Posted on 09/19/2014 1:21:41 PM PDT by servo1969
Mega-church pastor Joel Osteen may lead the largest Protestant church in the United States, but a recent Facebook post shows he might need to go back to Sunday school.
A Monday post to his verified Facebook page, Joel Osteen ministries, read: “God said in Numbers 11:23, ‘Moses, is there any limit to My power?’ He was saying, ‘Moses, you saw Me part the Red Sea, stop the sun for Joshua, keep three Hebrew teenagers safe in a fiery furnace, don’t you realize that I can bring water without rain?’ There’s no limit to God’s power.”
As of Friday afternoon, the post had over 317,000 likes and 52,000 shares.
There’s just one problem: According to the Bible, Moses was dead before Joshua asked God to stop the setting of the sun, and long before the three Hebrew youths were burned in the furnace.
The Old Testament Book of Joshua explains that God appointed Joshua as Moses’s successor after Moses’s death (the first sentence literally begins, “After the death of Moses…”), who led the Israelites into battle against the Amorites, during which he commanded the sun and the moon not to move. “So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the people had revenge upon their enemies,” (Joshua 10:13).
The story of the “three holy children,” as the Hebrew youths are sometimes known, is told in the Old Testament Book of Daniel. According to the passage, the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar, who reigned around the 6th century B.C. (long, long after the projected time of Moses), ordered his people to worship a large golden idol, “and whoever does not fall down and worship shall be cast immediately into the midst of a burning fiery furnace,” (Daniel 3:6). The three Hebrew youths refused to worship the idol and were thrown into the furnace, but were not burned.
In many Christian traditions this passage is particularly important because it is understood to prefigure Christ — when the king asked whether the three were burned, one of his counselors replied “I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire; and they are not hurt, and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God,” (Daniel 3:25).
Some of Osteen’s followers noticed the error, with one commenter asking “Bro, do you even Scripture?”
Osteen, who has neither a bachelor’s nor a divinity degree, lives in a $10 million dollar mansion in Houston, Texas, and has an estimated net worth of $40 million. Nearly 50,000 people attend services at Lakewood Church every week, and millions more watch his televised sermons. Lakewood, whose “central campus” is a 16,000-seat arena, is notable for its total lack of crosses and other Christian symbols or imagery.
“I make You my Lord and Savior.”
Easy to say, hard to do.
Can’t stand old Blinky Boy.
Granted that I don’t know much about this guy, other than what I read on FR. I rarely watch TV. But when trapped in a motel room, when I do turn the boob tube on and flip through the channels, if I happen to catch Osteen, I don’t hear him quoting any scriptures like I am accustomed to hear from preachers with whom I am acquainted.
This guy strikes me as nothing but a feel-good, have-it-your-own-way, charlatan.
If you want to know what God says, you’re not apt to hear it from this guy.
So...do you like a gospel of poverty?
Must we all be poor?
What is wrong with prosperity?
What is wrong with the prayer I posted?
Don’t like it FINE.
Why the bashing of people who like and take inspiration from it?
Unless I am misunderstanding you are saying that only strict interpretation of the Bible will be accepted.
Is my family allowed...by you since you seem to have a deeper understanding than we...to observe our Celtic ancestry? Halloween? Beltane fire? Maypole? St David’s Day?
Or is that a bit of poison?
Please, get over it.
This you tube was great but on the next one this pastor talks about his belief in pre-trib. Trust me folks were headed to a world of pain in the tribulation. And if you are a believer in Africa or the middle east you believe your in the tribulation right now. When you home is burned and your family killed and your young woman sold as sex slaves you fell like your in the tribulation.
So, I agree. I am not a pre-tribulation believer but a mid-tribulation. I think there is more scripture on mid, but I understand WHY people like pre.
OK...What should I say...pray?
I just don’t understand the vitriol against Osteen. Almost daily. Why not a daily thread bashing Dolan, Pope Francis, Billy and Franklin Graham?
Heck I could post a daily Santorum bashing thread but WHY bother?
My - admittedly weak - defense of Joel is because the threads seem like a distraction and a push to a divisive agenda.
As conservatives we do not need that in this time of political and religious tempestion.
There is ONLY the Gospel.
And the gospel of prosperity is not it.
It does not matter if you are “inspired” by it.
Are you “inspired” by the doctrine of sin?
Was Jesus rich? Did all the disciples live “prosperous” lives?
So if the gospel of prosperity is correct, why are the most unhappy people flying first class? Why are so many wealthy people on mind altering drugs? Why did Robin Williams commit suicide?
Do you want the truth, or to feel comfortable?
Every bible character I know of did not have a “Best Life Ever”. God uses the difficulties in our life to refine our character. Satan uses prosperity (or the promise of) to ruin peoples character.
Pray if you want but don’t excuse the false prophets. Don’t side with them
So you are saying that to believe in “The Gospel - Good News” we have to be poor, suffer, endure adversity?
Let me beat my back bloody with chains and drive nails through my hands.
Conversely someone who is wealthy, happy, and never had a bad day can not be a Christian?
Really?
REALLY?
> Satan uses prosperity<
So prosperity is Satanic?
Feel free to send my family your money. Our net worth is less than ...calculating...15K dollars and that is a stretch.
But we are happy and appreciate the Gifts of our Lord.
According to you we should reject them.
Oh and not use our God given strengths for prosperity and abundance.
Joel is a prophet? I though he was a TV evangelist. Stupid me.
You are making assumptions.
Any parent disciplines their children.
Hebrews 12:6 because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.
Proverbs 3:12 because the LORD disciplines those he loves, as a father the son he delights in.
So, if we think God is more interested in our salvation than our comfort, He will use the things in our lives to improve our character.
IF our character is good, God does not have to discipline us much, and we may see prosperity in this life. However, our reward for believing in Christ is not in this life, but the next.
God pours our onto us just as much success as our characters allow, without spoiling us.
Satan, on the other hand, will heap on success, fame, fortune onto us until it does spoil us, and ruins our character.
In this way, prosperity is like many things, neither good nor bad, but dependent on the person and circumstances.
I know this does not fit into your belief system, but it is biblical. I would suspect you did not grow up in a bible preaching church? You have never heard the bible preached and searched the word to struggle to find your own beliefs? We are commanded to “work out our own salvation”
Phil 2:12 Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling,
What Paul meant here was not the “works” of doing good things, but by searching the scriptures and following the example of Christ, who although being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his Own advantage, but rather humbled himself by taking on the nature of a servant.
Is the definition of how well you are doing defined by your back account? Where is your security? What if the economy crashes? What goos is money without health?
You have already won the lottery. You live in the best nation, in the best of times. You have more blessings than 95% of the people on earth. A poor man here in America is better off than most people in history have ever lived. How many TVs do you have in your house?
We are approaching the season of Thanksgiving. I pray you have everything you want, but I ask that you examine what you really need and what will last once we leave this earth.
We are approaching the season of Thanksgiving. I pray you have everything you want, but I ask that you examine what you really need and what will last once we leave this earth.
You have no clue.
We believe we are provided with what we - my family - need. We give thanks for what we receive. Do we ask for abundance? Yes. Does that make us less Christian?
According to many on this thread yes.
My family is strong in faith. To be told that because we enjoy Joel, or the Graham family or any other evangelical preacher is beyond insulting.
Not that we have a constitutional right to not be insulted. That is not our way. We deal with things day to day.
Here is a fair summation of my family...without the Die Spitting Blood Motto,lol.
The Measure of a Man (Man being male or female)
The measure of a man isn’t his wealth.
It isn’t his looks or how he speaks.
The measure of a Man is how he uses his God given strength to:
Provide for his family,
Help his neighbors and
Take care of himself.
When he does these things to the best of his ability he is a Man God’s eyes.
My family lives this. We are doing well. As Joel recently preached - all is well. Very well. God provides and we give thanks. Maybe not we want but what we need.
If we listened to folks like you we should not have even asked for deliverance from the problems that troubled us.
Exposing false teacher, huh. Are Catholic or islamist?
No, I don’t have clues. I used to think i made a living, made money and might give God some back.
But the reality is we don’t provide for our families. God does.
We should be faithful with what God has given us.
You would not draw a single breath without God.
The prosperity Gospel is really based in a deep seated fear - of not enough.
J Paul Getty, on his deathbed the richest man in the world, was asked J Paul, how much is enough? J Paul said “Just a little more”.
Could J Paul ever spend what he had accumulated? No, but fear kept him wanting more.
I invite you to read around on “word faith: or “prosperity” preaching, and see what the arguments are about. Whatever you do, do your homework, by checking it in the bible. Nothing anyone says no matter how logical or well conceived or great sounding can compare to the Word of the Creator of the Universe. We should not be hanging off of men’s words, but by every word from the mouth of God.
Fare well.
And there’s nothing the guy can do that his loyal drones will not excuse.
He’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing who uses Jesus for his own profit.
Disgusting.
bookmark for later
Riches are deceitful and we can’t serve two masters.
We get saved to spend eternity with God, not to use Him to get rich and make our lives comfortable.
So, how’s that message of prosperity working out in the rest of the world? Iraq? Iran? Africa?
Places where you are imprisoned and tortured for naming the name of Christ? Where children are being beheaded? Where your property is confiscated and you can’t find employment?
Tell them that God has a wonderful plan for your life and you just have to claim it and walk it out?
*****You have already won the lottery. You live in the best nation, in the best of times. You have more blessings than 95% of the people on earth. A poor man here in America is better off than most people in history have ever lived. How many TVs do you have in your house?****
AMEN!!!!
*****You have already won the lottery. You live in the best nation, in the best of times. You have more blessings than 95% of the people on earth. A poor man here in America is better off than most people in history have ever lived. How many TVs do you have in your house?****
isn’t it interesting how “rich” is always more than we have?
Jesus told us not to seek for the things of this world, but to seek FIRST then kingdom of God and HIS righteousness.
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