The man who made prayer cloths and a financial interpretation of the Bible a staple of Christian faith, Frederick J. Eikerenkoetter II, died July 28 in Los Angeles.
The man who made prayer cloths and a financial interpretation of the Bible a staple of Christian faith, Frederick J. Eikerenkoetter II, died July 28 in Los Angeles.
Eikerenkoetter died from complications resulting from a stroke in 2007. Known for his garish clothing and jewelry, Eikerenkoetter is remembered for his witty remarks, “The Bible says Jesus rode on a borrowed ass. But I would rather ride in a Rolls Royce than to ride somebody’s ass!”
While Eikerenkoetter preached a message of material prosperity to his majority middle-class and low-income African-American flock, his beginning in Ridgeland, S.C. were humble. Eikerenkoetter was born on June 1, 1935 to a Dutch-Indonesian father, who was a Baptist minister, and a Black school teacher. He got the “calling” to preach around age 9.
Eikerenkoetter said that he felt the traditional Christian ministries were too constricting and instilled poverty among its members by supporting messages of piety.
At 14, he became the assistant pastor of his father’s church, Bible Way Baptist in Ridgeland, and by 21 had earned a bachelor’s degree in theology from the American Bible College in Chicago, Ill.
After two years in the Air Force, Eikerenkoetter started a ministry at the old Sunset movie house on Harlem’s 125th Street. He built a congregation based on faith-healing, coupled with positive self-imaging. Eikerenkoetter often bragged to his televised ministry that he owned 16 mink-lined Rolls Royces, wore $1,000 suits and sported diamond rings on both of his hands.
In the early 1970s, Eikerenkoetter’s ministry was among the first televangelists shows in the world. He reached millions of households each week. Eikerenkoetter reportedly owned lavish mansions on both the East and West Coasts and estimated his yearly income to range between $6- and $15 million a year primarily from donations mailed to the television ministry. At the height of his success, Eikerenkoetter admonished the faithful that he only accepted cash offerings and did not “appreciate the sound of loose change in the offering plate.”
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