made Osteen's book a number one best seller on the New York Times list this week.

Those numbers don't take into account Osteen's base -- faith-based book stores.

"It's been a very pleasant surprise that the message has crossed over into the whole community, because we never wanted to reach just the Christian community. We've reached them, and we keep talking to them and it just feels like that we ought to get beyond the church borders," says Osteen.

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"The road to heaven is paved with money".

THAT is what I am talking about!  Church for trendoids.

how do you assume it's about money for everbody? look, when you are living the right way and being obedient to God, he blesses you in every area of your life.in the area of finances, marriage,etc...only a fool would deny blessings from God.so you think that the more poverty you're in makes you a better Christian?Christ wasn't poor and God definitely isn't. so, idon't understand your position on mega churches. are you supposed to turn people away when they want to become a member of your church, so that it looks better to people like you who feel that a church shouldn't prosper doing the Lord's will? your position on this is pointless and outdated. i guess it's ok for us to build multi million dollar state of the art stadiums where we cheer,clap, and glorify players who are just as human as we are. why can't we do that for God without question?

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how do you assume it's about money for everbody? look, when you are living the right way and being obedient to God, he blesses you in every area of your life.in the area of finances, marriage,etc...only a fool would deny blessings from God.so you think that the more poverty you're in makes you a better Christian?Christ wasn't poor and God definitely isn't. so, idon't understand your position on mega churches. are you supposed to turn people away when they want to become a member of your church, so that it looks better to people like you who feel that a church shouldn't prosper doing the Lord's will? your position on this is pointless and outdated. i guess it's ok for us to build multi million dollar state of the art stadiums where we cheer,clap,  and glorify players who are just as human as we are. why can't we do that for God without question?

I agree. I don't know where people got the image of Jesus as a poor man. The Bible said that His robe was without seam, and when He was on the cross, they gambled for His clothes. I don't think anyone would gamble for rags. Plus, Jesus wasn't born in a barn because His parents were poor, it was because there was no more room anywhere else. Also, if He had no money, why would the people bother asking Him the question about paying taxes?

God is about the best, and yes, that includes money among other things.

For Christians, it's not up to us to decide "well, I don't trust this man with my money, so I won't give any to this thief". God says to bring the tithes into the storehouse. If preachers take and do stuff with the money contrary to what God says, then He will deal with them. It's up to us to do our part--once we give, we wash our hands of it because we have fulfilled our responsibility.

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no, they only offered that at rice.

anyways, i find mega-churches with ice rinks and basketball courts...odd.

why?churches do offer activities for kids and grownups, you know. i think it's great that churches offer activities for the benefit of the mebers and community. what's with you people?there's Bible study, singles bible study, married couples workshops and plenty of other organizations you can choose.we have a basketball court at our church and people ,whether they are members or not, come and play.this is one way to keep kids off the street or spending most of their time playing video games.you still find that odd?
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why?churches do offer activities for kids and grownups, you know. i think it's great that churches offer activities for the benefit of the mebers and community. what's with you people?there's Bible study, singles bible study, married couples workshops and plenty of other organizations you can choose.we have a basketball court at our church and people ,whether they are members or not, come and play.this is one way to keep kids off the street or spending most of their time playing video games.you still find that odd?

there's nothing wrong with it. i actually use the fitness center at second baptist church but i'm just not used to big churches that's all. if i was a church going person, i would find them impersonal due to the immense size.

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Call me burnt, but I grew up in the Southbelt Area that was dominated by Sagement Baptist Church. I have seen the bad side first hand of these mega churches, so call me paranoid.

I like smaller churces like Trinity Episcopalian. And they find ways to have fun, too. Just on a much smaller scale.

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I don't think that size has anything to do with "impersonal". Can it be intimidating? Yes. But it is all about the people inside the building. I've gone to churches that were waaay smaller than Lakewood (say 1200 people instead of the 25000+ at Lakewood) and only knew about 3 or 4 people. For the most part, the people at Lakewood are very friendly and speak to you like they're really interested. I probably have 25-30 people that I know there pretty good.

The other thing about those bigger churches is that they usually have smaller group-type events. Lakewood has home groups which, from what I have witnessed, have provided some very strong relationships amongst the people. There's also other stuff like Portico, the young singles service they have on Thursdays (where I met my wife, btw) where the attendace can still hit 500-600 sometimes, but it is very easy to meet and talk to people there. If you ever go, there's a guy named Momo who usually greets everyone--and knows everyone's name.

So you see, it's more about the type of people than the size of the church.

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Swimming pools, bowling alleys, fitness centers, singles mixers...at what point does it cease being a church, and merely becomes a tax-exempt Club Med?

Big churches is big bidness.

There's a quote somewhere in the bible "Be still, and know that I am God". The Eastern religions try to inspire solitude and stillness, this place sounds like the opposite. Are these extra amenities part of the church or just sharing the facility?

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A church meet market.  I love it!  How shagadelic.

j/k

But you have to understand that some of us just don't understand.  It floats your boat, and does not hurt mine, so all is well.

Yeah, I can understand that some people just don't understand.

However, I can say that with so many different churches with insignificant differences (many churches separate b/c of theological and/or personal conflicts), that much division has to be the biggest glaring weakness in the Christian church.

Too many churches 'compete' with each other today and that's just flat wrong. The Bible talks about ONE body of Christ, so it will be interesting how He will do away with the barriers between Baptists, Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopalians, and other denominations.

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I've been trying to figure out how I would describe how I felt about mega-churches, and I think you hit it on the head with it being "impersonal". With a church that has more than one morning worship service, how do you even get to know your church family - if you only get to see half of them?

Houcajun - calm down...you're way too defensive over all this church talk..Some people just aren't comfortable with mass production religon. Some of us like to know everyone we go to church with, and some of us are okay without having an ice rink/basketball court/concert hall/3 ring circus in our sanctuary. Besides, it's God's house, not yours. He demands a place of reverence - not rowdiness.

Glen

it's okay wanting to goto a smaller church and one without those amenities, but don't downgrade the bigger churches that do. there are advantages and disadvantages with both."how do you get to know your church family." go to church more often. join an organization. you'll be surprised that big churches can be as personal ....if not more personal than smaller ones sometimes.
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houstonsemipro --

I brought up The Potter's House (the name) of T.D. Jakes' church. And if you're going to expound terms like "world's largest" and "biggest in the U.S." you should at least know what the competition is. The Potter's House is ONE of the largest churches in the United States, and when the new complex is finished, it WILL be the largest.

Additionally, to some other people, Lakewood Church will not be the largest church in the world. The Basilica of Our Lady of Peace in Cote d'Ivoire was constructed in 1989 and has seating for 18,000 parishioners. It was constructed by President Felix Houphouet-Boigny who also moved the capital of the country from Abidjan to his hometown of Yamoussoukro.

Boasting of glory does not make glory, and singing in the dark does not dispel fear.

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