Joel Osteen can kick my ass?

Since Ryan has turned our blog into the Joel Osteen Outpost, I thought I would add my two cents. Or just my random thoughts.

– Did you notice at the end of that 60 Minutes interview they state that Joel puts up 300 pounds on the Bench Press? 300 pounds? Wait, does this mean Joel Osteen can kick my ass? I need to go back to the gym.

– Vicky and I had some supporters in Seattle, and the guy was in love with Osteen’s Your Best Life Now. Since he gave me money I held my tongue (yeah, I suck) and let it go. Well, less than a year later this friend was attending Mars Hill and represented nothing close to Osteen’s theology. Perhaps we need not always raise the banner against Osteen. If our friends love Jesus, they’ll see the truth eventually.

– Another buddy of mine has just completely taken a turn to the Self-Esteem gospel movement. He was a elder of a church I attended, and at one time a mentor. Now Tony Robbins is among his heroes. This issue of Osteen’s Christianity is sad, scary, and for me, a bit personal.

– iMonk has all Osteen knowledge on lockdown. If that is a rabbit hole you would choose to go down. And since he encourages me to, I hereby deny any association or agreement with Joel Osteen, his church, or his er … theology?

– I love Bob Hyatt and his blog. I am excited to catch time with him this week when I’m in Portland. He has had some fun posts on the topic.

– Did I mention Joel Osteen can kick my ass?

Despite the fact that he can kick my ass, I want to address this idea brought up in recent comments regarding Driscoll’s calling Joel out, and whether any of us have the right to call him out. OSTEEN is a HERETIC. If the church refuses to call out heretics is is not faithful in DEFENDING THE FAITH (see Jude). We have a responsibility as the church to protect ourselves from false teachers (see 1 John 2). Joel should be glad the church is nicer to heretics now than it used to be (oh, shouldn’t have written that. Yet, instead of pressing backspace I continue in parenthetical thought).

Now with that said, where is the line? How many heretics do we call out weekly? Do we make a section in each of our services each week where we call out heretics?

This week we’ll warn you about Creflo Dollar. And just as a general rule, if a man has currency in his name, he has a 75% chance of being a heretic. Next week we will be covering Joyce Meyer, and the week after that we have a 2 week VINTAGE HERETICS series where we cover Oral Roberts and Charles Finney.

Well that isn’t very reasonable, unless you are super-fundamental and you think Billy Graham is a heretic (yeah, some people think Billy Graham is a heretic. Isn’t that an automatic ticket to hell?)

Yet, as Ryan pointed out, as certain heretics begin to represent the face of Christianity to popular culture, we have a responsibility to point out that they are not on our team. That being said, I will do my part:

THIS PERSON IS NOT ON OUR TEAM

matt

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