HOUSTON Lisa Osteen is sharing the trials and triumphs of her life in a newly published book in an effort to show people that God answers prayers.
Osteen was raised in Lakewood Church. It s the mega-church her father John Osteen started, and her brother Joel Osteen helped grow into the largest congregation in America. In a new book titled You are Made for More, she reveals she has had her share of sickness, tragedy and disappointment.
The trouble started at birth. Osteen says her umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck, causing brain damage.
And that meant my muscles did not develop properly, my mother would have to force feed me, because I hardly had any sucking reflexes, she said.
Doctors thought she would never walk, but she says her parents prayed, and by the age of one, she was well again.
Then on Jan. 30 1990, an incident happened that nearly took her life. Osteen said she opened a package at the church addressed to her father and it was a pipe bomb.
I took the wrapping paper off, then opened the flap that s the last thing I remember really when I opened the flap, she said. It did hurt my leg and my abdomen, but the nails that were 10-inches long went into the desk, into the wall. God really spared my life.
To this day, investigators don t know who sent the package.
More difficult days were still ahead for Osteen. She got married at 22 and divorced at 23. She was devastated.
I didn t doubt God, but I did question him, I wondered what happened. Did I make a mistake by marrying him? And I questioned myself: I must have been a bad wife for this to happen. Of course, I got over that and realized it wasn t me, she said
She moved on, and remarried Kevin Comes, a member of Lakewood.
Then they experienced six frustrating years of trying to have children. She finally decided to accept it, with a prayer.
I said, God if you never give me children I want you to know I am going to be happy, I recognize I have a great husband and a great life, I am never going to pray about this again because I put it in your hands, she said.
Within weeks, she got a call from a woman who knew of a teenager about to have twins, and wanted to put them up for adoption.
Nine months after the doctors had said we can t help you anymore, we brought those babies home, they were only four days old, Catherine and Caroline, she said.
Those twins are now teenagers, and Lisa and her husband also adopted a little boy, who is now ten. So the preacher s kid, who became a preacher, wrote a book about all that happened to her. She says it is proof that God answers prayer, again, and again and again.
I say often, I don t live an airbrushed life, but I can tell you God has brought me through everything I ve been through and I am very happy today, she said.
