Love, Scandal and New Ventures

0:00 A supernatural love story is making headlines. Omega Church cancels their conference as backlash of the scandal continues. And Joel Osteen launches a new venture. I'm John Maddarazzo for CharismaNews.com and this is your midweek rundown. This article that was originally posted on April 9th is still getting a lot of readers attention. The supernatural love story of Joni Lamb and Doug Weiss. In this, they tell their love story and how Joni said that after the passing of her late husband, Marcus Lamb, that there was no real desire in me for a relationship. I wanted to make that crystal clear. I wasn't looking and had no need to do so.

0:41 So many people have judged my timeline from Marcus's death to my marriage to Doug. They question how I could have grieved through grieved enough in seven months to even think about talking to someone else. They think that's not enough time. You can read more of her thoughts in this article. The link will be in the description below. And you can also watch the interview that I had with her about her latest book through the storm. Next, the annual conference put on by Gateway Church, Gateway Conference, has officially been canceled. In their post, they simply say that Gateway Conference 2024 is canceled. They went on to explain, we want to let you know that after much prayer and consideration, we have decided not to hold Gateway Conference in 2024.

1:24 Our congregation and staff are in the midst of navigating Robert Morris's resignation and the emotions surrounding it. We are deeply sorry for the pain this situation caused the survivor and other survivors of abuse and the church at large. For those of you who have already registered, we will be issuing full refunds on the tickets. With Gateway Church still reeling from the ordeal, interim teaching pastor, Max Lucado, has stepped in to help guide and right the ship of the Dallas area congregation and bring about healing and restoration to the community. Lucado previously stated, my desire is simply this love God's hurting people. I see this as an opportunity to do just that.

2:05 Pastor Joel Quim Lundquist has also temporarily joined with Gateway to help in a pastoral role for those still on staff at the mega church while also occasionally giving sermons. And Joel Osteen announces the launching of a new media venture. He says that I'm excited to see our content become part of the Roku channel's exceptional free streaming offer. The media launch occurred last Wednesday with the network known as the Joel Osteen network. The new streaming service is just one of a few other major milestones that Osteen has celebrated this year. Earlier this year, Osteen celebrated his 1000th sermon since taking over at Lakewood Church, along with the finished payment of the one million dollar loan that the church has been working on paying for two decades.

2:56 There's good things happening for Joel Osteen. These are all things to keep an eye on and make sure that you stay tuned to charisma news dot com for updates on all of these stories and breaking news from a spiritual perspective. I'm John Madarazzo for charisma news dot com.