Since 2000, Pastor Joel Osteen seemingly has become an overnight success on the national evangelical scene.  But his rise in popularity, along with that of Lakewood Church, has a deeper history dating back to the ministry of his father, John Osteen.  Prof. Phillp L. Sinitiere — an associate professor of history at the College of Biblical Studies (Houston) and a visiting assistant professor at Sam Houston State University — talks about his new book Salvation with a Smile: Joel Osteen, Lakewood Church, & American Christianity.

As is par for the course, we explore how our guest came to be interested in the topic he studies.  Prof. Sinitiere grew up in Houston, which he calls the “buckle of the Bible Belt,” and attended small churches in a mixed-ethnicity neighborhood.  Having known about Lakewood Church growing up, he found it to be an interesting topic given his fascination with the history of American Christianity and considering how it dovetailed with his interests in African-American Christianity.  His experience studying Lakewood dates back about a decade, and Phillip tells the story of his first visit to the mega-church and how he was immediately approached to sing in the choir.  He talks of himself as a “shade tree sociologist” using both archival research and ethnographic fieldwork to paint a vivid picture of the Osteen family and the Lakewood community.

Our conversation turns historically to the story of John Osteen, the founder of Lakewood Church, and his unique personal journey to the pastorate.  We learn about John Osteen’s childhood growing up during the Great Depression, his evangelical conversion to Christ as a teen, and his Southern Baptist charismatic roots.  After attending John Brown University, he then followed his spiritual development through the Northern Baptist Theological Seminary and spent some time in California during the 1940s before returning to Houston.  Phillip notes that the elder Osteen was associated with some of the early attempts at “televangelism” in the 1950s when TV was becoming all the rage.  Following a divorce in 1955, another marriage brings him a daughter who has medical problems at a young age but who eventually grew in health.  This event had a significant impact on John and he becomes more drawn to the neo-Pentecostal movement bubbling up at the time and develops an interest in divine healing, which plays an important role in his theological development, eventually influencing his son Joel.  Prof. Sinitiere then details the institutional founding and growth of Lakewood Church.  Interestingly, shortly after Lakewood’s founding in 1959, John heads down to Mexico to do missionary work but returns home in the late 1960s.  This gap in the senior Osteen’s ministry proves critical for Lakewood’s eventual multi-racial appeal as John did not get drawn into the divisiveness of the Civil Rights Movement in the South during the 1960s.

We follow Lakewood Church’s history through the 1970s and into the ’80s when Joel enters the picture and begins working in the television aspect of his father’s ministry in the early 1980s.  By this time, Lakewood could be considered a mega-church by scholarly standards (more than 2,000 members) and Joel is learning how to manage such a large congregation as it grows extensively during this time.  We also talk a bit about the transition of the pastorate to Joel in 1999.  Shortly after taking the helm, Joel moves Lakewood from northeast Houston and to Greenway Plaza and the Compaq Center, giving the church new visibility along a major highway.  Combined with the use of social media and an expanding televangelism ministry, Lakewood witnesses unprecedented growth making it the largest congregation in America.

Our discussion then picks up on theological themes and Prof. Sinitiere explains the “prosperity gospel” that Joel Osteen (and his father before him) were known for.  Phillip traces the roots back to 19th century “New Thought” and the neo-Pentecostal movement of the 20th century.  While there is much emphasis on material advancement within prosperity gospel thinking, Phillip points out that a major part of John Osteen’s theology also revolved around divine healing, which was influenced both by his daughter’s recovery from muscular disease and his second wife’s overcoming cancer.  We then examine the development of Joel’s theological perspective and the influences that Joyce Meyer and John Maxwell played.  Joel’s thinking emerges in the first few years of his taking the helm at Lakewood, and in addition to the material aspects of his theology that his critics are quick to point out, Prof. Sinitiere notes that there is a great deal of emphasis on healthy living, psychological wholeness, and positive thinking, which was an influence from his father.  The picture that is painted by Phillip is more nuanced than of Osteen’s critics.  While not an apologist for the prosperity gospel, Prof. Sinitiere puts it into a much broader context based upon his own research of the topic.

We finish our discussion with an examination of how Lakewood’s congregants have taken to this prosperity gospel message, and what impact the Osteens have had on American Christianity.  Phillip notes that many individuals who attend Lakewood see it as a means of finding a “second chance” in life, and that several of these individuals eventually go in search of deeper Christianity elsewhere.  Amongst these individuals, there is an image of Lakewood being a “seasonal Christianity” from whence they move into other phases of their spiritual development.  Phillip also points out that Lakewood’s congregation is multi-racial although the leadership has tended to be Caucasian, but notes that there have been efforts to address this in recent years. As for Lakewood’s impact, Phillip explains how the Osteens have “re-enchanted” American televangelism and how the message of predictability in unstable times seems to resonate during times of economic turmoil.  He also observes that many of Osteen’s Calvinist critics indicates the broader influence Osteen is having on the discussion of Christianity in America.  Recorded: Jan. 21, 2016.

RELATED LINKS

Phillip Sinitiere’s bio at the College of Biblical Studies.

Phillip Sinitiere’s personal website.

Salvation with a Smile: Joel Osteen, Lakewood Church, and American Christianity, by Phillip Sinitiere.

Holy Mavericks: Evangelical Innovators and the Spiritual Marketplace, by Shayne Lee and Phillip Sinitiere.

Christians and the Color Line: Religion & Race after Divided by Faith, by Russell Hawkins and Phillip Sinitiere.

Blessed: A History of the American Prosperity Gospel, by Kate Bowler (mentioned on the podcast).

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Dave Travis on Megachurch Myths.

Marc von der Ruhr on Megachurch Recruitment and Retention.

Gordon Melton on Mega-Trends in American Religion.

Matt Sutton on Aimee Semple McPherson.

Darin Mather on Evangelicals and Racial Attitudes.

Our conversation begins with a discussion of the West Dallas neighborhood and the various social problems it has faced over the decades.  We then discuss the Serve, West Dallas program that consists of integrating the efforts of a variety of faith-based organizations that are sponsored by local and outlying suburban churches.  William provides us with the history of this effort, tracing it back to Arrvel Wilson who grew up in the neighborhood, left it for his military service, but was called back by God to help improve the community.  Mr. Wubbenhorst highlights a number of component parts to this program, including Service Optimizing Academic Reach (SOAR), Mercy Street Mentoring, Advocates for Community Transformation (ACT), and Brother Bill’s Helping Hand Clinic.  He discusses some of the specific efforts undertaken by each of these individual organizations, including the importance of cupcakes (which immediately catches the attention of Tony).

We then spend some time talking about the collaborative efforts of Serve, which seeks to coordinate the activities of each of these organizations so that the causes and symptoms of poverty are addressed in a more holistic manner.  We discuss the funding of the program and whether there have been any tensions between the different faith-based organizations in vying for financial resources and territory.  Overall, William notes that the program has been successful in helping different organizations realize what other activities are going on in the community.

We then talk about William’s business and how he had a vision of providing evaluative services to faith-based organizations to help them determine whether the resources they were expending were working.  He chronicles his education and idea for creating the company, and the methodological tool that they use — the Expected Value Return on Investment model.  We discuss some of the methodological difficulties in measuring outcomes for many of these programs, including ones that have goals such as improving emotional and social learning.  He notes that his company works with these organizations to determine their definition of success and attempts to build the best metrics possible.

The final portion of our interview is spent examining the success of the different component parts of Serve.  The ACT program was the easiest to measure as crime statistics and property values were easily determined.  They found that this program, which aims to clean up abandoned houses and remove drug dens, had a huge impact, returning $5.79 to the community for each dollar spent.  Brother Bill’s Helping Hand Clinic, which is targeted and health education and preventive care as well as monitoring diabetes, also had a very favorable return at $6.64 to $1 ratio.  We finish with William’s thoughts on the nature of this new collaborative model in the world of faith-based organizations and the importance of continual evaluation to see if resources are being used wisely.  Recorded: February 11, 2015.

RELATED LINKS

William Wubbenhorst’s bio at Social Capital Valuations, LLC.

Community Transformation in West Dallas: Developing and Measuring Collective Impact Initiatives, by Byron Johnson, William Wubbenhorst, and Sung Joon Jang.  (A downloadable copy of that report is available at that link.)

Baylor University’s Institute for Studies of Religion.

RELATED PODCASTS

Torrey Olsen on Faith-Based Humanitarianism and World Vision.

John Rees on International Development and Faith-Based Organizations.

Jay Hein on the Faith-Based and Community Initiative.

Byron Johnson on Religion & Delinquency.

Byron Johnson on More God, Less Crime.

Sung Joon Jang on the Boy Scouts of America.

David Wills on Religious Charity and Taxes.

Dan Hungerman on Religious Charity and Crowding Out.

Religious folks would agree that religion is pretty good for them.  But is a more religious society good for the entire society as a whole, including non-believers?  We take a look at the “positive spillover effects” that spiritual belief and church attendance has on the population as a whole with Prof. Rodney Stark, frequent guest and co-director of Baylor University’s Institute for Studies of Religion.  (Disclaimer: Baylor’s ISR is the sponsor of our podcast.)  Our conversation begins with a discussion about how religious America really is.  Recent students appear to indicate increasing non-participation, particularly among the young, and the newly-defined category of “nones” has become a regular talking point in the popular media.  Prof. Stark puts these studies into perspective noting some methodological issues with these studies, but also notes that the “nones” — when examined more closely — actually behave rather religiously, including engaging in regular prayer.  Rod mentions that the problem may not be so much as a loss of faith amongst the population, but rather a current weakness among churches to provide an adequate set of services.  We then talk about a variety of benefits that a religious, and churched, population brings to society as a whole, including atheists.  Our first stop on this journey deals with crime and its flipside, “pro-social behavior.”  Despite having an image of a society out of control, Rod points out that “secular” (or “unchurched”) Europe has much higher crime rates in almost all categories except murder.  We then discuss how and why religion may help to ameliorate crime by promoting pro-social behaviors, a seemingly obvious notion that has often been overlooked by criminologists.  Religion not only decreases crime, but it promotes pro-social behavior such as helping people on the side of the road and donating blood, which moves us into a discussion about voluntarism.  Contrary to the oft-cultivated notion that religious folks only provide charity or donate time to their own religious organizations, Rod points out that religious individuals are more engaged in secular organizations than secular folks.  This moves our conversation into the realm of civic (political) involvement, and again the data show that religiously-active individuals shine in this area as well, and this includes not only evangelical Protestants, but Catholics, Jews, and members of other faith traditions.  Tony then notes that being a “community volunteer” is not the only way to benefit a community, but rather being successful in one’s own chosen profession and not becoming a burden on society is also a way of benefitting the society at large.  Rod talks about how religious individuals are, on average, more successful in business than secular individuals and are less likely to become a burden on society.  This move us then to the issue of education and how homeschooling, promoted largely by religious individuals, has transformed the educational system to the point where many institutions of higher learning are taking note.  Again, this provides a great many “positive externalities” for the local and national community.  We then tackle intellectual life by playing off Mark Noll’s famous book about the lack of an “evangelical mind,” and Rod shows — to the contrary of Noll’s assertion — that religious individuals contribute greatly to intellectual life and high culture in the U.S.  We finish off the interview with a discussion of health-related issues, including both physical and mental health.  Both Tony and Rod share their various outrages at some of the very odd studies that have looked at the interconnection between religion and health.  And just to spice things up on RoR, we get into a bit of a discussion about s-e-x, as well as how that relates to a bigger issue facing the Western world — fertility.  Recorded: April 30, 2013.

RELATED LINKS

 Rodney Stark’s website with bio and list of books.

America’s Blessings: How Religion Benefits Everyone, Including Atheists, by Rodney Stark.

The Triumph of Christianity: How the Jesus Movement Became the World’s Largest Religion, by Rodney Stark.

America’s Blessings: How Religion Benefits Everyone… Including Atheists, by Rodney Stark (available November 2012).

Baylor University’s Institute for Studies of Religion.

RELATED PODCASTS

Rodney Stark on the Triumph of Christianity, Part I.

Rodney Stark on the Triumph of Christianity, Part II.

Rodney Stark on the Triumph of Christianity, Part III.

Rodney Stark on The Crusades.

Byron Johnson on More God, Less Crime.

Byron Johnson on Religion and Delinquency.

Daniel Hungerman on Religious Charity & Crowding Out.

Jeff Levin on Religion & Health.

Chris Bader on Ghosts, UFOs, and the Paranormal.

Paul Froese on America’s Four Gods.

RELATED LINKS

Jeff Levin’s website.

Divine Love: Perspectives from the World’s Religious Traditions edited by Jeff Levin, Stephen G. Post and Seyyed Hossein Nasir

God, Faith, and Health: Exploring the Spirituality-Healing Connection  by Jeff Levin.

“‘And Let Us Make Us a Name': Reflections on the Future of the Religion and Health Field by Jeff Levin.  Journal of Religion and Health.