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I just want to take a moment to thank everyone who's listened or downloaded or shared our podcast so far.

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It's amazing to see people's response and to just be a part of this conversation.

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And I feel like I'm on this journey with a bunch of people now.

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If you want to help us out, continue to listen, of course, but please leave us some reviews.

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That's the number one thing in the internet world that helps people find our podcast.

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Share this podcast with a friend.

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We're going to do a poll on Instagram on Friday when this episode releases.

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And we're going to have a few books and ask our audience which one we should do

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as we are starting to plan the next season, which is also kind of crazy already.

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We got some good books coming up.

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Well, and should people stay tuned for further waves to support us as the holidays roll around?

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Ooh.

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And perhaps some bonus content that is premium?

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Yeah, a little Giving Tuesday.

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That'll be in the future.

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But also, like, maybe it's not best to speak about on this episode,

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considering we're talking about the prosperity gospel.

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Hey, listen, open your purse.

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We're about to talk about Joel Osteen.

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I remember the day that I went into my local Christian bookstore and there was my book.

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You are not God!

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You are just a man!

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The Total Money Makeover book is your sold-almost-present-thing.

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The number one best-selling book.

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Book.

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Book.

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No, because it's not a great book.

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It's such a great story, you gotta read the book.

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This is Bad Christian Books.

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Welcome to Bad Christian Books, a podcast about the worst bestsellers Christianity has to offer.

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I'm Mary Hall, a person of faith and a current churchgoer.

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I am Sammy Collieto, also a person of faith and not a current churchgoer.

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This is also maybe a good note.

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We are operating off of very little sleep.

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A funny thing happens when we operate off of little sleep.

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I get very philosophical and I can't speak for you, Mary.

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What happens to you on little sleep?

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My words just like go down the drain.

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I get a lot of brain fog, you know, like add extra letters into things,

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which actually is really bad because until I started reading this book,

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I thought the topic of the book, the person, Joel Osteen,

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his name was Joel Olsteen with an L,

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and I'm just like very paranoid that I'm going to say his last name wrong.

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I called Dave Ramsey Gordon Ramsey, so I think we're, you know.

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Yeah, that's true.

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Okay, Samuel, what do you know about Joel Osteen in one sentence?

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He scams old ladies.

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Oh.

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That's my image of him.

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His book is at Target and he's got a smile that's a mile.

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That is very true.

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Yeah, so today we're talking about The Power of I Am by Joel Osteen.

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Full disclosure, I want to say that I chose the best book because I'm just brilliant at

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knowing which of his books are the best, but actually it was a total fluke,

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or perhaps I'm manifesting the right things because I was just in the library

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and it's the book of his that was in the library.

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But, and this ties into the scamming older women thing,

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this is actually one of his most popular books, Slash Sermons,

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because all of his books were sermons that he made longer,

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because he was promoted by a very specific celebrity who said that this sermon changed her life.

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And Samuel, I sent you a link.

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Is it going to be Oprah?

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We shall see.

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There she is.

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Whatever follows I Am is going to come looking for you, just really was a big aha.

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Yeah, you know, Oprah, so many people don't realize the way they go through life is,

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I think they've just been trained that way. But like you're saying, I am so tired and I am unlucky

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and I never get any good breaks. But when you speak that out, you're setting the tone for your life.

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I always tell people if you want to know what you're going to be like five years from now,

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listen to what you're saying about yourself right now.

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He talks like a supermodel.

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I want to know what you mean by that.

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You can't go around saying all day that, you know what, I'm not attractive and

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I'm never getting any good breaks and I'm a lousy mother.

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That's just going to draw in negative defeat and things that are going to keep you from God's best.

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Well, I love that whatever follows I Am is going to come looking for you because whatever follows it,

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this just happened to me recently. I was filming the movie The Butler and I was so tired and all

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day I kept saying, I'm so tired. I am so tired. And what I realized is I was getting more and more tired.

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And then I thought about the sermon. I said, how can I turn this around? And for me, I can't

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immediately go to I am so energized because I wasn't. So I was trying to think what, so I can't go,

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I'm so energized. I'm now lying to myself because I'm not. But what can I use in between? So I started

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to say, I am looking forward to my second win. I am looking forward to my second win. And it came.

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Yeah. You know, I think that's true. You could say just what you said and I am refreshed. I'm

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being restored and yes, you know, things like that. You don't have to go to the extreme.

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Go to the extreme. How did you come to that? What spark of God happened that made you conclude that

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whatever follows I Am is going to come looking for you? I think sometimes we make things so

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complicated, but it's the simple things that keep most people back. Oh, look at that. We got to

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simplify things. That's a theme I'm noticing on our podcast. Well, I think it's just so important

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to never speak negative words about yourself, your family. You know, it may come to your mind,

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but don't give your words life by speaking them out. Don't ever say anything negative about

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yourself. You may feel it, but just, you know, zip it up and make those positive declarations.

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It takes time though, because from the time I heard the I Am sermon, I mean, what it did,

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and I'm hoping this is what's going to happen for all of you who are watching who are here,

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is that you start catching yourself. Because, you know, if you're however old you are,

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you have the habit of feeding the negative tapes to yourself. I do too. And so when you first catch

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yourself doing it, you switch it. Just as we've been doing here today, you switch the I Am.

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This is so LA. I feel like I'm at like Erewhon right now. And it takes practice. That's why the,

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I declare the declarations help you get into the practice of it. Absolutely. It's not something you

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go out and have to do in public. You get up in the morning, you're in the shower, you're driving to

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work saying, you know what, Lord, thank you. I'm, I'm strong. I make good decisions. I'm healthy.

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Just simple things like that. I'm looking forward to my future. Oprah just pointed at somebody and

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called them out. Yeah, I think she must have been from earlier in the thing. Yeah. Yes. I'm looking

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forward to my future. Yes. Could you lead us in a few I Ams? Absolutely. Okay. Can we all stand? Can

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we all stand? Let's stand. All right. All right. Just repeat after me. I am strong. I am strong.

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I am healthy. I am healthy. I am confident. I am confident. I am secure. I am secure. I am talented.

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I am self-sacrificing. I am creative. I am disciplined. I am focused. I am valuable. I am beautiful.

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I am blessed. I am excited about my future. I am victorious.

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I am victorious.

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That's really creepy. Okay. So what did you mean by he sounds like a supermodel?

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So when they do like Miss Universe pageants and they're like, what is your solution to

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world peace or something along those lines? And it's always just this word salad of

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buzzword affirmations, or it's like, we're not doing this beauty pageant to get some nuanced

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politics. We're here to look at people. And honestly, it's the same thing with Joel and Oprah.

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I mean, they're beautiful people who already have what they want. Kind of just telling you that if

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only you are as happy as these people after they got what they wanted, you too can get what you want.

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Right. Yeah. I mean, that's that's a summation. And I did think about showing you the the clip

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of the actual sermon. But in reality, what just happened is exactly what the sermon is,

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except Oprah's not there. And I think Oprah's a little bit more interesting.

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I got a little nostalgic for my old watching Oprah days.

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Oh, I know. I used to watch Oprah with my mom every day. That's such a core memory for me.

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Well, and I mean, that's part of Joel Osteen's rise to fame. I mean, he was famous before, but

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Oprah really platformed him at a time when like her platform was arguably the biggest in the world.

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I think that so so what we just watched, I should probably say it was an Oprah life class.

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It took place in 2012. Don't distract me.

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I'm so sorry. I just Oprah life class. Also, I could tell it was recent ish because she was

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talking about Lee Daniels, the butler. It's just wild because it's such an old looking video. But

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that's like only 10 years ago, really. Right. It was the year after she like ended her show,

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but then like launched her network. But I was wondering if maybe you could describe like,

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what you just watched, like the people and how people were reacting the energy.

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I'm sure I'm like, do I let tired Samuel go wild? Or do I attempt to put it?

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Let him go wild. It looked like the Hunger Games. Like,

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you know, when they show the pageants on the Hunger Games be in between the actual kids fighting each

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other, it just had this, it's this massive, massive venue that they're at, they're on a stage.

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And the congregation because it is a congregation. It reminds me of like a hype and hoopla mega

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church. There's a fervor to the room. It's like Oprah is the king, and Joel is the shaman. And so

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she's saying what the shamans thinking. And then the shaman sort of, you know, subtly guides her.

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Like she's like, because she kind of points out a hole in his problem in his viewpoint, which is

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like, you can't just say I'm good if you're not good. But he kind of corrects her. And he's like,

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well, you could say, I'm better. You know, like he's he is sort of right. Yeah, exactly.

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Well, and I don't know if you noticed, but she goes, what big word from God did you receive to

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come up with this amazing thing? And he literally just says, Oh, well, it's very simple. And then

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he like, literally repeats everything he just said in a slightly different way. You're right.

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I miss that because I kind of zone out when he talks. But he never answered her question.

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No, he doesn't. I'm so glad you put Oprah on here. Because otherwise, I would have just been like,

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he spoke, I didn't hear it. There's times where she's almost like, like a little kid or something

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being like, can we do the affirmations? Like she's looking to him. It feels like a magic show.

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Yeah, we'll link to it so people can watch it themselves. What happens like the I hesitate to

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say argument because I don't even think it's like worth the meaning of that word. But like the

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rhetoric that he has in that little clip is exactly what his book is kind of to give a slight

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background about Joel Osteen. This sermon, the power of I am has been called the most popular

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sermon on the internet. You can watch the full sermon on Oprah calm and where it has like more

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than 4 million views. Every sermon he posts has like multiple millions of views, their own platforms

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reach hundreds of millions of people around the world and a bunch of different languages. And

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the Joel Osteen podcast is consistently in the top five in the world. We're talking about someone who

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is enormous and is a much bigger personality than historically, I think a lot of the prosperity

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gospel people were who, for most of America, for like a lot of Christian church goers was like,

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okay, that's like kind of a fringe thing. And we recognize that that's not like great. That's what

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it is. Whereas today, one in five Americans say that they believe that if they give money to a

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church, they will receive blessings from God and that it's required to receive blessings from God.

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So I mean, this is just a movement that is completely taken over how a lot of Western

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people think about what churches and what God is. And because of who I am, I did turn this into a

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two parter. So we're going to kind of look at Joel and what he does as a view of like, what the

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prosperity looks like today. But then we're going to go back into the history books to talk about

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like how the American prosperity gospel formed in the next episode. And as a teaser for that,

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I am curious, what what year about would you say the prosperity gospel really began?

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So I think like you first see it really take hold in American churches and like the 1800s, late

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1800s. That was my guess, but I wasn't sure. And interesting enough, like kind of the main thrust

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of the American prosperity gospel actually came up out of the same movement as as Aureans came out

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of anything in the like charismatic Pentecostal kind of vibe, like there was all the other churches,

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and then there was the prosperity gospel that took like a hard left turn. So Joel Olson says

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that he is not a prosperity minister, quote unquote. And he says this because he does not say

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that you have to give money to the church to receive blessings from God. Is that the definition

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of prosperity gospel? I always thought of it being like Christians get paid. Yeah. And I think what

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he's referring to is kind of when we're looking at like the history of the gospel, like a lot of the

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really big names, Kenneth Copeland, Benny Hinn, a lot of them did literally say like, give $1,000

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to be healed. Like it was very transactional. And it is true that he like doesn't explicitly say

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that. He also like says, I'm not taking a salary anymore. Because he's so rich from his book deals

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and his media stuff. He does like a conference that goes around like the country, which is a

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little bit of like a medium true because like obviously he's using his work for the church as

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a platform to earn money. I would assume that he's got a lot of passive income that remains even

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without the salary. Oh, yeah. I mean, it's it's really hard like all of these guys to figure out

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how much he's actually worth. But it's definitely in the tens of millions, if not hundreds of

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millions. And he also says that he doesn't just focus on health and wealth, although he literally

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does. But that he's like, Oh, well, I also talk about emotional health and family relationships

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and job satisfaction. That sounds like health and wealth. I mean, exactly. And so I guess when

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you say like, how would you define the prosperity gospel? To me, it is this idea that my faith

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can make God give me what I want. Kind of the connection of that with a charismatic preacher

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who is exploiting that point of view, then uses the wealth that he exploited out of his followers

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to say, Well, you don't have enough faith, if you're not getting to where I am. That's kind

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of the crux of what the prosperity gospel is to me. And that to me is the wicked, wicked dark side

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of magical thinking. For any viewpoint, whether it's Christian or otherwise, faith is a beautiful,

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beautiful thing. It's also a very personal thing. So if you as a separate individual are using a

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lack of results to claim somebody else doesn't have enough faith, I can think of a few things

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more shameful or sinister, you simply don't know that is the nature of faith. Yeah, exactly. The

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level of exploitation that has happened out of this thinking this teaching is immeasurable

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within Christian culture, like you're breaking down their faith in God to be good despite

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circumstances. It is like a little bit like commenting on somebody's family situation where

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it's like, well, if your husband loved you, he would do this or if your spouse cared for you,

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they would do that. And it's like, that's not your business. And God's your relationship with God,

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I think should be the same way. I'm very impassioned about this because I feel like I'm very susceptible

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to magical thinking as somebody who is very imaginative. I like to think there's a good way

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to go about it. But yeah, we'll talk about the bad way. I mean, as well as the prosperity gospel

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that has been around for over a century, there is a rise of self help gurus like Tony Robbins,

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and like those type of figures and kind of the 70s, 80s, 90s, that I think Joel Osteen has

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taken on what they've learned from that side of the world as well. But because of the way that

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prosperity gospel preachers, in my opinion, are abusing people spiritually, it just, it makes it

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that much more important.

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I wanted to kind of finish the origin story of Joel Osteen before we dive into what the book

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says. Samuel, I'd love it if you would read the first excerpt. And this is how he tells the story

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of how he became pastor of Lakewood Church.

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I'd go the extra mile to make sure the lighting was perfect. Camera angles were just right.

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I would even go over to my parents' house every Sunday night and pick out a suit and tie for my

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father to wear the next day on television. I wanted that broadcast to be perfect. I wasn't

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looking to become Lakewood's senior pastor. I was content where I was behind the scenes.

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But when my father wanted to be with the Lord, this opportunity came looking for me. I never

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planned on doing it. It chased me down.

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God's dream for your life is so much bigger than your own. If you will keep being your best right

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where you are, you will come into favor, promotion, and opportunity bigger than you ever imagined.

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You won't have to go after it. It will come to you. Like a magnet, you'll draw it in.

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So he got it from his dad, basically. Like he's an epo baby.

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Right, exactly. Like several of the other people we've talked about. And he talks about it in other

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places in the book where he's like, I just kind of like fell into where I am. And this wasn't my

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plan. Literally, he worked behind the scenes. And then when his dad passed away suddenly,

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they asked him to be pastor. It's like the most.

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That's just like, that's how they do it in North Korea.

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I will say the Ostian family has better hair.

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I'm sure they'd be glad to hear that. They put a lot of work into it.

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Yeah, right. The inability that certain people have to like see that they had a leg up is

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bonkers to me. But also like this whole passage kind of is, I mean, playing right into what we

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heard him talk about in the earlier clips and basically what the premise of this book is.

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The book is called The Power of I Am. And this paragraph is the entire book.

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I'm going to read it. It says, Here's the principle. Whatever follows the I am will eventually find you.

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When you say I'm so clumsy, clumsiness comes looking for you. I'm so old, wrinkles come looking

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for you. I'm so overweight, calories come looking for you. It's as though you are inviting them in.

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Whatever you follow the I am with, you're handing it an invitation, an open door and giving it

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permission to be in your life. There's a grain of truth to this though, because I suffer from

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negative self-talk. And it's been very helpful for me to replace the negative self-talk with either,

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you know, no self-talk at all, or in cases where that doesn't work, to at least have an affirmation

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in my own head. That has been beneficial because it changes my perspective to what I'm grateful for.

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We always think about bad stuff that you can't change. But it's nice to think about good stuff

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that you can't change. There is value to that. But then he's taking it, he's taking that little

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kernel of like, yeah, you could be cooking with that. And he's now saying like, and that's how

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you're going to become a multimillionaire like me, which is not even the purpose of that kind of mindset.

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Kite Yeah, exactly. And I think the other thing that he does is he says, whatever positive thought

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you have in your mind, God has to act on that. Which means that God responds to our will,

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which is like completely antithetical to what Christians believe, but also like, you should

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believe that God is outside of like the human sphere, right? Or it's not God, it's just like

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this puppet master in the sky. Well, it's so arrogant to think that God has any obligation to serve

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our whims. Now there's there's promises in Scripture that he'll meet your needs. But I think

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with that is the implication that he knows what you need better than you do. So if you're not getting

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what you want, it might not be and there's a danger to what I'm saying here as well. And I

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recognize that it could be done in a problematic way. But it's like if you're not getting what you

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want, it might be a sign that it's not what you need. I think this is actually a situation where

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it's easier to prove God doesn't exist than he does because the vast majority of people get neither.

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Kite I mean, I guess you did say tired Samuel's philosophical Samuel.

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That was not a conversation I was prepared to enter into.

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Sam You should have heard my brain at 5am this morning. You're just like,

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I see the sun rise, but does it truly rise? Kite Oh, my word. I do think what you're saying

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about like the desire to have positive to use positive affirmations, it's sometimes called,

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there's nothing wrong with working on feeling better about yourself and how God created you to

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be. But what Joel Osteen promotes is whatever you want, say that about yourself and then it will be

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true. It's a slight nuance difference, but it makes all the difference in how you view God.

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Sam There's a difference between, you know,

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affirmation and gaslighting. Like something I love about the Gospel of John is John describes

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himself as the disciple whom Jesus loved. I think that's such a cool way of looking at yourself.

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Sam And I think it can be beneficial for

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Christians to see themselves that way. If that was Osteen's mission, I wouldn't have an issue

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with the guy. But he's he's asking John to see himself as the disciple who gets laid and paid.

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Probably not laid, but paid. Kite Oh, man.

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So everything we just talked about, you know, speaking what you want into existence,

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that is relying on a prosperity gospel idea that goes back to the 1800s called positive confessions.

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It's this idea that God only moves based on what our words say, like physically speaking words into

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existence is equal to faith is equal to making God move on your behalf. But the flip side of that,

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which he definitely talks about in this book is called negative confessions. And then some

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traditions has been called like curses. And I'm going to read a little bit about a very strange,

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I'm not sure if Joel believes this or if he's making this up, unclear. But this is kind of

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an example of how he's thinking about these negative confessions. He writes, sometimes the

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reason a promise is being delayed is because of what we're saying. Imagine an answer is on the way,

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God has already dispatched the angel with your healing, your promotion, your vindication. But

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right before it arrives, God says to the angel, Hold on, don't go any further. Stay right where you

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are. The angel replies, Why God? This is what you promised. It's in your word. God answers, No,

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listen to what he's saying. He's talking about how it's not going to happen. How the problem is too

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big. How it's been too long. How he'll never meet the right person. Negative words stop God's

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promises. I wonder how many times we were just a couple months away from seeing the answer. But

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right before that special someone shows up, you let your guard down and start saying, Oh, that's

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not going to happen. Wow, that's really sinister. Right? Like God's just sitting there being like

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grading how positive you are as if there's anything he can't do, which is, by the way, a common way I

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feel like a lot of these bad Christian books scam people is they posit there's some blind spot

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to God's abilities. Like if you believe in an all powerful God, it's almost absurd to have it be

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like, I don't know, this guy's a little too negative for me to really, you know, be omnipotent.

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Yeah. Well, it's also against, like, literally the entire Bible. I feel like a lot of the stories of

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the prophets are stories of quitters who get encouraged. I mean, you look at one of the most

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righteous prophets, it's literally Elijah telling an angel like there is nobody left who cares about

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God. There are men coming to kill me. I am the last person who's left and they're going to get me.

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And the angel doesn't go, you know what, you were wrong, but now you're right because you were too

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negative. He's like, no, you don't know the full story. That was a great example. That is not in

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the book, but that's one of my favorite stories from the Bible, by the way. That's yeah, I mean,

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it is a great one. We're gonna we're gonna dig a little bit more into the Old Testament, because a

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lot of this book, the examples from the book centers around the story of Egypt and the Israelites

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in the desert and that whole world. He literally says on the acknowledgments page that he made all

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of the stories up, which is very bizarre. He writes, some of those mentioned in the book I have not met

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personally. And as the son of a church leader and a pastor myself, I have listened to countless

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sermons and presentations. So in some cases, I can't remember the exact source of a story.

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He tells on himself, literally, pre page one, if this was a comedian, everybody would be dragging

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them on Twitter for stealing jokes. And if that was the worst him making up stories of the book,

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we may not be talking about him. But this book is also like insanely boring. I fell asleep multiple

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times trying to get through it and had to force myself to read a chapter before bed every night

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before I allowed myself to watch Hoarders, which is my like guilty pleasure show of choice.

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That's a great sleep show.

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I enjoy it. But yeah, like, it's just a book of stream of consciousness. It's like whatever comes

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in his brain, he says, most of the stories don't have an ending where you would like find out if

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God came through, it just kind of ends where they say, yes, there's no structure.

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It sounds so avant garde. But I know it's like the most tweet Corpo stuff out there.

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Well, he literally like chapter one, he just starts saying things. And then the chapter ends.

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And then chapter two, he starts saying things.

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He's like caroac.

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The way he writes is he has an aphorism. So some kind of like pithy phrase that like means

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something. Then he mentions an out of context Bible reference. And then he follows it up with

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a weird anecdote that sounds okay, but actually proves nothing. And so because I know how much

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you love grazing mammals, Samuel, I am going to have you read excerpt two called a place of

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abundance. The background of this is that the pithy saying in this chapter is that you need to start

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having a fatted calf mentality. Are you serious?

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Another bovine mentality.

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Yep. 100% serious. And I was like, I have to include this for Samuel.

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So it comes from the story of the prodigal son where the brother who's good is jealous of his

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other brother who gets a fatted calf. And the other brother who was good only ever got a skinny goat,

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which like is not the point of this. Like the point he makes is not the point of the story.

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But anyway, like his whole thing is like, act like you have a fatted calf mentality.

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And then he leads into this story.

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When the Israelites were in the desert in the land of just enough, they got tired of eating the same

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thing every day. They said, Moses, we want some meat to eat out here. They were complaining,

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but at least for a little while they had a fatted calf mentality. Moses thought,

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that's impossible. Meat out here in the desert? Steak for two million people?

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There were no grocery stores, no warehouses to buy truckloads of meat.

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But God has ways to increase you that you've never thought of.

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God simply shifted the direction of the wind and caused a huge flock of quail to come into the camp.

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They didn't have to go after it. The food came to them. What's interesting is that quail don't

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normally travel that far away from water. If there had not been a strong wind, the quail would never

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have made it way out there in the desert. What am I saying? What are you saying, Joel? God knows how

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to get your provision to you. I find myself stumbling over his words a lot because there's

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a weird kind of... Oh yeah. They're arranged in a very... He just says things. He's just saying things.

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Joel's just spitballing. No need for a new draft. A statistician ran some numbers. A stati...

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A statistician ran... Yeah, you know, he's causing me to stumble.

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A statistician ran some numbers. Based on the size of the camp, the number of people,

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and enough quail to be three feet off the ground, as the scripture says, he concluded that there

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were approximately 105 million quail that came into the camp. Also, it's like, it's an ancient

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text. They just threw a number out there. That's an abundant god. He could have given them a couple

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of quail per person, which would have been four or five million quail. But God doesn't just want

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to meet your needs. He wants to do it in abundance. The question is, are you thinking skinny goat?

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Skinny goat. Or are you thinking fatted calf?

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Well, Joel, I could never afford a nice place to live. Can I say this respectfully? Skinny goat.

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I could never send my kids to the college they really want to attend. Skinny goat.

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What's that like to live deliciously? I'm gonna have so much fun with that in the edit,

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Mary. You have no idea. Well, yeah, I read that. I was like, oh, man,

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have to have to break that out. But I mean, so what do you think, Samuel? Are you a

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fatted calf? Or are you a skinny goat? I'm a fatted calf son and a skinny goat rising.

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Actually flip it around. I think I'm a fatted calf rising in a skinny goat, skinny goat son,

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because people look at me and they're like, this guy, just nothing phases him. And then they like

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talk to me and they're like, that is the darkest thing I've ever heard somebody say. And I'm like,

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I'm so sorry. I didn't sleep last night. Oh, man. And she like, I have no idea what

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you're even talking about, because I don't know anything about astrology. And I'm like a very bad

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millennial woman for that. It's funny, because I feel like Joel vibes with tarot and astrology in

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ways that I'm not even sure he knows. Like I have, I do the labyrinthos tarot app on my phone. And

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it's like, I'm not sure I know anything about it. And next to each of the cards, they will give

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affirmations or it'll say stuff like, I am grateful for what I have, or like I am loved. And it is so

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similar to the language that he is using. And to be clear, I think it's hokey in both scenarios.

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I just want to see what the card says.

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So the context of the story, right, is the Israelites were slaves in Egypt,

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God called Moses and was like, go save your people. Moses did that. There were all the plagues. This

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is where Passover starts. And then they go into the wilderness. And then they have like a bunch

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of people in the wilderness who are like, let me eat. The number of times before this and after

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this where the Israelites like constantly say, I wish we would have died as slaves in Egypt.

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And why did you bring us here to die? And like he even writes here that like, Moses, we want meat.

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And he says that like, that's a fatted calf mentality. But like literally, they weren't saying

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like, oh, we want meat, we believe they were saying literally, we're gonna die because we're

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in a desert and there's no meat. Well, I would argue the pinnacle of this so called fatted calf

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mentality is what Moses was treated to when he left the mount and saw that they had built a giant

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calf to manifest calf meat. Like they built an idol of a fatted calf because they didn't believe.

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To me, the whole mentality being everything thing falls apart immediately when you like take

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idolatry into account. I hadn't thought about that aspect of the story. But you're right,

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that happens not that long after this. And it's like to me, that shows a much deeper problem that

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they had as a group of survivors, which is like, we're not even fully behind our leader. Well,

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and exactly like, literally the story of Moses getting called from the time Moses is called

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by the burning bush to his death, literally through like the rest of the Old Testament,

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over and over again, it's people being negative and God being like, be quiet, I'm going to do it

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anyway. It's the whole story of Jonah. Like, Jonah is just like, this is a bad idea, this isn't going

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to work. He ends up in Nineveh and nobody dies. I mean, literally, like Moses says multiple times

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when he's called, he says, Who am I? I have a weak tongue. No one's gonna listen to me because I

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murdered a guy. And God's response is, he says his name, I am who I am. And if you notice the

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similarities to the title of this book in that, we're gonna come back to that later. Well, that

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was my first thought, because I thought that was what the book was going to be about. Like, he's

392
00:37:22,480 --> 00:37:28,000
like, God says, I am who I am. So what if we adopted the same mentality? But no, it's like,

393
00:37:28,000 --> 00:37:34,320
I am rich. That's not being who you are. That's being what you think you should be. I also liked

394
00:37:34,320 --> 00:37:40,480
how at the end, he just has this weird anecdote about an unnamed statistician. Wow, that is hard

395
00:37:40,480 --> 00:37:47,440
to say. It's a hard word. Some math person who does calculations based on some unknown formula

396
00:37:48,080 --> 00:37:54,320
that proves that the Israelites were right to complain in the first place. I don't even know

397
00:37:54,320 --> 00:37:58,160
how he did the math because no one knows how many Israelites were in the desert at this point,

398
00:37:58,160 --> 00:38:03,680
because like, Exodus contradicts numbers. It's almost like they had to eyeball it or something.

399
00:38:03,680 --> 00:38:10,480
Yeah, right. Okay, so just to prove that the Old Testament is literally about people having

400
00:38:10,480 --> 00:38:19,200
negative confessions and God providing for them anyway, we're gonna jump to what Joel Osteen says

401
00:38:19,200 --> 00:38:26,400
about the story of Gideon. And that is the next little part that I'd love for you to read, Samuel.

402
00:38:26,400 --> 00:38:30,720
Very interesting. I find the book of Judges fascinating. Let's do this.

403
00:38:30,720 --> 00:38:37,680
Just to clarify, this is the Bible. I'm having you read the Bible story, not what Joel Osteen says.

404
00:38:37,680 --> 00:39:00,640
All righty, this is from Judges 6.

405
00:39:07,680 --> 00:39:14,080
This is a little eerie to read right now.

406
00:39:37,680 --> 00:39:39,600
keep it from the Midianites.

407
00:40:07,680 --> 00:40:13,440
Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian's hand. Am I not sending you?

408
00:40:14,480 --> 00:40:21,600
Pardon me, my lord, Gideon replied, but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh,

409
00:40:21,600 --> 00:40:27,520
and I am the least in my family. The Lord answered, I will be with you, and you will strike down all

410
00:40:27,520 --> 00:40:34,320
the Midianites, leaving none alive. Gideon replied, if now I have found favor in your eyes,

411
00:40:34,320 --> 00:40:40,800
give me a sign that it is really you talking to me. Yeah, Gideon's kind of like, okay,

412
00:40:41,440 --> 00:40:43,280
this sounds a little too good to be true.

413
00:40:43,840 --> 00:40:50,960
I mean, he literally says all the things that, at this point, Joel had spent about 80 pages

414
00:40:50,960 --> 00:40:57,440
telling me not to say out loud, or God's gonna stop the blessing angel from coming to me.

415
00:40:57,440 --> 00:41:00,080
He's being a bit of a skinny goat, is what I'm hearing.

416
00:41:00,080 --> 00:41:06,560
Yeah, exactly. In the book, Joel stops after halfway through, when the angel of the Lord

417
00:41:06,560 --> 00:41:10,880
appeared to Gideon, he said, the Lord is with you, mighty warrior. That's the end of the story

418
00:41:11,600 --> 00:41:17,520
in the book. And then Joel says, if you allow the wrong thoughts to play in your mind,

419
00:41:17,520 --> 00:41:22,320
you can have the talent, the opportunity, the strengths, and the looks. But like Gideon,

420
00:41:22,320 --> 00:41:26,960
you'll make excuses and talk yourself out of it. You may think you're ordinary,

421
00:41:26,960 --> 00:41:29,200
but God sees the DNA of a champion.

422
00:41:29,200 --> 00:41:31,040
Wait, did he read the story?

423
00:41:31,040 --> 00:41:38,800
Right. So yeah, he says, start seeing yourself as a mighty hero. And I'm like, what?

424
00:41:39,440 --> 00:41:46,640
Yeah, like not to go extreme here, but it would be similar to him using Jesus asking God to save

425
00:41:46,640 --> 00:41:50,320
him from having to make the sacrifice. And then being like, are you going to be like Jesus and

426
00:41:50,320 --> 00:41:55,440
give up? And it's like, Joel, Jesus died. Like he did the thing he didn't want to do.

427
00:41:55,440 --> 00:42:00,080
Well, and Gideon is known for being the guy who did it.

428
00:42:00,080 --> 00:42:07,360
Right. And literally, Gideon goes on after this passage to test God at least two more times.

429
00:42:07,920 --> 00:42:14,720
And like, literally the entire section of this story, he's constantly being like, God, you got

430
00:42:14,720 --> 00:42:22,560
the wrong guy. And then God says, suck it up. And then he does. Like he never has, he never says

431
00:42:22,560 --> 00:42:28,320
good things into existence. Which by the way, all the heroes of the Old Testament are negative,

432
00:42:28,320 --> 00:42:34,480
like are negative about themselves with maybe the exception of David, like Moses, don't do it. I'm

433
00:42:34,480 --> 00:42:40,880
not the guy. Jacob literally wrestles with God. And it's like, you know, God injures him after

434
00:42:40,880 --> 00:42:43,920
that. But it's almost like him being like, good fight, man.

435
00:42:43,920 --> 00:42:49,200
What the Old Testament shows, without a doubt, even the most cursory understanding of it you

436
00:42:49,200 --> 00:42:56,560
could have is that the Israelites consistently over years were people who did not have faith,

437
00:42:56,560 --> 00:43:05,840
who complained, who sinned, who did X, Y, and Z, and God remains faithful. And so to end halfway

438
00:43:05,840 --> 00:43:11,120
through and then distort it and say, oh, well, you can also just speak things into existence.

439
00:43:11,120 --> 00:43:19,040
I mean, it's like the most egregious way to talk about the Bible. I mean, and also is just like,

440
00:43:19,600 --> 00:43:23,200
how stupid do you think we are as well? Because it's just so dumb.

441
00:43:23,200 --> 00:43:30,000
I'm totally with you. It's, it really, it to me, it reeks of the days in which the church

442
00:43:30,560 --> 00:43:36,560
did not allow the Bible to be translated. Because Joel is counting on you not knowing how those

443
00:43:36,560 --> 00:43:42,880
stories go for his points to stick. You have to wonder in the days when there was no translation

444
00:43:42,880 --> 00:43:47,840
of scripture that the common person could read when literacy levels were low, what kind of

445
00:43:47,840 --> 00:43:52,560
stretches were leaders making then? I mean, we know they were doing indulgences.

446
00:43:52,560 --> 00:43:58,240
You give money to the church in order to have favor with God. And I also want to point out kind of

447
00:43:58,240 --> 00:44:02,400
like what you were talking about earlier, there is a hair of truth in this, you know, like you can

448
00:44:02,400 --> 00:44:08,080
definitely look at the story of Gideon and be like, the Lord says you're a mighty warrior,

449
00:44:08,080 --> 00:44:13,600
even though he's like, no, I'm not. And even though like Gideon literally had done nothing

450
00:44:13,600 --> 00:44:19,120
in his life, except be ordinary to that point. So this idea of like, believing in living into who

451
00:44:19,120 --> 00:44:24,320
God says you are, even if you don't see it, there's a kernel of truth there.

452
00:44:24,320 --> 00:44:29,280
Well, I'm feeling so glib today, because I'm like, the kernel of truth is that song

453
00:44:29,280 --> 00:44:34,000
from the Prince of Egypt where it says look at your life through heaven's eyes, like the way you

454
00:44:34,000 --> 00:44:40,880
see yourself might not be the full story. Yeah. Oh, I love that. I think the piece that

455
00:44:40,880 --> 00:44:48,320
Joel misses is like, you can say positive things or have affirmations or you know, have better talk

456
00:44:48,320 --> 00:44:54,880
about yourself, but it needs to be rooted in what God says about you and what God wants.

457
00:44:54,880 --> 00:45:01,600
It's not just like whatever you want. And when you turn those on their head, you know, it does

458
00:45:01,600 --> 00:45:07,840
distort the character of God. If you're a Christian, it distorts the gospel that you say you believe in

459
00:45:07,840 --> 00:45:14,880
because it puts you in the driver's seat. And I think whether you're a Christian or not,

460
00:45:15,520 --> 00:45:22,000
the giant red flag here is it puts enormous power into the hands of humans, which we're going to

461
00:45:22,000 --> 00:45:28,960
dive way deeper into next week, but has led to unspeakable abuses. Well, and we should say to

462
00:45:28,960 --> 00:45:36,400
enormous power in the hands of humans that are benefiting from an already power imbalance. I

463
00:45:36,400 --> 00:45:44,400
mean, it's it's no mistake that Joel is sitting on Oprah's stage and selling the snake oil to

464
00:45:44,400 --> 00:45:50,400
people. There was a really good quote I read in a Financial Times article that says, you know,

465
00:45:50,400 --> 00:45:57,040
Times article that that quoted a social scientist and this is the quote, preachers like Osteen know

466
00:45:57,040 --> 00:46:03,120
how to work the modern marketplace. They are like the mega mall of religion with an Amazon account

467
00:46:03,120 --> 00:46:10,640
added on. They are at the cutting edge of consumer trends. Wow, that's, that's eerie and it's dead

468
00:46:10,640 --> 00:46:17,920
on. To me, it shows that there is in fact a God at play with these things, but it is not the God of,

469
00:46:17,920 --> 00:46:23,680
you know, Abraham and Isaac. It's not the God of the apostles. It is the God of the free market,

470
00:46:23,680 --> 00:46:28,640
this thing we call the invisible hand. It's something you can't see, but people still appeal

471
00:46:28,640 --> 00:46:35,680
to and that we talk about the golden calf. I think this is the same God is that. Well, and I think

472
00:46:35,680 --> 00:46:42,000
kind of as we've said in like almost every episode, it creates a new form of legalism,

473
00:46:42,000 --> 00:46:50,720
legalism through simplification. It puts all of the impetus on the individual to have faith in the

474
00:46:50,720 --> 00:47:00,720
right way, say the right words and never fail in that as a way to meet God. When the Bible lays out

475
00:47:00,720 --> 00:47:07,200
fairly clearly, like faith is not supposed to be based on what you do. Yeah. Well, I mean, that's

476
00:47:07,200 --> 00:47:11,280
always the tricky thing, right? Because there's the concept of faith that that works is dead,

477
00:47:11,280 --> 00:47:17,440
but I do think that prosperity Christians in America really throw that in your face and

478
00:47:17,440 --> 00:47:24,160
that it becomes only about works because, because nuance is dead. Yeah. Well, it becomes about works

479
00:47:24,160 --> 00:47:30,800
for their congregants, but very little work for themselves. And so that was kind of the end of

480
00:47:30,800 --> 00:47:36,640
like what I wanted to say about this book. I'll be very happy to return it to the library, but I kind

481
00:47:36,640 --> 00:47:43,520
of wanted to dig into a little bit of that of like, what are the works that Joel Osteen has? Like,

482
00:47:43,520 --> 00:47:51,440
what is the fruit? The first is that he has zero financial accountability. This probably surprises

483
00:47:51,440 --> 00:47:59,440
no one, but Ministry Watch, basically they rate different churches and denominations on a confidence

484
00:47:59,440 --> 00:48:05,680
score of like how confident a donor could be that their funding will go to the right place or, you

485
00:48:05,680 --> 00:48:10,640
know, whatever. Would you like to guess what percentage out of a hundred they got? For Joel

486
00:48:10,640 --> 00:48:17,440
Osteen? For Joel Osteen Lakewood Church? I'm going to say, honestly, I'm going to go big and say zero.

487
00:48:17,440 --> 00:48:25,120
Yeah, he didn't get to zero, but he is at a solid six. A six is very close to zero where percentages

488
00:48:25,120 --> 00:48:35,360
are very close to zero. Yeah. It says, does the board have more than two non-independent

489
00:48:35,360 --> 00:48:42,720
members? The answer is no. Fun fact, he does not have a board. There is no board for Lakewood Church.

490
00:48:42,720 --> 00:48:48,880
There's a bunch of stuff about the board that's all wrong. Does the organization file a Form 990

491
00:48:48,880 --> 00:48:55,040
and make it available to the public? The answer is no. Does the organization have an audit or review

492
00:48:55,040 --> 00:49:01,360
that is available on the website? No. Is the CEO presence compensation that's Joel Osteen within

493
00:49:01,360 --> 00:49:09,040
one standard deviation of the median compensation? No. Does the organization operate at a net profit

494
00:49:09,040 --> 00:49:15,200
in the most recent year? Yes. So that would be like a pro for them. In the past five years,

495
00:49:15,200 --> 00:49:22,560
has the organization been free of any lawsuits or administrative actions? No. So I mean, it goes on

496
00:49:22,560 --> 00:49:28,400
and on, but basically they have an F. That should be a red flag in and of itself as nonprofits.

497
00:49:28,400 --> 00:49:33,520
I mean, the very lack of some like, listen, I don't like bureaucracy any more than an ex-guy,

498
00:49:33,520 --> 00:49:39,840
but a lack of oversight is what I'm hearing by no church board. That's bad. The church is a

499
00:49:39,840 --> 00:49:45,280
nonprofit status. That means they don't have to pay taxes in the same way that like everyone else

500
00:49:45,280 --> 00:49:52,960
does. With that status, there is an understanding of an amount of oversight that exists as a legal

501
00:49:52,960 --> 00:49:59,200
status, which they do not have. And then you add on that they are prosperity gospel preachers.

502
00:49:59,200 --> 00:50:03,920
That money is not going into the work of the Lord. It's complicated because I think separation of

503
00:50:03,920 --> 00:50:09,680
church and state is good, but I think that the tax exempt status has created such a loophole where

504
00:50:09,680 --> 00:50:14,880
it's like, what does America do to really enforce that? Oh, nothing. Nothing. Because it's like

505
00:50:14,880 --> 00:50:20,160
Scientology exists. I have friends who are ex-Mormon. They told me how much money the

506
00:50:20,160 --> 00:50:25,280
Mormon church, which is hemorrhaging members, is sitting on. It's insane. I mean, they just have a

507
00:50:25,280 --> 00:50:31,200
war chest, the likes of which Fortune 500 companies would kill for, literally. The next little piece

508
00:50:31,200 --> 00:50:37,520
of fruit that I was going to talk about kind of ties into that. So in March, 2023, there was a

509
00:50:37,520 --> 00:50:43,680
widespread scandal with Hillsong Church. They're based in Australia, where Australia is much better

510
00:50:43,680 --> 00:50:50,080
than the US at investigating nonprofits. Basically Hillsong, which has this huge brand, they have

511
00:50:50,080 --> 00:50:56,560
these like conferences all over the world. They had this scam where like mega church pastors could

512
00:50:56,560 --> 00:51:02,880
buy their way into this list that they had called the Hillsong family. These are like massive

513
00:51:02,880 --> 00:51:08,320
donations coming out of individual churches. Joel Osteen was one of the people on here, although

514
00:51:08,320 --> 00:51:15,280
it's not clear whether he paid or he was already on the list prior to like the scam happening.

515
00:51:15,280 --> 00:51:21,360
But in return for those donations, the pastors would get perks like being invited to speak at

516
00:51:21,360 --> 00:51:26,960
Hillsong's events, where at those events they could have these like huge honorariums and then

517
00:51:26,960 --> 00:51:33,280
like profit from like selling their merchandise. These pastors would be invited to luxurious

518
00:51:33,280 --> 00:51:38,640
over-the-top Hillsong family retreats several times a year. We know about this because the

519
00:51:38,640 --> 00:51:45,200
Australian government is investigating specifically this scam. But the majority of the pastors here

520
00:51:45,200 --> 00:51:52,720
are from American churches. So besides just the lack of financial accountability, I wanted to dig

521
00:51:52,720 --> 00:52:01,120
a little bit into two incidents that happened with Joel Osteen in 2017 that I think really show that

522
00:52:01,120 --> 00:52:06,080
while he claims the money that you give to the church is going to help people in need, that may

523
00:52:06,080 --> 00:52:10,480
not really be where the money is going. Both of these events happened in like August, September

524
00:52:10,480 --> 00:52:20,080
of 2017 back to back. The first was his response to the neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville. While I

525
00:52:20,080 --> 00:52:25,040
think in general it's probably a good thing when churches sometimes try to stay out of politics,

526
00:52:25,040 --> 00:52:32,560
in this case like when something's just so obviously wrong, even the most trying to take it easy mega

527
00:52:32,560 --> 00:52:38,800
church pastors spoke out against what happened. Joel Osteen did not. He first posted a Facebook

528
00:52:38,800 --> 00:52:46,640
post in 2017 that is still up and it reads, one of the biggest challenges we face is getting along

529
00:52:46,640 --> 00:52:52,800
with people because everyone is different. We have different personalities, different temperaments,

530
00:52:52,800 --> 00:52:57,920
we come from different backgrounds. When someone doesn't agree with us, it's easy to get in conflict

531
00:52:57,920 --> 00:53:03,680
with them, to argue, to try to straighten them out, to prove our point. No, you have to be the

532
00:53:03,680 --> 00:53:09,840
bigger person. Just because they're doing wrong doesn't mean you have to engage. Wow, that is so

533
00:53:09,840 --> 00:53:16,800
sinister, especially when you consider like these protests happened because people in a black church

534
00:53:16,800 --> 00:53:24,400
were murdered by a white supremacist terrorist. A woman died in the protest when a white supremacist

535
00:53:24,400 --> 00:53:30,720
drove his car into the crowd. I mean this isn't as simple as a disagreement. And then he has the gall

536
00:53:30,720 --> 00:53:36,160
for his tone to be scolding and it's very vague. We don't know who but we can kind of guess who he's

537
00:53:36,160 --> 00:53:42,080
scolding here. Well yeah, I think people rightly got very offended. So I just bring that up to say

538
00:53:42,080 --> 00:53:48,480
that like I think that really put him in the spotlight in secular spaces. He never wants to

539
00:53:48,480 --> 00:53:57,440
say anything negative. His whole message is about placating people. Well and there's a kind of fear

540
00:53:57,440 --> 00:54:03,520
in his attitude. I actually see this interpersonally when there are people who cannot stand to say

541
00:54:03,520 --> 00:54:09,440
anything negative. It's usually because they're deadly afraid that that negative thing is the

542
00:54:09,440 --> 00:54:15,040
truth. The negative thing doesn't have to be the truth but usually the truth is much more complicated

543
00:54:15,040 --> 00:54:21,920
than light or dark. So that was obviously not great. Right after that, Hurricane Harvey hit Houston,

544
00:54:21,920 --> 00:54:29,360
the city in which his church is. It was one of the most extreme rainfall events in US history.

545
00:54:29,360 --> 00:54:37,280
Some areas of the city had 50 inches of rainfall. Thousands were displaced. If you talk to a Texan

546
00:54:37,280 --> 00:54:43,440
about Joel Osteen, I have family who live in Texas and they bring this up as the reason why

547
00:54:43,440 --> 00:54:50,400
like they hate him. The Lakewood Church didn't open their doors in the first days of Hurricane

548
00:54:50,400 --> 00:54:55,920
Harvey to anyone who was displaced. I mean 50 inches is like the equivalent of four feet.

549
00:54:55,920 --> 00:55:02,560
You only need like a foot of moving water to be lethal and just like irreversible property damage.

550
00:55:03,120 --> 00:55:08,480
Right exactly. Truly a miracle. More people didn't die. Thousands and thousands of people

551
00:55:08,480 --> 00:55:14,640
across the city did not have homes to go to and a lot of the places that like theoretically would

552
00:55:14,640 --> 00:55:19,920
have been like the shelter or whatever like also was flooded. In his style, he wrote one of these

553
00:55:19,920 --> 00:55:26,880
like placating tweets that was just like, God has the best for you even in hard times or something

554
00:55:26,880 --> 00:55:32,720
like that. You're really seeing the masks start to fall off. It's like word salad, mystification,

555
00:55:32,720 --> 00:55:39,920
and vague positivity can only get you so far. But as the world gets darker, it does sort of reveal

556
00:55:39,920 --> 00:55:47,840
these things for the BS that they are. They didn't open the church. They issued on Saturday,

557
00:55:47,840 --> 00:55:52,240
which I don't remember exactly what day of the week like the hurricane first hit, but it's like

558
00:55:52,240 --> 00:55:58,320
several days into kind of the crisis. Church officials issued a Facebook statement that said

559
00:55:58,320 --> 00:56:04,800
that the church was inaccessible due to severe flooding. There was a huge internet storm because

560
00:56:05,440 --> 00:56:10,400
people had photos of like the outside of the church because the church is up on a hill. So

561
00:56:10,400 --> 00:56:16,400
like there was no water around the church. A spokesperson for the church later said like,

562
00:56:16,400 --> 00:56:22,720
I don't know why people are saying it was closed. It was never closed. They just were talking out

563
00:56:22,720 --> 00:56:29,200
of all sides of their mouth. To this day, they now open their church. They're like one of the first

564
00:56:29,200 --> 00:56:35,280
ones to open it in any storm, which I guess is great. But when you're thinking about like,

565
00:56:35,280 --> 00:56:40,960
where are the millions of dollars going? The answer is it's not to the people around them.

566
00:56:40,960 --> 00:56:46,800
Sam Brace Do you think he sees generosity almost as a skinny goat mentality? Like, oh, if I'm being

567
00:56:46,800 --> 00:56:51,840
generous, then that suggests that there are people in need instead of people who aren't just about

568
00:56:51,840 --> 00:56:55,520
to receive their blessing. I mean, that's assuming he believes any of what he's saying.

569
00:56:55,520 --> 00:57:00,400
Katie Grant That's a great question. I've been thinking a lot about our Dave Ramsey episodes.

570
00:57:00,400 --> 00:57:07,040
Dave Ramsey has a prosperity gospel message. You know, the same mentality of like, each individual

571
00:57:07,040 --> 00:57:15,120
can create their own power in a way that is so antithetical to how I think how God calls you to

572
00:57:15,120 --> 00:57:21,440
live out your faith. His message falls flat in so many ways. But I think the biggest way is that

573
00:57:21,440 --> 00:57:29,760
like, if we could really create reality with our words, why would I be putting out, give me a

574
00:57:29,760 --> 00:57:37,760
promotion at work? Totally, right? Like, if you believe that all humans are made in the image of

575
00:57:37,760 --> 00:57:48,080
God, put out, I want war to end, or I'm going to end genocide in this world, or end poverty and

576
00:57:48,080 --> 00:57:53,120
illness on a mass scale. Sam Brace This is like kind of goes back to my question of like,

577
00:57:53,120 --> 00:57:58,880
in trying to end those things, would he say that you're admitting those things exist,

578
00:57:58,880 --> 00:58:06,480
which would be bad because it's negative? Do you admit that you have need? Or do you just focus on

579
00:58:06,480 --> 00:58:10,480
the greed? I didn't mean for that to rhyme, but there's something interesting there.

580
00:58:10,480 --> 00:58:13,920
Katie Grant It's very pithy saying you could start your own book with.

581
00:58:13,920 --> 00:58:15,680
Sam Brace Oh, I should do a bad Christian book.

582
00:58:15,680 --> 00:58:22,720
Katie Grant Well, and I mean, I think it ties into what we were talking about with Dave Ramsey.

583
00:58:22,720 --> 00:58:31,920
It's created in a way that the individual can't win. Anything that you don't receive is your fault

584
00:58:31,920 --> 00:58:40,240
because of lack of faith. And anything that these like gurus have, they've earned through faith.

585
00:58:40,240 --> 00:58:50,080
When you tie it into someone's spiritual health, that is an abuse at a level that I put among like

586
00:58:50,080 --> 00:58:54,320
the worst things a person can do, truly. Sam Brace Well, it's a little bit like that verse

587
00:58:54,320 --> 00:58:58,640
where it's like, it's better to have a millstone wrapped around your neck and tossed into the sea

588
00:58:59,360 --> 00:59:04,320
than to, you know, I think the context of that verse is then to discourage little ones. But I

589
00:59:04,320 --> 00:59:10,160
think with that is what is discouragement if not preying upon somebody's faith?

590
00:59:10,160 --> 00:59:12,960
Katie Grant I can understand how it could be comforting to feel like,

591
00:59:12,960 --> 00:59:16,880
okay, well, this actually is in my hands because I can control my faith.

592
00:59:16,880 --> 00:59:20,160
Sam Brace And that's the interesting thing to me is I think simplicity,

593
00:59:20,720 --> 00:59:25,440
this push for simplicity that we've seen literally in every single person we've covered for bad

594
00:59:25,440 --> 00:59:33,280
Christian books, beneath that desire for simplicity is a desire for control. If you believe in God,

595
00:59:33,920 --> 00:59:39,360
I do think the need to control that which you can't control is one of the first things you have to

596
00:59:39,360 --> 00:59:45,760
give up. That's easier said than done. And I certainly have compassion for the average person

597
00:59:45,760 --> 00:59:49,280
who struggles with that. I'm in that boat. We all try to control.

598
00:59:49,280 --> 00:59:53,280
Katie Grant I was gonna say, God's working with me on it. I'll just say that.

599
00:59:53,280 --> 01:00:00,800
Sam Brace Sure. Yeah. And I don't have compassion for folks who do have control,

600
01:00:01,600 --> 01:00:07,120
and they create a false narrative for how they got it, and they use it to make other people feel

601
01:00:07,120 --> 01:00:16,240
worthless.

602
01:00:16,240 --> 01:00:24,640
Katie Grant There's also some really wild,

603
01:00:24,640 --> 01:00:29,840
weird Olsteen scandals that have happened. I just said Olsteen with an L. O-steen.

604
01:00:29,840 --> 01:00:32,480
Sam Brace Spill the O-s-T, Mary.

605
01:00:32,480 --> 01:00:43,600
Katie Grant Yeah, so one is that he and Kanye West did this weird baptism slash service where

606
01:00:43,600 --> 01:00:48,960
they pretended they could walk on water, and there was a choir in the background.

607
01:00:48,960 --> 01:00:55,760
Sam Brace I didn't realize that Joe Olsteen was a potential keynote speaker at Donda University.

608
01:00:55,760 --> 01:00:59,440
Katie Grant But you should go look up the pictures. They're kind of weird. The second weird

609
01:00:59,440 --> 01:01:05,280
scandal, quote unquote, is like there was a plumber working in Lakewood Church. He apparently found

610
01:01:05,280 --> 01:01:10,960
$600,000 in cash stuck into the wall of the church.

611
01:01:10,960 --> 01:01:13,760
Sam Brace I heard about this. There's always money in the banana stand.

612
01:01:13,760 --> 01:01:18,560
Katie Grant Well, and I guess, again, I also didn't go very deep into this because people kept being

613
01:01:18,560 --> 01:01:23,280
like, why is there money, blah, blah, blah. And from what I read, I think it was just someone

614
01:01:23,280 --> 01:01:30,720
stole from the church and then hid it in the wall and then couldn't come back for it.

615
01:01:30,720 --> 01:01:34,160
It doesn't seem like there was anything wrong in the part of the church except they just

616
01:01:34,720 --> 01:01:41,040
had that much money in cash, but we know that. So I said earlier that we're going to come back to

617
01:01:41,920 --> 01:01:43,440
the meaning of God's name.

618
01:01:43,440 --> 01:01:46,240
Sam Brace Well, yeah, I mean, just as a refresher,

619
01:01:46,240 --> 01:01:52,720
the story is, you know, this is sort of Moses's origin story. He's fled from Egypt after killing

620
01:01:52,720 --> 01:01:59,120
somebody. He's a shepherd. He sees a burning bush, and the burning bush is God's presence.

621
01:01:59,120 --> 01:02:03,920
And it tells him to, you know, go back to Egypt, this place that you fled from, and tell them who

622
01:02:03,920 --> 01:02:08,480
I am. And he's like, well, who am I going to tell them you are? God's answer is simply say,

623
01:02:08,480 --> 01:02:15,600
tell them I am who I am, or more accurately, I am that I am. But basically, this idea that I speak

624
01:02:15,600 --> 01:02:17,680
for myself, I am the God of gods.

625
01:02:17,680 --> 01:02:20,400
Sam Brace The Israelites that Moses would be going back to

626
01:02:20,960 --> 01:02:28,000
have not heard from God in 400 years. He doesn't really talk about the story except in the half

627
01:02:28,000 --> 01:02:34,640
baked ways that we already talked about. So I was looking up the meaning of this name and,

628
01:02:34,640 --> 01:02:38,880
you know, digging into it a little bit, I came across this organization called the Center for

629
01:02:38,880 --> 01:02:47,920
Hebraic Thought. What they do is they publish and support people who try to put the Bible back into

630
01:02:48,560 --> 01:02:54,160
the context of how the person writing it would understand it, especially the Old Testament,

631
01:02:54,160 --> 01:02:58,000
but also the New Testament, because the New Testament was written by Jewish people,

632
01:02:58,000 --> 01:03:04,320
for the most part. One of their scholars writes, to the Hebrew to be does not just mean to exist,

633
01:03:04,320 --> 01:03:11,920
but to be active, to express oneself in active being. Perhaps a helpful paraphrase of God's word

634
01:03:11,920 --> 01:03:18,800
at the burning bush would be, say to the people of Israel, I am present has sent me to you.

635
01:03:18,800 --> 01:03:20,560
Sam Brace I never left, essentially.

636
01:03:20,560 --> 01:03:23,680
Sam Brace Right. And then you compare it to the God

637
01:03:23,680 --> 01:03:28,560
that Joel Osteen promotes. They're truly opposite of each other.

638
01:03:28,560 --> 01:03:31,040
Sam Brace And you even see that in how Osteen is

639
01:03:31,040 --> 01:03:36,800
interpreting Scripture. I mean, Gideon, his telling of Gideon's story is the polar opposite

640
01:03:36,800 --> 01:03:42,160
of the actual arc of that story. It's almost like this guy has no credentials other than inheriting

641
01:03:42,160 --> 01:03:43,680
a job from his daddy. Lina Hickman

642
01:03:43,680 --> 01:03:49,040
It was almost like an inheritance. But in doing that inheritance, there was just this complete

643
01:03:49,040 --> 01:03:50,880
disconnect from Scripture. Sam Brace

644
01:03:50,880 --> 01:03:55,040
It makes so much sense, though, because that's how generational wealth operates. You have to keep it

645
01:03:55,040 --> 01:04:00,720
in the family. And if your wealth hinges upon a story, then your son and your grandson and your

646
01:04:00,720 --> 01:04:05,920
great great grandson, and I am deliberately framing it patriarchal, they need to keep telling that

647
01:04:05,920 --> 01:04:06,640
story. Lina Hickman

648
01:04:06,640 --> 01:04:10,560
Yeah, that is this book, Joel Osteen. Sam Brace

649
01:04:10,560 --> 01:04:12,160
That's our boy. Lina Hickman

650
01:04:12,160 --> 01:04:16,320
Yeah. Next episode, we're going to dive into kind of some of the stuff we very hinted at.

651
01:04:16,320 --> 01:04:21,760
Specifically, we're going to follow someone who did choose to leave and not follow the prosperity

652
01:04:21,760 --> 01:04:25,520
gospel movement that they were kind of raised into and what they have to say.

653
01:04:25,520 --> 01:04:27,760
Sam Brace Well, I'm looking forward to that. Stay

654
01:04:27,760 --> 01:04:33,360
tuned for that next episode, then. I feel like I'm Stan Lee here being like, stay tuned loyal

655
01:04:33,360 --> 01:04:34,960
listeners. Lina Hickman

656
01:04:34,960 --> 01:04:37,760
Anytime we can get Spider-Man in an episode, we win.

657
01:04:37,760 --> 01:04:39,920
Sam Brace What's funny is I think any references to

658
01:04:39,920 --> 01:04:44,160
Spider-Man always get cut. So eventually we're going to be like, we keep referencing Spider-Man

659
01:04:44,160 --> 01:04:45,680
and the listeners are going to be like, Lina Hickman

660
01:04:45,680 --> 01:04:51,680
But only to ourselves. Actually, you know, it's funny, my partner, when I was reading this to them,

661
01:04:51,680 --> 01:04:57,040
so I explained the whole like, whatever you say I am, like, that's what it is. And literally,

662
01:04:57,040 --> 01:05:02,160
for a week straight, every morning they woke up turned over to me and said, I am a Jedi,

663
01:05:02,160 --> 01:05:05,120
and then got out of bed. I'll never join you.

664
01:05:05,920 --> 01:05:11,520
If you only knew the power of I am. That's all to say, Samuel, do you have any

665
01:05:12,480 --> 01:05:14,960
affirmations you want to speak into the universe?

666
01:05:14,960 --> 01:05:19,280
Sam Brace I am a highly successful writer of Christian

667
01:05:19,280 --> 01:05:26,320
horror. I am reaching a lot of people, and they are listening to this and they are going to check

668
01:05:26,320 --> 01:05:35,120
it out. I'm going to speak into the world. We will get many five star reviews in the next few weeks.

669
01:05:35,120 --> 01:05:37,520
Sam Brace I am certain this is the case.

670
01:05:37,520 --> 01:05:42,400
Mary Katz Oh my gosh. It's so dumb. I'm sorry. Okay.

671
01:05:42,400 --> 01:05:50,160
Our social handles are at bad Christian pod or bad Christian books. You can email us at

672
01:05:50,160 --> 01:05:52,640
badchristianbooks.gmail.com. Sam Brace

673
01:05:52,640 --> 01:05:59,360
I'm going to say one more I am, Mary. But it's going to be a we are. We are the Oprah

674
01:05:59,920 --> 01:06:06,800
of bad Christian books. Because every two weeks, you get a book, and you get a book, and you get a

675
01:06:06,800 --> 01:06:10,640
book. And what's more, it's a deep dive. Mary Katz I love it.

676
01:06:10,640 --> 01:06:12,640
Sam Brace Very similar to Joe Osteen, Mary was like,

677
01:06:12,640 --> 01:06:16,720
I have an idea about an Oprah joke. And then I immediately was like, oh, I've got it. And then

678
01:06:16,720 --> 01:06:19,680
I just did her idea. Mary Katz

679
01:06:19,680 --> 01:06:25,600
Yeah, so this has been bad Christian books. And we'll see you for the next dumpster dive.

680
01:06:25,600 --> 01:06:53,600
Sam Brace Skinny goat.