Country music star clashes with famous televangelist over preaching style

Country music superstar John Rich has criticized megachurch pastor Joel Osteen in a recent podcast appearance.

Rich appeared as a guest on Tuesday’s episode of “The Shawn Ryan Show” — a podcast “dedicated to preserving history through the unfiltered stories of heroic events and current world issues by honoring the real experiences of the men and women who lived them,” its website reads — during which Rich vocalized his disdain for Osteen’s preaching.

The 51-year-old country musician said he believes the “end times” are near and that Osteen would not preach this because he doesn’t want to make his audience uncomfortable.

“Joel Osteen is never going to say anything that’s going to make anybody uncomfortable ever on any level ever,” Rich said. “He’s never gonna say anything that would prick the heart or conscience of his congregation.”

Rich elaborated that he thinks the idea that “God would never make his people go through something like that” is one of the most “spiritually ignorant things a person could say.”

Osteen preaches an ideology known as propserity theology, which teaches that those who commit to Christian faith will be rewarded through material gain. Osteen himself is a multimillionaire, with a net worth of about $100 million this year, according to theStreet.

Rich said he recognizes that most Christians in the United States live comfortably, but that Christians around the world are being persecuted.

“Why don’t you go tell that to the underground Christians in communist China right now who are being killed by the thousands?” he said. “They are willing to worship God and be a Christian when it means they could die for doing it. And we don’t have that problem in the United States.”

Osteen had not responded to Rich’s comments as of Friday afternoon.

Rich rose to fame as a member of the band “Lonestar” from 1992 to 1998, serving as the band’s bassist and co-lead vocalist.