The prosperity preachers

Holly Bailey and Michael Isikoff:

For the Rev. Mike Huckabee, the podium is never far from the pulpit. Last month, just as the former Republican governor of Arkansas was unexpectedly rising in the Iowa polls, he was invited to deliver a Sunday-morning sermon at the DFW New Beginnings Church. An evangelical Christian congregation in the suburbs of Dallas (a three-hour drive from the Texarkana, Ark., church Huckabee led in the 1980s), New Beginnings is different from other megachurches in the South. It calls itself a "multicultural" ministry that upholds the Judeo-Christian tradition. The pulpit is adorned with a crucifix inside a star of David. A scattering of "messianic Jews" in the congregation wear yarmulkes. Its message is a blend of theology and self-help. God, the church Web site says, "wants to release the inner winner in you."

As it happens, that is a theme now very much on Huckabee's mind. All his life, he told the congregation as he casually paced the thick red carpet, God has found ways to point him to where he is today. An ordained Baptist minister, Huckabee immediately won over the crowd with a typically self-deprecating joke. "Are you one of those Baptists who think only Baptists go to heaven?" he said a woman once asked him. "No, ma'am," Huckabee said. "I don't think all the Baptists are going to make it myself."

Huckabee, who gave his first sermon as a teenager and got his start as an assistant to a televangelist, wasn't just playing at preaching in Dallas. He didn't take on that awkward way politicians have of speaking in church—drawl artificially deepening, voice dramatically quavering. He was entirely at ease. Huckabee never uses notes when he speaks, yet he covered a lot of Biblical ground in his talk, which centered on God's way of creating opportunity from adversity. He started out with the Old Testament story of Joseph and his brothers; touched on his own Everyman roots as a once poor kid "one generation away from dirt floors and outdoor toilets"; dipped into Romans 8:28 ("For we know that all things work together for good to those who love God …"), and gave "personal testimony" about how adversity in his own life has made his faith stronger. "You don't know that Jesus is all you need," he said, "until Jesus is all you've got." When he was done, the congregation gave him a standing ovation.

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The "Jesus wants you to be rich" churches have been on a growth spurt in recent years and Huckabee seems to be able to appeal to that audience. More traditional churches have a different message about religion. The question for America may be whether it wants to hear the "Jesus wants you to be rich" sermon for the next our to eight years.