Jay Bakker Writes Letter to Joel Osteen: We Should be Concerned About Those Who Feel ‘Le
- Posted by: Todd
- Posted on: Tue, April 29, 2008
- Viewed 166
- (46) comments so far
Here’s a copy of the letter:
Rev. Joel Osteen
Lakewood Church
3700 Southwest Freeway
Houston, TX 77027
Subject: The American Family Outing
Dear Rev. Osteen and the congregation of Lakewood Church,
My name is Jay Bakker. I am pastor of Revolution Church in Brooklyn, New York. You may know me as the son of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker.
As you might have heard, I lost my mother this year after a long battle with cancer. This has led me to reflect on the importance of family, as well as the lessons my mother taught me regarding the unconditional love of God. It is in her memory that I write you this letter today.
As a child growing up, I saw a side of the church that to me did not always reflect God’s grace. This experience has led me to be concerned for our brothers and sisters in Christ who sometimes may feel rejected and left out of the church.
It is for these reasons that I have decided to be a part of a plan to bring dozens of lesbian, gay, ########, and transgender families from around the country, as well as heterosexual families that support them, to visit your congregation on Mother’s Day Weekend (Saturday May 10 and Sunday May 11th, 2008) to create meaningful dialogue about homosexuality and Christianity.
This visit is part of the American Family Outing, a collaborative project between Soulforce, the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, the National Black Justice Coalition, and COLAGE. It is my understanding that the Executive Director of Soulforce, Jeff Lutes, sent you an initial letter, dated December 3, 2007. I wanted to follow-up to let you know of my involvement in this important effort to bring true hope and prosperity to all God’s children.
So many look to you for leadership, and therefore you and your congregation have an exceptional opportunity to advance respectful and Christ-centered conversation on a topic that too often divides our families and our nation. As Jeff expressed in his letter, we hope that you will collaborate with us in structuring our time together at your church. I invite you to match the families I bring, with a roughly equal number of families from your congregation, and ask that we arrange to share a meal together on Saturday, May 10th or Sunday, May 11th, followed by structured and educational conversation. We are also planning to attend your worship service on Sunday, May 11th.
Together, we can make this an experience that will bless the lives of so many. Please contact me at (private number) or Jeff Lutes at (private number) so that we can work together on planning the details.
In John 13:35, Jesus said that your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples. I invite you to reflect Christ’s unconditional love and participate with us in this event.
In Grace and Hope,
Jay Bakker
Pastor
Revolution NYC
cc: Victoria Osteen, Paul Osteen, M.D., Dodie Osteen, Kevin Comes, Lisa Comes, Duncan Dodds, Marcos Witt.
FOR YOUR INPUT: What do you think of this letter? What good could come out of these meetings? And if there IS any good, would it be the good/agenda that Soulforce is desiring?
Soulforce released an open letter over the weekend from Pastor Jay Bakker of Revolution NYC church to Rev. Joel Osteen and Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas. Originally mailed in January 2008, the letter invites Osteen and families from the Lakewood congregation to share a meal with lesbian, gay, ########, transgender (LGBT) and straight-ally families over Mother's Day weekend. According to Jay Bakker, "As a child growing up, I saw a side of the church that to me did not always reflect God's grace. This experience has led me to be concerned for our brothers and sisters in Christ who sometimes may feel rejected and left out of the church."
Comments
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Vincent Anderson on Wed, April 30, 2008
Randy,
You may think my sound bite adds little to the conversation. I don’t think is does when someone has the opportunity to learn the truth. Homosexuality is sin.
Talking and ministering to the homosexual to get them delivered of that spirit is great.
But, setting down to dialog for the purpose of finding common ground will lead to compromise.
There is no dialoging to find common ground.
OK….Rev. Joel Osteen and Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas…This is your chance to take a stand.
Will anyone with a nationial voice take a stand?
It may hurt finanically and in the national press to the big ministry names, but someone needs to stand for the truth.
How many people stand for the truth?
Jay Bakker is wrong and leading people to hell. This may not “sound” loving, but the truth is love.
Wendi on Wed, April 30, 2008
Brian – Since you have been part of Soulforce, I have a hypothetical question. (Oversimplifying here) Say that you are fully persuaded that the scriptures allow for monogamous homosexual relationships and I am fully persuaded that it does not, and that the practice of homosexuality is sinful. We have both come to these views through honest encounters with scripture and there is no chance that either of us will change our view. If the issue of homosexuality is off the table, are there still things for us to dialogue about? I think so, but I’m wondering if Soulforce would be interested. Is the homosexuality issue the only one your guys will want to discuss? I did my undergrad at FPU, BTW.
Vince, really??? Every time you encounter a sinner, if they don’t repent immediately, you kick the dust off your feet and move on? You cannot agree to disagree on something and find common ground? How would it be compromise to tutor urban kids with a gay brother, or feed the poor, or mentor kids in juvenile hall?
Leonard – great to meet you face-to-face too. We really enjoyed what we were able to see of the conference.
I will agree with you that in years past Americans looked at the world through Judeo-Christian world view lenses. However, I gotta take issue with the concept of America (or any nation) being “post-Christian” (or Christian in any fashion). I always bristle at the concept of “the good ole days when we were a ‘Christian nation.’” Those good ole days were when our Christian forefathers committed genocide on the natives to this continent, then built our country by ripping African families apart and oppressing and abusing and enslaving. Our history is as full of depravity as our current state, except that much of our historical depraved behavior was committed by people who claimed the name of Christ.
But even if your explanation for evangelical’s motives for imposing Christian views into the legislative/political fabric of America, isn’t it still a “my way or the highway” posture? This posture is never really interested in dialogue. I just think faulting the gay/lesbian advocates for taking a posture we’ve already perfected is a bit like the pot calling the kettle black.
Wendi
Peter Hamm on Thu, May 01, 2008
but Leonard…
There was a time when our country made treaties with Native Americans and then the people blatantly broke and defied them without penalty, and without thinking they were doing anything wrong. Nowadays, we’d be much more hard-pressed to break a treaty.
There was a time when we considered anyone who wasn’t white as not even really human all over this country, denying them the same rights we said in our Declaration of Independence were God-given, and suffering no penalty for killing them indiscriminately, breaking up their families, and building our nation on their backs. Churchmen spoke out against it. Others spoke out in favor of it.
There was a time when if you were hiring, you could put out a sign that said “Irish need not apply”.
Now we still have prejudice, but we have abandoned those practices of slavery and all that went with them. In fact, forty-some years ago we had an Irish president, and now we have a bona fide Presidential candidate who is black.
There was a time when we felt that women didn’t deserve to vote. Now we might put a woman in the White House.
Research seems to be showing that our actually practiced sexual mores in this country have NOT changed, they have ALWAYS been this way.
Knowing the ten commandments didn’t seem to stop Americans from routinely violating them.
No, I stand with Wendi on this. I vigorously deny that there was a time when America was “more moral”. We are fallen and broken and human, and we’ve been sweeping a lot under the rug throughout our history. Some of that has been brought to life, and perhaps some is still hidden.
Daniel on Thu, May 01, 2008
Peter’s right Leonard. Who’s your ‘we’? Who were the ‘people’ who had ‘Judeo-Christian’ morals? Who were the ‘people’ who could recite the Ten Commandments?
Were they the Africans suffering under the oppression white Europeans crushed them with for the sake of economic expediency? No of course not—because slaves weren’t people at all!! And so your ‘people’ isn’t the people at all, but rather a small privileged and, by their behavior, thoroughly unChristian minority.
Yes, some things were nice. Yes, some things are awful. Let’s not pretend like either of those are false.
Peace,
-Daniel-
Leonard Lee on Thu, May 01, 2008
I knew someone would bring these issues and thanks for that. I want to make myself clear. I am not saying America is perfect nor am I saying America is God’s country. I am saying that the mores that anchored this nation in many places are gone and that those mores were biblical. Have we been sinful? Yes. As a nation and as people.
Peter you live in the benefits of a white ruling society, does that make you a racist. Daniel you live on land where Native Americans once lived, does that mean you took it from them? I am not burying my head in the sand as to the sins of this country and it is kind of offensive to me that you suggest I am. You are accusing me of an argument I am not making. But to wash away the impact of Christianity in a positive way on this country and this country in the world is blind. I am not trying to trot out a good /bad list in front of you as much as sighting the fact that when I was in school, the Ten Commandments were on the walls of most every classroom, school began in prayer…
My family fought and died to end slavery because of their faith, my family started one of the first schools for salves in this country, were pioneers in the Underground Railroad, even when Lincoln made it a crime. Not for money, not for power but because of their faith.
So in the last 50 years has the divorce rate climbed? Has divorce become more or less acceptable? In the last 50 years has teen pregnancy rate climbed? Is unwed mothering more or less acceptable? Has pornography increased? Is it more acceptable? Look at an R rated movie, considered pornographic years ago. Has crime increased? The answer is yes. Has greed increased? The answer is yes… One major reason is that the mores that held these things and many other issues in place have been ejected from our values causing these actions and what leads to these actions to be acceptable. People now do what was considered unacceptable as though it is totally acceptable.
Here is a question for you Peter and Daniel; In times past many people were sinful in their morals, and culture deemed them so. Why? Today these same acts that are wrong are no longer considered wrong. Why? What has changed?
Slaver was not invented by white people. It has been perpetrated by white people but Africa had slavery before white slavers made their way there. Tribes there fought, took each other as slaves, sold and trafficked in humanity in way just as unspeakable as whites did. This is true of nearly every culture in the world. Slavery is one of our sins, but it belongs to the world as well.
CS on Thu, May 01, 2008
Jumping back a few posts, and avoiding some of the United States historical battle a little…
Leonard Lee:
“I think that much of what we see with fundamentalists is a reaction to the shift in cultural mores. In my life time abortion has become legal, homosexuality has become legal, (still not in some places) in a world of free sex and “love”. Fundamentalists still believe we live in a Christian nation and are fighting to regain that nation; they see these things as a matter of preservation.”
Even if America is no longer a Christian nation (or never has been, for some), things like abortion and homosexuality are still sinful and wrong. Regardless of the national position and the civil or criminal laws on this topic, God’s Law trumps anything else here, and Christians need to keep explaining this to people.
Brian:
“Soulforce is an organization rooted in non-violence and thus the goal is not “victory” or “making the others take your side” but rather moving forward together. “
This sounds like Hegelian philosophy, where a thesis and antithesis merge to form a synthesis. Kind of like how white and black pigments mix to form a gray, meeting somewhere in the middle.
The problem here is that I cannot see this type of synthesis happening with sin. We cannot have goodness and sin mixing together to, “move forward together.” If sin is sin, we need to say so, and accept no compromise.
—
CS
Leonard Lee on Thu, May 01, 2008
Come on Peter, you seem to be arguing to make a point rather that dealing with the facts. Pornography makes more money than the NFL, NBA and MLB combined in this country. The fact it is available to every home that has a computer, that huge numbers of men are addicted to it, that millions of women are not looking at it, that some stars are now household names… It’s accessibility and visibility is in direct correlation to a loosening of cultural mores. I have worked with teens and families for over 25 years and I have personally seen a rise in Teen pregnancy and students who parents were never married. You make not connection to the visibility and rise in several of these areas in the last 50 years to a shifting of cultural mores? How can that be?
We are not arguing the rightness or wrongness of slavery or what happened to the Native America. A quick look in history will tell you this treatment of people is rampant and it will also tell you that very often what curbed that treatment was real Christianity. Sure religion has had its share of corruption and abuse but that is beside the point that in my very own life time we are loosening the mores that once kept certain sins in check. What is on my television was unspeakable 50 years ago, even 35 years ago. What we view as honest has changed, what we view as ethical has changed, and the lessening of these mores had allowed an increase of activity in many realms. It has lessened the restraint too. Teens today are more likely to have sex than when I was in high school 30 years ago. Teens today are more likely to both abort and keep a baby than when I was in high school 30 years ago. Why? The mores have loosened. People walk away fomr marriages much more easily than in the past, I deal with marriages that end all the time for no reason other than they are tired of being married. Why? The mores have loosened.
You are communicating with denial to make a point I am not sure we even disagree upon.
You honestly do not see any moral decline in this country in the last 50 years?
Peter Hamm on Thu, May 01, 2008
no, Leonard, it is my point,
Many Christians seem to think it was more christian to believe that African-Americans and Native Americans were not human than it is now to believe that unborn children and unclothed women in photographs and videos are not human.
Or morality has, I would still argue (after reading a LOT in the past few years about our history in our first hundred years of being a nation) has simply changed from depraved to depraved differently. At least in the 21st century people who do some of these things we as Christians rightly disapprove of are honest enough to say they aren’t Christian, when in times gone by they tried to “explain them away”.
Leonard Lee on Thu, May 01, 2008
Who is arguing that point here Peter? Who thinks that as you say “Many Christians seem to think it was more Christian to believe that African-Americans and Native Americans were not human than it is now to believe that unborn children and unclothed women in photographs and videos are not human.”
I would like to believe that if I were alive in the days of slavery I would use biblical and political methods to abolish slavery. I would like to believe that if I were alive in the days when Native Americans were being mistreated and wrongs so severely I would have used biblical and political and every other means necessary to stop the harm. I cannot nor can you go back 200 years and change what happened to Native Americans or Africans. No one here is claiming that this was good or made us moral.
Sociology tells us that boundaries help hold people in check in their behaviors. Our country used to have boundaries that it no longer possesses. These are its mores. Social and legal boundaries have been eradicated, thus allowing options and activities that for many would not take place. I am not arguing some philosophical ideology of depravity; I am talking about behavior and boundaries.
Here is what I know as a pastor, a father, a leader and a human being. The more acceptable lying becomes in our culture the more easily people do it. The more acceptable and normative pornography becomes in our culture, the more people see it and as I here so very often… What’s the big deal, it is just a picture? The more accessible and easily obtained divorce is in our culture the more easily it will be attained. The losing of the boundaries no longer takes into account the pain kids have, the repercussions divorce has upon our economy, parenting, social responsibility… Etc. The number 1 cause of nearly every ill we face in the family is Fatherless ness. Has this increased over the past 50 years? Absolutely! Why? Because the mores that help this back are gone and depravity is now less in check than ever.
I am not getting your point and I certainly don’t think my point is coming across. I am not arguing for a more moral heart 200 years ago, I am saying that there are certain mores that have been remove, giving license to the depraved heart of people.
Peter Hamm on Thu, May 01, 2008
Leonard,
Thanks for the discussion.
At the heart of it, I’m disagreeing with this point you made earlier. “Truth is we live in a post Christian nation and have for over 40 years.” We have never lived in a Christian nation. Never. And I say again that to believe we ever did is to believe that racism, slavery, and genocide (not to mention greed… during the nineteenth century the gap between the “haves” and “have nots” was FAR more grevious than it is today in USAmerica) were “lesser” sins than abortion, gay marriage, pornography, fornication etc. Our nation didn’t just turn a blind eye to those things, they were institutionalized.
Today, even those who favor abortion on demand admit that they want to see far less of it, for instance. However, the institutional gross sins I mentioned above took place during the time that you implied we were a “Christian” nation, and people who knew far more scripture than we do, and people who had the 10 commandments on their walls and supposedly in their hearts, did not just turn a blind eye to these atrocities, they were in many cases actually responsible for them.
THAT is my point. We’re way off topic now, but it’s still been invigorating. Thanks again for engaging.
Leonard Lee on Thu, May 01, 2008
Likewise Peter, I have enjoyed the dialog. I do not mean to imply what those words mean to so many. I also do not excuse the sins of many who claim Christ but oppress others. I mean we live in a country whose mores were Christian in origin and now those mores are gone or rapidly disintegrating. I do know that many like Dobson do believe we are a Christian nation and as such the point I was trying to make before we bunny trailed is that they are playing with a different set of rules. It is not an ungodly goal as many sincerely seek the redemption of people, but when the view is we lost something and want it back, you use different tools than when the view is we need to reach people.
Europe has committed far more atrocities and been party to longer periods of harm than America ever has but feels no shame not is it decried throughout the world. Why? A quick study of our own history and you will see the French, British, Spain did great harm to the native American as well. I do not say this to excuse our nation, just to bring a more balanced picture than we are given in the media and in school.
Africa has harmed its own people far more than America ever did by virtue of a longer existence and internal tribal warfare. It was Africans killing Africans in Somalia, throughout the Congo, Nigeria and many other places. There is no outcry against Africans there. Why? China oppresses its people more than almost any other nation in the world along with North Korea. Why no outcry? No nation has sacrificed more for the abolition of slavery than this country. No country has sent more money throughout the world, food throughout the world and any student of WW1 and WW2 could easily see that this country literally saved the world from Nazi Germany, Japanese imperialism and tyranny.
I do not write this with a blind eye to my countries sins. But one reason I think we are so hard on this country but wink at the sins of others is a heritage of Christian values and the expectations this kind of heritage has upon others.
Peter Hamm on Thu, May 01, 2008
[I mean we live in a country whose mores were Christian in origin] THAT is a perspective I’m not sure in reading my history lately that I agree with. But we agree far more than we disagree anyway.
Have a GREAT weekend, mine starts right now! (I get friday’s off, woo hoo…)
Wendi on Fri, May 02, 2008
Boy, you guys had a lively discussion yesterday. I had a packed day and couldn’t chime in. I won’t add much opinion here, except to offer one comment and one example.
Peter’s comments reflect my views on this. I’ll add that (IMO) the idea of a “Christian nation” is dangerous because it gets us off mission. We begin to think that if the 10 Commandments is on the walls of our public places, if we get to pray “in Jesus name” on the public address system at the local HS football game, if we can pass enough laws to enforce Christian behavior onto non-Christian citizens . . . then somehow we’ve accomplished. When we lament about how, in the old days, America was so much more “Christian” because [we wrongly conclude] we behaved better. Even if this were true (and I completely agree with Peter – it is not true), citizens acting morally does not make America a “Christian nation.” Individuals and faith communities follow Jesus, not governments.
Yesterday I was at our City Hall for a National Day of Prayer gathering. I’ve attended this completely Christian event for many years. Local pastors and Christian civic leaders take turns praying for God to bless our city and remove the depravity. This year’s event was quite a spectacle. Members of the “Interfaith Alliance” showed up carrying signs that read “one nation . . . many faiths.” As the festivities began, our Christian mayor at the mic, welcomed the others and [being politically correct], invited leaders from other faiths to the front and even offered the mic. A Muslim cleric accepted and proceeded to offer a prayer to Allah. The Christians were outraged. The pastor in charge grabbed the mic to prevent any other non-Christians from offering prayers. Each of the subsequent “pray-ers” boldly and blatantly prayed Christian prayers. I’ve never heard so many “in Jesus name” statements from the mouths of public officials and pastors. Several times we were instructed to gather into groups and pray. Prayer eavesdropping (I confess), I heard several prayers for blessing on people of “every faith, any sexual orientation.”
I was mortified and embarrassed at our “Christian behavior.” I was ashamed to hear Jesus name being used to make an “in your face” point. The interfaith signs are right. America IS one nation of many faiths. Our constitution which guarantees religious freedom insists on religious pluralism. Yesterday was the “national” not the “Christian” day of prayer. These folks should have been welcomed on the City Hall steps. America does not belong to the Christians, and taking America back for God was never the mission Jesus gave us.
I may have hijacked this thread a bit. My point is related to some of the comments that SoulForce doesn’t really want discussion but rather wanting to make people change their minds. American evangelicals have been doing this same thing for years in the public and political venue, trying to force Christian morals onto non-Christian people making Christian laws. Furthermore, Bakker and SoulForce are indicating that they want dialogue. Like many who have posted here, I question how genuine the desire is for real dialogue. But what I was part of yesterday at the National Day of Prayer event also shuts down dialogue. Claiming Jesus as an “in your face” way of telling those of other faiths or who hold different moral values that they have it all wrong is no way to invite them into a dialogue.
Wendi
Scott on Wed, May 07, 2008
What happened to Jay and Joel?
CS on Wed, May 07, 2008
Scott:
“What happened to Jay and Joel?”
Last time I checked, Mother’s Day is this coming Sunday. Time shall tell. =)
—
CS
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