Rise of the Mega-Pastor

The book and movie The Secret are very much inspired by the Wallace Wattles book The Science of Getting Rich. In fact this is the book that Rhonda reports being given by her daughter that started everything off for her. (The cover page shot in the movie shows a different book, which is Secret of The Ages by Robert Collier).

I wish to address the following passage from The Science of Getting Rich:

"What is now needed is a demonstration of the science of life from the pulpit. We want preachers who can not only tell us how, but who in their own persons will show us how. We need the preacher who will himself be rich, healthy, great, and beloved, to teach us how to attain to these things; and when he comes he will find a numerous and loyal following."

Mr. Wattles wrote this 100 years ago. If he were alive today, I think he would visit Houston, point to Lakewood Church, and say: See! I told you so!

If you are one of the five people in America who have not heard of Lakewood Church or Pastor Joel Osteen, it is a non-denominational church following similar theology and methods as an Assembly of God church would. Pastor Osteen draws crowds of several tens of thousands every weekend, filling up the former Compaq Center, where the Houston Rockets used to play basketball. At the rate they are growing it seems that the currently unused 60,000 seat Astrodome might be the church's next location. The television audience is numbered in the millions.

To put things in a little perspective, I estimate that about 3-4 million people have had the opportunity to see the DVD movie The Secret. Pastor Osteen reaches twice that many people directly every single week. I do not know the numbers for the book.

And yet several other pastors and leaders from other churches level much criticism for Lakewood Church being really light on doctrine or even repentence, which is scarcely mentioned. In my mind Pastor Osteen is more a motivational speaker than a Pastor, but having grown up as the son of the former Pastor of Lakewood church it was natural for him to follow in his father's footsteps.

And yet to attend motivational seminars that are half as good as what is presented at Lakewood costs several hundred dollars. At Lakewood, the services and the parking are free. The church brings in millions upon millions of dollars from donations from the congregation and from the TV audience, which is quite interesting because the do not show collection on the TV program, and they never ask for money on the TV version (a great plan given what some TV preachers have done in the past).

So, why is this Pastor so popular?

Because his message describes a loving God who is always working to bring better things into our lives. All of his sermons discuss different ways that we block Him from doing that, and how we can stop blocking Him. It is a refreshing change of pace from those who preach that God is uncaring or uninterested in the details of a single persons life, or the message that true spirituality is obtained through poverty and lack.

As information comes to light in this age about the Law of Attraction, we can begin to understand how it was us, and not God, who caused most of what we are complaining about to happen to us. This is an important distinction!

If our afflictions are sent to us by God, then we would be absolutely powerless to do anything about them at all except for muddle through, and pray to the God who sent them to take them away. Does this seem like a disconnect to anyone?

What if instead we attracted them ourself? True or Not, this is a more empowering idea. You see if God is the cause of your afflictions, then i do not know how you do anything different than live your entire life as a victim. The God in this thought universe is the God of Justice, brimstone and damnation.

If instead you attracted them yourself via the Law of Attraction, then guess what? You can do something about it! Given we are taught that God helps those who help themselves, it is apparent that we were meant to do something about it ourselves. The God of this thought universe is the mentor, the loving father, the advocate. The one who wants to bless us with more than we can imagine, but also the one who knows when we are ready to handle something.

Pastor Osteen does exactly what Wallace Wattles said 100 years ago, and he certainly does not lack for a following.

Here is another item to consider. The success of Pastor Osteen is but an example of the success that every human being can attract once they get in line with the Universe and start using the talents that they were blessed with. Combine that with some marketing work to find the right audience, and a similar success story can belong to anyone else who seeks it.

And we should all seek it. How would you like to go to different cities and towns and have hundreds of people line up all telling you that you have so inspired them, that their life is so much better now since they have come to know you. Talk about a virtuous circle, here is the case of someone living in the magic of life.

All of us are meant to do the same, no matter how much we ignore it.

Joseph