Victoria Osteen: "When we obey God, we're not doing it for God...we're doing it for ourselves"; Bill Cosby responds, video

Two days ago, a friend emailed me the link to an amazing clip of a video going viral. It is a 38-second clip of Victoria Osteen, co-pastor with Joel Osteen of Lakewood Church. In the clip, she is telling the audience that they are to worship themselves, because God is pleased when they do that. I am not making this up.

I assure you.

Here is the transcript courtesy of Cross Map, Heather Clark, the same author as the piece at Christian News I mention and link to below.

Here's Victoria Osteen, speaking to approximately 16,000 attendees,

I just want to encourage every one of us to realize when we obey God, we're not doing it for God-I mean, that's one way to look at it-we're doing it for ourselves, because God takes pleasure when we're happy," she declares in the undated 36-second clip with her husband standing by her side and nodding. "That's the thing that gives Him the greatest joy...

So, I want you to know this morning: Just do good for your own self. Do good because God wants you to be happy," Osteen continues. "When you come to church, when you worship Him, you're not doing it for God really. You're doing it for yourself, because that's what makes God happy. Amen?

I searched to see if the video was a hoax. It HAS to be, right? Yet...the Joel Osteen.com graphic was embedded in the video, and the two figures on stage indeed were indeed of Victoria and Joel. Her lips moved in time with the sound of the words, so it hadn't been dubbed or altered. I looked at Snopes and Hoax Slayer but nothing came up. Though the clip was from their website, unfortunately only the Joel-portions of the Lakewood services are put up (that I could find) not the first half with the music and the short message from Victoria prior to when Joel begins his speech.

So I waited.

It kind of took the social media by storm. It is such a blatant statement, shocking to our core. No, we are not surprised an Osteen would say something like this, but it's shocking nonetheless.

In adulterous marriages, when one spouse intuits that the other spouse is engaging in adultery, our brain handles the information. However it is an entirely different story when we are confronted with the cold hard fact of it. We are not surprised, because we kind of cognitively knew it all along, but it is still a shock to the system emotionally, through and through. Or so I read.

The Osteens and all their kin are spiritual adulterers. We know it- cognitively. We know it theologically. But when we see it, we are as emotionally shocked as if Victoria had put rollers on her bed and theatrically performed actual adultery while rolling down Main Street. There is a difference between knowing, and knowing.

Essay edited to include this thought:
What is shocking about Mrs Osteen's speech is that they aren't even bothering to hide their apostasy anymore. Usually they cloak their speeches and comments in Christianese, paying lip service to Jesus. Here, that veneer is ripped away and they simply come out as who they are: evil blasphemers.

Meanwhile Christian News Net published a thorough article on the video and the Osteens. It's here. And that was that. I wasn't going to write about it because Christian News said all there was to say, and better than I could. Until I saw this video on Twitter. It's from Manuel Brambila ‏@mbrambila, who I do not know, retweeted by Bjørn Storm, who I do know. I took a look at the video, it is on Bryant Harris' Youtube page. But because so many of these videos are scrubbed from the net, I downloaded the video to my own hard drive and then put it up here. Hopefully this will keep the Archival Evidence of Gross and Craven Apostasy intact.

Though the Christian News article is good, I think this response is better.

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Further reading

Victoria Osteen Ripped for Telling Church 'Just Do Good For Your Own Self'; Worship Is Not for God, 'You're Doing it for Yourself'