Osteen Outdoes Virgin Mary, Pope in Miraculous Appearances

10/29/2007

by Chris Mikesell

AUSTIN, Texas—In recent weeks true believers have reported seeing Pope John Paul II in a Polish bonfire and the Virgin de Guadalupe in a water stain outside a Del Rio, Texas, house. Surpassing both these instances of divine messengers, however, is the recent appearance of Joel Osteen in bookstores coast to coast.

"It seems like years since this happened last," says Lily Deschardin of Oklahoma City. "I was in the Borders Express at the mall last weekend and there was a display of John Grisham books just inside the door. When I came in today, there was Joel instead, smiling his benevolent smile. I felt at peace right away." Deschardin's daughter Lisbeth, a sophomore at Oklahoma City Community College, added, "I picked up five books with his picture on them, so friends could share in the miracle. After I walked around the store for a bit—walked! it felt like my feet barely touched the floor—but when I got back to the front of the store the stack of books was back to full height. I was stunned. To see God work like that...I wept."

Sightings have been reported from Miami to Seattle. Parnell Harper, a drywall installer in Vero Beach, Fla., reported seeing Osteen three times in one day last week. "I was looking for a book for my niece's birthday, so I was shopping around. I wound up getting her a Madeleine L'Engle box set at WalMart, but Joel appeared to me at a Barnes & Noble and a Target first. He was at WalMart, too. Everywhere I went. I think God really wants me to pay attention, turn my life around."

Not everyone is impressed, however. Warren Burkis, night manager of a Citgo station in Dallas, says he lived through a similar rash of sightings three years ago. "He was everywhere, just like now. People felt blessed by his presence for awhile, some even saw a turnaround in their lives, like the miracle of his appearance was making a difference.

Then...nothing. Osteen disappeared from the bookstores and so did the changes in people's lives. They went back to being ordinary folks, y'know, regular nothing-special-about-me Joes. Same thing'll happen this time around, too, just like it did for my sister Rhonda and brother-in-law Bert."

No one knows exactly what is causing this nationwide phenomenon. (Unconfirmed rumors report seeing Osteen in European bookstores, the internet, and most-inexplicably, television programs like 60 Minutes and Good Morning America.) For years Osteen-sightings have been limited to devoted channel surfers, hunting for and tracking him like a basic-cable Sasquatch with better hair and teeth. Lwellyn Ridgeworth-Trask, media liaison for the Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University, says the college is taking a "wait and see" approach to the situation. "Time will tell if this current manifestation heralds a new direction in God speaking to man or if it's mass hysteria on a grand scale. We're leaning toward the latter, but there's no need to be hasty."

Little is known about Osteen, onetime leader of the A/V squad at his father's Houston church, who disappeared part-way through his first year at Oral Roberts University. Since 1999, however, he has reportedly been speaking messages of scripture-laced positive affirmation to those fortunate enough to have witnessed a television appearance. Many put great faith in his transformational messages, calling him a prophet for a new age. In some quarters, however, his messages are dismissed as the wishful thinking of children who believe in the Tooth Fairy and leprechauns. "It's preposterous," says Dylan McLean, editor of a popular hoax-busting blog, "People see and hear what they want to hear. Stare at TV static long enough and who knows what you'll experience."

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