 So I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Kenneth Copeland and Joel Osteen are still a problem. But you're like, Isaac, I don't know who these guys are. Why are they a problem? Well, let me tell you about it. Who is Joel Osteen? Pastor of Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas with his charisma and southern smile, he boasts of attendance of tens of thousands every week in his mega church. You'd be hard-pressed to find somebody who grew up Christian who hasn't heard the name Joel Osteen. So what's the problem? This guy's just doing his thing. A pastor? Sure, he has lots of people coming to his church, but that doesn't necessarily mean his preaching's whack. Well, let's hear from him from an interview with the late Larry King. What if you're Jewish or Muslim and you don't accept Christ at all? You know, I just, I'm very careful about saying who would and wouldn't go to heaven. I don't know, I think only God- Because you believe you have to believe in Christ. I believe they're wrong, aren't they? Well, I don't know if I believe they're wrong. So if you're familiar with Christianity, one of the biggest tenets is that Jesus is the only way to God. And in that clip, Joel demonstrated that he doesn't actually believe that. Not only that, but he preaches something known as the prosperity gospel. It's messages that Jesus came to bring us emotional, physical, relational, and financial prosperity on earth. And if you notice here, this directly contradicts a lot of the teaching within the Bible that Christians will encounter problems, difficulties, trials, sickness. In fact, Paul actually talks about how Christians should expect persecution. This goes in direct contradiction to Joel Osteen's message of prosperity, health, wealth, all that stuff. He also utilizes something known as name it and claim it theology. The belief that every blessing is available to us if only we would believe God enough to get it, to claim it. But think about it. That means that every time we don't get something, we're not rich or we're not famous or we're not extremely wealthy, it's because we didn't have enough faith. That's what it always comes back to. And what you'll see is this actually leads to a lot of detrimental perspectives of God when people that are sick are told, it's your fault that you're sick because you don't believe God enough to heal you. It's a really dangerous thing, but honestly, the reason I wanna make this video also is to point out the prosperity gospel, the problems with these guys, and I'll get into Kenneth Copeland in a second, but also to recognize, look, these guys have not gone away. I realize I've talked about them in the past and there was definitely a big hubbub about them in the early 2000s and 2010s and all that stuff. That was when it was really popular to call out these guys, but these guys are still getting millions of views. Like Joel Osteen is getting millions of views on YouTube. So this isn't just like the random lady across the street watching Joel Osteen or just somebody's grandparent like tuning in every once in a while. He is reaching millions of people with this false gospel. Who is Kenneth Copeland? Kenneth Copeland is a popular preacher, televangelist. He was mentored by Oral Roberts, one of the father's or if not the father of the prosperity gospel movement. One of the first of the big name TV preachers died today, Oral Roberts, he was 91. Beginning in the 1950s, Roberts used television to raise spirits and raise money and he even once claimed he'd raised the dead. Don Teague now with the Oral Roberts story. Out of that barren ground. Oral Roberts was considered the father of televangelists among the first preachers to take religious revivals from tents to television. It's so sad how Oral Roberts really distorted the name of Christ in Christianity, but honestly that distortion didn't end when he died. Establishing a multi-million dollar ministry that reached around the world. My soul's at stake, I may lose my soul. I know I will if I disobey God. Roberts' faith and philosophy grew out of about with tuberculosis as a teenager. He said God cured him and gave him healing powers of his own. He trained Kenneth in his ways of televangelism and Kenneth has been at it for years. Even at the ripe old age of 74, he's still consistent with his weekly messages and televangelism programs. In other words, his same old garbage. And if you feel like I'm being too harsh with these guys, I want you to keep watching because I'm gonna explain exactly why I'm pointing this out in a bit. Thank God I call myself well. I call myself healed. I call my memory fine and restored. I call my body well. So I'm calling things to be in all this other world. Kenneth Copeland is sucked right up into the prosperity gospel movement, mirroring Oral Roberts. And honestly, a lot of what Joel Osteen says as well, Kenneth is really ingrained in this name it and claim it. You can see the example of this when he talks about I am is so important. What you call yourself is so important. And I mean, you could be like, yeah, that is important. But what he means is like, hey, if you call yourself well, you will become well. It's this name and inclement theology, like health is available to me as long as I truly, truly believe it in my heart. And what a disgusting message to have because what do you tell the person that is dying of cancer or the son that is losing his mother of cancer that, oh my goodness, your mother's just not believing God enough, like that's absolutely messed up and twisted. And it completely denies the teaching in the Bible that, look, we're gonna experience sickness and Christians die of sickness. But that doesn't mean that it was because of our lack of faith in God to heal us. God has purposes even in things that look difficult or challenging or are difficult and are challenging and are heartbreaking. But it's about believing that God is a purpose behind each of these things. So number one, I want you guys to make sure your grandparents, your parents, because a lot of these guys are hitting older people up. They're making their ways into TV and, you know, like they're popular among old evangelical Christians. Like it's just the way it is. And you never know. Maybe your parent is watching Jalosti on a consistent basis and getting his theology from there or Kenneth Copeland. It's just a good thing to check up on people in your life. Like, hey, like, have you heard of this guy? What do you think about this guy? I'm just beginning a conversation because, man, what we're gonna discover is that a lie, when it is close to the truth, it is that much more dangerous. And that's why I'm calling out these guys. That's why I want us to be aware of it is because when something seems like it could almost be true, but it's not, that's the most dangerous lie. In doing research for this video, I came across something that I did not expect. Notice how I was saying before, like these guys hit up the parents, the grandparents, the previous generations with this prosperity gospel, mumbo jumbo, but it is infecting the next generation. And in fact, Jalosti's son, Jonathan Osteen, is now preaching his own sermons at Lakewood Church. And yes, it's toned down from his father's stuff. It's not as blatant prosperity gospel, but believe me, if you pay attention, it's there. And like I said before, something that is even more close to the truth, but it's still a lie, that is the most dangerous thing. And that's what concerns me is this stuff isn't gonna go away. This prosperity gospel stuff, it's not really becoming less trendy. It's still very, very prominent, especially internationally, not just in Western culture. And so as we're seeing people like Jonathan Osteen rise up and begin to take on the footsteps of his dad and continue on with the prosperity name and claimant gospel, I think it's that much more important that we are aware of the distinctions between the prosperity gospel and the true gospel. Because what God promises us is not just monetary wealth or financial success or relational success, it's not this pragmatic thing like sign up for God and you'll get the life that you've always wanted and all your dreams will come true. That's not what God is offering. He is offering us freedom from sin, forgiveness, a right relationship with God. And that does not mean it's gonna be smooth sailing. When people sign up for Joel Osteen's gospel, they are severely disappointed. In Kenneth Copeland's gospel, they are severely disappointed when they actually encounter problems. They're disillusioned. They say, well, what's going on here? And Joel Osteen and Kenneth Copeland are saying, you just don't have enough faith. You gotta have more faith and life will be better for you. And so you're guilting these people and making them feel terrible like they're not actually Christians or not actually living the Christian life because they're not believing enough because their life isn't going perfectly. It's disgusting, it's terrible and it's not the gospel. It's not Christianity. Let's cling to the true gospel. The gospel that Jesus came to this earth fully God and fully man lived a sinless life, a life that we could not live to die on the cross, a death we deserve to die for our sins against God. It wasn't to just bring us all this like money and prosperity and successful life and to be loved and all that kind of thing. No, it was to break the bondage of sin and it was to give us new life in him and new identity in him. That's the gospel guys and he rose again defeating death. Let's cling to that. I hope you got something from this video. If anything, just a further love for the true gospel and a keen awareness to be discerning about what you're listening to and have conversations with people on your life. Just see who they're listening to and begin this conversation about what is the true gospel? What is this prosperity gospel and what are the things that are so dangerous about it? I think it's an important conversation to have, especially as new people are rising up with this false gospel. Thank you so much for watching this video. I hope you enjoyed it and thank you to all my patrons on Patreon. It is an amazing blessing to be able to have you guys there. The goal for February is to get to 40 patrons. We're like seven or eight away right now. And so if you guys could head on over to patreon.com slash daily underscore disciple and give $5 a month, that would be amazing. Like literally every time somebody signs up, I'm so excited and so thankful because you're making it that I can continue to make these videos. So thank you. Thank you for like, commenting and subscribing. I will see you next time. God bless.