Family Game Night gone wrong- Sorry Joel Osteen Fans but I'm not letting this one go

Joel Osteen. Many adore this man and hang onto his every positive word, but is what he teaching biblical, is it meant to get and keep you in tune with the Lord of with nature and self? When i came to matters of Joel, i always stood very neutral, Because, to each his own, right? NO , there is nothing right about thousands and and I me and Thousands of men women and children being taught to Discover the Champion in you. I have personally heard him say have faith in yourself that you will archive your goals? No mention of having faith in the Lord. So after my recent experience and what the lord has revealed to me... in the famous words of Jessica Alba, I can no longer " , BE Neutral,BE SWEDEN"( sorry Mrs Alba, I couldn't resist.LOL.

This summer I decided to spend as much time having fun with my children as possible, so I buy board games all the time. So imagine my delight when at a christian bookstore I found an area of board games. . One in particular called Your best life Now( pay attention to the title it's going to come in a little later) stood out to me like a sore thumb.The sign promotion read... an excellent choice for a solid , christian game, to play with your family and friends. The description, something like will help your family open up share and talk to one another and blah blah blah self esteem. I knew It was going to be a bust, but jokingly bought it anyways, thought of all types of ways to sure ways to lovingly, and jokingly torment my teens, while playing a game that was based on talking openly about ones feelings. However to be honest, really bought it because my spirit was so bothered by it. Garrett and I talked about it in depth before buying it, we actually went back and forth. I finally said, you know Garrett ,I just have to see whats in this box.

We made dinner, and set up the game smack dab in the middle of out living room. The game had soooooo many pieces to it, so it actually took some time to set up. As I set it up, I told my oldest to go get the bible, in case we needed it for reference. Boy was that a trip to the bedroom, that wasn't needed.

Here is the set up of the game

Now as your are clearly able to see, there is a Massive head shot of yours truly on the box yet, honestly, OK not enough to worry some, I know, I was there and heard many times over, OH HEY it's Joel O, look mom the hay this Joel O game marked down. So ok moving past that, lol because that's just me being well retentive. Here is where the truth needs to set in and sink in deep. Take a close look at board game it's self. Notice anything? OK you have a Valley and a Mountain top. OK I'm hopeful and so that's what I thought when I first opened it, nothing new age about it, right? Well no not just based off of that.

Game Play Time (YEAHHHHHHH)

•   Enlarge Your Vision
•   Develop a Healthy Self Image
•   Discover the Power of your Thoughts and Words
•   Let Go of the Past
•   Find Strength Through Adversity
•   Live To Give
•   Choose to Be Happy

Noooo, I didn't just quote Dr. Phil. Those are the name of the game play cards.

First all players must take a goal tab and write one goal on it, with one way of archiving that goal, fold it , place their name on it and place it in the MY MIRACLE Envelope. Yet i thought the Lord said, miracles are things HE does, not things we do, check out John 2:18; and Matt. 12:38.

ok so Then each Player gets dealt 7 Enlarge your vision cards and two faith cards.

There are seven levels to complete so let's get started shall we? Humm 7, this poor number can pretty much be associated with tons of things from the sublime to the ridiculous.

● Seven ages of man
● Seven colours of the rainbow,
● Seven wonders of the ancient world
● Seven gates of hell
● Seven primary chakras
● Seven Christian sacraments
● Seven Sisters (the Pleiades)
● Seven dwarfs

THAT'S A WHOLE other blog folks... However I had to point it out. So where is Joel's stand in all of this. Let's play on!

Level one: Enlarge your Vision.

You start with the youngest player, they in turn roll the die and then move their game piece that amount of spaces. Then they must pull one of their enlarge your Vision cards.Here is what is on each card and the instructions

Example given per game instructions, search the images with in the image. If you look at a tree and see a cat, then say cat, there are no wrong answers. YEP MEDITATION TIME. However if your not able to describe why you see a cat, you loose a turn or you can use on of two of your faith cards.

NOW I think it's safe to say what role seven plays in this game. Remember the title... Your best Life NOW. Here is where 7 comes in, Meditation 101, Living in the Now
Your best life NOW.Living in the NOW is the is just one key focal point of Meditation. Which is then dear sisters, divided off into 7 categories, or LEVELS.

1.Meditation: Peak Experiences and Flow: peak experiences are those moments in which you get totally involved to the point that you lose all sense of time and forget all your worries, fears, and problems.You generally do this by focusing on nature. Do you all remember the Enlarge your vision Cards? No right or wrong answers?

Well how does this line up with the word of God? In the word of God we can definitely see there is right and wrong answers in all areas of our daily lives.

Level two: Develop a Healthy Self Esteem:

Players must look into the little mirror provided as they make a statements about themselves, with a 15 sec limit. If not, the player looses a turn, unless you use that good ole faith card. Mind you the game instructions warn you in the the start, basically not to have to much faith, because it only allows you two faith cards.

2. Meditation :Acting instead of Being part of human nature to be in the NOW at all times. With the help of Meditation, you can be happy without doing anything. It is essential to realize this aspect, otherwise, the attainment of happiness will be difficult. One sure way of getting to this place is learning to be happy with who you are, right here and now.

Look into the mirror everyone, pick out everything you love about yourself NOW and accept and embrace it.

OK I'm not going to go and outline the entire game, but what i am going to do is show you the different levels that line up perfectly with new age teachings and that the bible is no where to be found, Nor was there one mention of the lord anyone in the entire game, no scripture... nothing. Just believe in your, you can do it, and have faith in your self.

Game levels

3Discover the Power of your Thoughts and Words
4Let Go of the Past
5 Find Strength Through Adversity
6Live To Give
7 Choose to Be Happy

Meditation levels

3unnessacery thoughts- pretty much self explanatory
4 in the Now everything is beautiful- here you learn to let go of your past
5 the key to now- teaches you how to overcome life situations
6Your potential is Now- learn to give to yourself, serve yourself
7 Acceptance- learn how to be and stay happy.

It goes even deeper than this, however i know if i were to bust it all open, no one would read it, soooo,lol, but if you are following the teachings of Joel, please, do so prayerfully, questions things, don't take things for face value. Stay in the word of God, if you desire a good meditation meditate in that day and night. Pray and ask the Lord to up your potion of discernment.

This game and I'm going to have to also go on his books are not safe. you can take it or leave it, but right now, I personally wouldn't be dabbling in anything other than the Lord. I'm glad I bought this game, for me I needed to see it IN MY FACE, but mainly because the Lord allowed me to research it and see what was really going on and then post it here.

We all, including myself have got to be careful. I was going to sell the game on ebay, but the was instructed to destroy it, one less game out there, i guess,lol.

Sorry for the typos, as i DID NOT spell check this one,lol.