Joel Osteen

For 17 years Joel Osteen stayed behind the camera. He grew up inside the church his father John Osteen founded in 1959, first in a tent and then in an abandoned feed store in northeast Houston, and after leaving Oral Roberts University in 1982 without a degree he came home to run its television operation — buying airtime and producing his father's sermons for a broadcast that reached 100 countries. He was ordained through the church in 1983 and still did not preach. He has said he never wanted to. On January 17, 1999, he took the pulpit for the first time. Six days later his father died of a heart attack, and by that October the son who had preached one sermon was senior pastor of Lakewood Church.

Attendance rose roughly fivefold in a few years, from about 6,000 people a week to 30,000, and Lakewood became the largest congregation in the United States. In late 2003 the church signed a long-term lease with the city of Houston for the Compaq Center, a 29-year-old arena that had housed the Houston Rockets, paying 11.8 million dollars in advance rent and borrowing roughly 100 million more to convert it. Lakewood held its first service in the 16,800-seat building on July 16, 2005. Its televised service is now estimated to reach some 7 million viewers a week.

The theological objection to him is not fringe and it is not mostly secular. Conservative evangelicals, Reformed theologians and scholars of American religion argue that what Lakewood teaches is prosperity theology — that material reward follows faith — and that a message carrying almost nothing about sin, judgement or the cross is self-help with scripture attached. On 60 Minutes in October 2007 the Reformed theologian Michael Horton called it heresy, and said the trouble with it is that it makes religion about us instead of about God. Osteen rejects the label. He says he preaches encouragement rather than money, that he does not ask for money from the platform, and that people already know what they are doing wrong. He draws no salary from Lakewood and says he lives on book royalties.

Outside his congregation, his public standing now turns heavily on one week in August 2017. As Hurricane Harvey flooded Houston, Lakewood was attacked online for not immediately opening its 16,000-seat building as a shelter. The church posted that the building was inaccessible due to severe flooding, and a spokesman said water came within a foot of the floodgates. Photographs posted online appeared to show it dry. Osteen called the accusation a false narrative. On the evening of August 28 Lakewood announced it would open, and the next day it took in evacuees. In August 2018 the city proclaimed a Lakewood Church Day for the church's rebuilding work. Both accounts of that week are still in circulation.

Joel Osteen's life against the full span of the corpus — the fading end marks a life still in progress.

• Lakewood Church television ministry television
  He built and produced it for 17 years before he ever preached 1983
• Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential book
  The first book, and the template for more than 20 that followed 2004
• Night of Hope other
  Stadium and arena events staged with Victoria Osteen in the US and abroad 2004
• Conversion of the Compaq Center other
  A 16,800-seat NBA arena rebuilt as a sanctuary on roughly 100 million dollars in loans 2005
• Become a Better You: 7 Keys to Improving Your Life Every Day book
  Written under a contract the New York Times reported as unusually large for religious publishing 2007

• March 5, 1963 aged 0 Born in Houston, one of six children of John and Dodie Osteen His father had founded Lakewood Church four years earlier.
• 1982 aged ~19 Leaves Oral Roberts University without a degree and returns to Houston He had studied radio and television communications.
• 1983 aged ~20 Takes over Lakewood's television operation and is ordained He produced his father's broadcast sermons for the next 16 years.
• April 4, 1987 aged 24 Marries Victoria Iloff She later became co-pastor of Lakewood Church.
• January 17, 1999 aged 35 Preaches the first sermon of his life John Osteen died six days later. Joel became senior pastor that October.
• 2003 aged ~40 Lakewood leases the Compaq Center from the city of Houston The church paid 11.8 million dollars in advance rent covering 30 years.
• July 16, 2005 aged 42 Lakewood holds its first service in the converted arena 16,800 seats, about twice the capacity of the old sanctuary.
• August 29, 2017 aged 54 Lakewood opens as a Hurricane Harvey shelter after days of criticism The church said the building had been inaccessible and at risk of flooding. Osteen called the criticism a false narrative.
• February 11, 2024 aged 60 A woman opens fire inside Lakewood between services Two off-duty officers killed her. Her seven-year-old son and another man were wounded.

• Oral Roberts 1918–2009
  Moved Pentecostal healing services from the revival tent onto national television, and built a university on the proceeds. attended his university
• Norman Vincent Peale 1898–1993
  Minister whose bestselling positive-thinking message joined American Protestantism with modern self-help culture. compared to
• Billy Graham 1918–2018
  Evangelist whose mass crusades, media reach, and presidential relationships made him a defining figure in modern American Protestantism. successor in mass evangelism
• Aimee Semple McPherson 1890–1944
  Evangelist and media innovator who founded the Foursquare Church and pioneered religious broadcasting and celebrity ministry. earlier arena revivalist
• Pat Robertson 1930–2023
  Founded the Christian Broadcasting Network and, after a failed 1988 presidential run, the Christian Coalition. fellow televangelist