Words of the profit--God wants you to be rich?

Kyle Smith:

A holy man in Chuck Palahniuk's darkly funny 1999 novel “Survivor" sells 200 million copies of a self-help guide called “The Book of Very Common Prayer," which includes The Prayer to Locate a Lost Contact Lens and The Prayer to Prevent Mildew Stains. The Prayer for a Parking Space goes:

Oh, divine and merciful God,

History is without equal for how much I will adore

You, when you give me today, a place to park . . .

In Your care will I find respite. With Your

Guidance, will I find peace.

To stop, to rest, to idle, to park.

These are Yours to give me. This is what I ask.

Amen.

Just eight years later, the principal difference between Palahniuk's satire and the most popular preacher in America today, Joel Osteen, is that Osteen's message is more blasphemous. Osteen's seven million Christian TV viewers might be interested to learn that Osteen, a college dropout with no formal training, is, literally, a heretic whose message is being called “Satanic," “occult" and “antichrist" by respected evangelical ministers. (See, for instance, the blog of Connecticut River Baptist Church pastor Ken Silva).

Osteen, who wears a deranged flash-frozen-smile - he looks like Martin Short playing the Joker - received a $13 million advance for his new book, “Become a Better You," and collects $73 million a year in donations at the former home to the Houston Rockets that is now Lakewood “Church." “Survivor," not the Bible, seems to be the blueprint for Osteen's life.

Palahniuk's character Tender Branson is born into a religious cult; Osteen inherited his ministry from his father John, a babbling freak who believed in faith healing and announced, at 77, that God had just given him the okay to keep preaching into his 90s. Two weeks later, Osteen Sr. was dead. Palahniuk's Tender Branson gets a makeover from agents who pump him up with exercise and steroids; Osteen bench-presses 300 pounds. “People shopping for a Messiah want quality. Nobody is going to follow a loser," writes Palahniuk.

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Osteen's favorite code word is “increase," because that gives a Biblicalish spin to materialist goals, as in “God wants to increase you financially, by giving you promotions." When Osteen cites the Bible (note to TV interviewers: Try springing a little Scriptural quiz on Osteen the next time you get him in the chair) he doesn't merely miss the point. He steers the opposite way. Osteen cites Colossians 3:2 (“Set your mind and keep it on the higher things") in his book “Your Best Life Now" (chapter two, page one - or 2:1) as applicable to the situation, “Perhaps you work in sales, and you are scheduled to give an important presentation." God wants to help you “snag that big contract" if you set your mind to it.

Flip to Colossians 3:2 (King James Version) and you'll find that the entire verse reads, “Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth." Colossians 3:5 warns against “covetousness, which is idolatry." Osteen's books are all about covetousness and idolatry. He is a false prophet to whom God is a cosmic waiter. (“Hi! My name is God and I'll be your deity this evening. Start you off with a bottle of water?").

The “Word-Faith Movement," of which Osteen is the unofficial leader, uses God as a Trojan horse to sell the ancient mystic rubbish - picture it and you'll pocket it - that also drives “The Secret." But “The Secret" doesn't pretend to be a tax-exempt religion.

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Hey, it worked for him. It has certainly made him rich. There has been an increase in the faith of God wants you to be rich churches lately. This abuse of faith is a sad commentary on its members. One of the first cases I prosecuted was a scheme to develop what was essentially a debit card and all the profits from these transaction were going to go to investors from a specific religious group. It was a fraud, though and God did not want them to get rich this way. Having the minister behind this scam arrested on Christmas eve was very satisfying. There is another scripture that these people need to hear. "Faith without works is nothing."