America's Largest Church Moves Into Their New Home

Lakewood Church in Houston, TX moved into their new sanctuary this weekend, the 16,000 seat Compaq Center, former home to the Houston Rockets.

America’s largest church celebrated its move into the former arena for the Houston Rockets with a capacity crowd of 16,000, an upbeat sermon from its televangelist pastor and a spirited welcome from the governor of Texas.

“How do you like our new home?” Lakewood Church pastor Joel Osteen asked to thunderous applause. “It looks pretty good doesn’t it? This is a dream come true.”

The new home for the nondenominational Christian church is the former Compaq Center, once home to the Rockets.

There were no vacant spots in the arena as Lakewood, which recently became the first church in the United States to average more than 30,000 worshippers weekly, held its first service there Saturday night. The service also was televised live.

‘Nothing short of amazing’
Gov. Rick Perry praised the church’s new look and told the crowd, “As lawmakers we do a lot of things, but only the church can teach people to love.

“This is nothing short of amazing,” Perry said. “It is so great to look across this crowd and see the wonderful diversity of this great state we call Texas.”

It took more than 15 months and $75 million to complete the renovations — which included adding five stories to make more room.

Good for them! Occasionally I've watched Pastor Joel Osteen on TV (and his father before him) and always found his messages upbeat and uplifting. He probably has the most diverse crowd of any church in America, so it's obvious the church's message and style has wide appeal. I'll leave it to the Monday morning preachers to analyze his sermons.

Some purists will undoubtedly be apoplectic at the thought that this big church might get even bigger, but I have a hard time getting upset about 30,000 people attending an evangelical church every weekend. I'm a big church guy, and I applaud their success.