I just established a new category on Joshua One called “Christian Celebrity Gurus.” In the process I have apparently coined a new phrase. I just Googled it, and of more than 25 billion(!) pages indexed by that search engine, I received back exactly ZERO hits. Amazing! I do several Google searches a day, and I do not recall the last time I didn’t get a single hit for a word or phrase. So, Joshua One proudly (?) presents: “Christian Celebrity Gurus.” (Cue applause.)

Earlier this year, we created the Joshua One blog when we split our earlier blog into two. We redefined that earlier blog, Terra Extraneus, as a law blog, and moved our faith-related posts to this domain. I transferred about 150 posts that Rod and I wrote during 2005-2006 to Joshua One.

However, I never undertook the daunting task of recategorizing all of those posts (and repairing all of the links that changed with the transfer) until now. As I finally began that project this week, I came across a few posts about Joel Osteen, the pastor of America’s largest church. So I created a “Joel Osteen” category. Then I came to a few posts about Pat Robertson. Another category?

I don’t really care to give the impression that a big reason why Joshua One Ministries exists is to take potshots at Osteen and Robertson and other members of the Christian celebrity roundtable. I would just as soon mind my own business and stick to speaking positively about the important stuff: God’s Word, church health, etc. However, as church leaders we have a responsibility from time to time to comment on trends that are having a big influence on our fellow Christians and churches.

We will not allow such posts to become a primary topic of conversation here at Joshua One, any more than I would preach about Joel Osteen or Pat Robertson week after week at my church. But I have mentioned both Osteen and Robertson on occasion from the pulpit, and we have mentioned them occasionally on this blog. To categorize those references, “Christian Celebrity Gurus” should do quite nicely.

A celebrity is someone who is “widely known and often referred to.” The Scriptures give us little guidance on responding to the celebrity of others, since it is a modern-day peculiarity. But when everyone is talking about somebody or something, church leaders occassionally need to speak up to provide a Biblical perspective to what is being said.

As I wrote in a January 2006 post titled “The Modern Church: Blowing in the Wind”:

Many believers feel uncomfortable when a Christian challenges a well-known Christian leader publicly. Perhaps one imagines that we should pull Rick Warren [the topic of that Jan. 2006 post] aside, maybe meet him for a coffee at Starbucks, to discuss our concerns. Unable to do that, some think perhaps we should just say nothing at all. Meanwhile, using mass media, Christian leaders are able to influence millions of believers and tens of thousands of churches all over the world. Modern Christians and churches especially seem eager to be carried along by every new wind that blows through the church. The anthem of the 21st-century Church could be “Blowing in the Wind.”

When we become convicted that the “the latest new thing” seriously misses the mark of God’s Word, we are right to speak up. And when the Church Gurus disseminate their ideas through the mass media, the only effective way to discuss or disagree with them is also through the mass media. We should do so in love and with respect, but there is usually more cowardice than honor in remaining silent.

Hey, it looks like I came close to originating the term “Christian Celebrity Gurus” back then. Obviously, the label includes a hint of sarcasm. A guru is someone widely regarded as a a spiritual leader and expert. Frankly, although men like Joel Osteen and Pat Robertson may be good men and brothers in the faith, the Church is in pretty bad shape when such men have become the gurus of our day.

There are some Christian leaders who have set truly great examples for the modern church by their lives, their faith, and their scholarship. Examples that come to mind include Billy Graham, C.S. Lewis, Chuck Colson, Watchman Nee, and John MacArthur. (Can you imagine C.S. Lewis and Joel Osteen having a vigorous theological exchange?) “Christian Celebrity Gurus” is not a category for such men.

This category is for posts in which we challenge and perhaps even criticize the latest fads and trends and the Christian celebrity superstars who are promoting them. Hopefully humility will prompt us to think twice before each post to this category. But sometimes, it is just not possible to keep silent.