John Osteen
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John Osteen (April 5, 1921 – January 23, 1999) was the first pastor of Lakewood Church from its beginnings in 1959 until his death in 1999 of a heart attack. His son Joel Osteen succeeded him.
Osteen initially was ordained as a minister by the Southern Baptist Convention. He received the Baptism in the Holy Spirit in 1958 and voluntarily disassociated himself from the SBC. On Mother's Day, 1959 he started what is now Lakewood Church in what was described as a "dusty, abandoned feedstore" in northeast Houston, Texas.
