I went to a Pride event over the weekend to support my church, and my elder, Sophia, who was selling her art. I glanced over her art, mostly deciding to observe and not buy.
Then I saw a piece of art titled “Audience of One.”
If you wonder why this piece of art struck me and spoke to me, please scroll to the top of this blog and look at my tagline.
I attended a prayer meeting at my church last Tuesday and it’s named “Prophetic Prayer and Worship.” Definitely lots of worship. We did some praying but my prayers were mostly self-centered.
I am too blessed to be here.
Everything is going right in my life. Other people need prayer more than I do.
I don’t deserve to be here
I decided that once the meeting had ended, I would slip out quietly and alone, as I usually tend to do.
Sophia saw me from across the room and came over to welcome me. I exchanged words with her briefly before a woman in the Children’s Ministry came over to me and said, “I have a Word for you.” I stared at her, baffled, because I had no idea what that meant.
She said, “God told me to tell you that ‘he hears you, he sees you, he loves you, and he is with you.’ Does that mean anything?”
And in a few minutes, I was crying because those were all of the things that I felt like God wasn’t doing. I cried for quite a bit, but it’s something I needed. God could’ve chosen anyone else in the world to talk to. But he chose me. Or even if it wasn’t “God,” the lady felt compelled to tell me those things out of everyone else in the room.
So I’ve been seeing God’s hand in different things and speaking to me in different ways ever since.
So when I came across the painting above, I definitely knew that wasn’t a coincidence—that was God speaking to me in the most important way he knew how.
Signs and symbols are different for everyone, but God knows just how to speak to me and reach me.
He hears me. He sees me. He loves me. He is with me.
I suffered a personal failure recently and found God challenging me on how I would respond to it. To be honest, my first instinct was to check out on life. But through the failure, I learned that I do not know how to handle failure. As a child, I was never taught how to handle failure. I was always taught that if at first you don’t succeed, you don’t accept failure as an option, you try harder.
I recently learned that’s not the way to handle things. The chart below is helping me to accept that failure is
a part of life
okay
a way to learn grace
a learning experience
something that reminds me I won’t be kicked out of God’s kingdom
Remembering my identity, who I am in Christ, will help me to navigate the ups and frequent downs of life as I should. Thereby assisting in me in trying to take the easy way out of life.
[This is the FINAL part of a multi-part series on Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins.]
Indeed, the end is here! And I know you and I are probably both glad for it.
Bell gives his testimony of how he came to know God’s love and invites his readers to trust God and that “the love we fear is too good to be true is actually good enough to be true.” Bell reminds his readers that the decisions they make today will impact the future, the hereafter.
This invitation to trust asks for nothing more than this moment, and yet it is infinitely urgent. Jesus told a number of stories about this urgency in which things did not turn out well for the people involved. One man buries the treasure he’s been entrusted with instead of doing something with it and as a result he’s “thrown outside into the darkness.” Five foolish wedding attendants are unprepared for the late arrival of the groom and then end up turned away from the wedding with the chilling words “Truly, I tell you, I don’t know you.” Goats are sent “away” to a different place than the sheep, tenants of a vineyard have it taken from them, and weeds that grew alongside wheat are eventually harvested and “tied in bundles to be burned.”
This paragraph begs for an explanation, begs for elaboration because of all the images and stories presented here. But Bell only offers this:
These are strong, shocking images of judgment and separation in which people miss out on rewards and celebrations and opportunities.
Bell glosses over the striking imagery presented in each of the parables he quickly presents, completely ignoring the deeper meaning and symbolism that lies in each because the explanation wouldn’t support his purpose in writing the book. It’s a shame because that large paragraph (not typical for Bell; I’ve done my best to adhere to his short line breaks) prompts more questions than Bell will ever be inclined to answer.
Love is why I’ve written this book, and
love is what I want to leave you with.
I walked away from this book with more frustration and unanswered questions rather than love and peace the fills the soul.
[This is part XIII of a multi-part series on Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins.]
Image from covdevotions2010.blogspot.com
Heading into Chapter 7, the reader gets the sense that Bell is wrapping things up. He details the parable of the Prodigal Son very much in Tim Keller-like style, giving equal attention to the elder and young brothers. But then he also focuses on the attributes of the father in how he dealt with his sounds:
The father redefines fairness. … Grace and generosity aren’t fair; that’s their very essence. The father sees the young brother’s return as one more occasion to practice unfairness. The younger son doesn’t deserve a party—that’s the point of the party. That’s how things work in the father’s world. Profound unfairness.
The odd thing as I read that is that well, yes, I agree. God is unfair. And somehow I see this as evidence that bolsters a Reformed theologian’s argument rather than Bell’s idea of religious universalism.
People get what they don’t deserve.
Bell and I still agree.
Parties are thrown for younger brothers who squander their inheritance.
I put on brakes here not because I disagree with the statement as it’s written, but I worry that the implication is that it’s okay to “squander” an inheritance because a party gets thrown anyway. (Romans 6 warns against this.)
As Bell continues to develop his idea of this widely known parable (shifting away from Keller), Bell seems to redefine “hell” as a person living in the enslavement of his or her own selfish attitudes and vices in the presence of a loving and generous God.
Jesus puts the older brother right there at the party, but refusing to trust the father’s version of the story. Refusing to join in the celebration.
Hell is being at the party.
That’s what makes it so hellish.
… In this story, heaven and hell are within each other,
intertwined, interwoven, bumping up against each other.
If the older brother were off, alone in a distant field,
sulking and whining about how he’s been a slave all these years and never even had a goat to party with his friend with, he would be alone in his hell.
But in the story Jesus tells, he’s at the party, with the music in the background and the celebration going on right there in front of him.
Later on, Bell says:
We create hell whenever we fail to trust God’s retelling of the story.
The odd thing is, I see Bell’s connection. But I fear that his conclusion is simply just a leap. This idea is not easily pulled from the text, and when you frame the parable of the prodigal son in the context of a book on heaven, hell, and fate, sure, it somewhat makes sense. But out of the context of Love Wins (and in context of the rest of the Bible), I don’t know that Bell’s interpretation of the story holds up. And therefore, ultimately, I think it falls apart as a whole.
Bell later on admits that people who reject God do suffer punishment:
We’re at the party,
but we don’t have to join in.
Heaven or hell.
Both at the party.
… To reject God’s grace,
to turn from God’s love,
to resist God’s telling [of our story],
will lead to misery.
It is a form of punishment, all on its own.
This is an important distinction, because in talking about what God is like, we cannot avoid the realities of God’s very essence, which is love. It can be resisted and rejected and denied and avoided, and that will bring another reality. Now, and then.
We are that free.
This is the part where I imagine Reformed Christians chafing at the collar at that last statement. But Bell continues on to unequivocally state that yes, hell exists and people can create it. But I fear Bell is too equivocal in what that hell is (negative attitudes and vices).
When people say they’re tired of hearing about “sin” and “judgment” and “condemnation,” it’s often because those have been confused for them with the nature of God. God has no desire to inflict pain or agony on anyone.
God extends an invitation to us,
and we are free to do with it is [sic] as we please.
Saying yes will take us in one direction;
saying no will take us in another.
… We do ourselves great harm when we confuse the very essence of God, which is love, with the very real consequences of rejecting and resisting that love, which creates what we call hell.
I’ll end this chapter analysis with a quote I liked (in light of the parable of the two sons):
Our badness can separate us from God’s love,
that’s clear.
But our goodness can separate us from God’s love as well.
Neither son understands that the father’s love was never about any of that. The father’s love cannot be earned, and it cannot be taken away.
After rambling on some random rabbit trail about “mystics” and the “Force,” Bell asserts that “Jesus is bigger than any one religion.”
Ah, durr. But then we get to Jesus’ claim in John 14 of being “the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
Remember that acquaintance of mine I quoted from Goodreads who said that she encountered people more hung up on this statement than on hell? I said I agreed with her.
What he doesn’t say is how, or when, or in what manner the mechanism functions that gets people to God through him.
John 3, John 16.
He doesn’t even state that those coming to the Father through him will ever know that they are coming exclusively through him.
John 14:6-7; John 17.
He simply claims that whatever God is doing in the world to know and redeem and love and restore the world is happening through him.”
I agree with the overall idea of the statement but I’m not sure it’s as “simplistic” as Bell makes it sound. Jesus has consistently proven to be accessible to the multitudes in a simple manner with a highly complex undertone in his parables and teaching—so complex that even the disciples who were with him rarely “got” what he was speaking of without Jesus having to explain himself first. So let’s watch Bell tackle Jesus’ bold statement of being the only way to God using mental gymnastics (because really that’s what it feels like to me).
And so the passage is exclusive, deeply so, insisting on Jesus alone as the way to God. But it is an exclusivity on the other side of inclusivity.
Dude, what?!
After explaining that exclusivity defines the traditional view of hell (“in or out”) and inclusivity is universalism (all roads lead to the same God), Bell says:
And there is an exclusivity on the other side of inclusivity. This kind insists that Jesus is the way, but holds tightly to the assumption that the all-embracing, saving love of this particular Jesus the Christ will of course include all sorts of unexpected people from across the cultural spectrum.
As soon as the door is opened to Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, and Baptists from Cleveland, many Christians become very uneasy, saying that then Jesus doesn’t matter anymore, the cross is irrelevant, it doesn’t matter what you believe, and so forth.
Not true.
Absolutely, unequivocally, unalterably not true.
What Jesus does is declare that he,
and he alone,
is saving everybody.
And then he leave the door way, way open. Creating all sorts of possibilities. He is as narrow as himself and as wide as the universe.
He is as exclusive as himself and as inclusive as containing every single particle of creation.
Bell is careful to write “Jesus is the way” omitting the oft-used word “only” or forgoing the italicization of “the.” (Just an observation. Jesus does not use the word “only” here although one could argue that it’s implied.) The problem here, which Bell raises by bringing in Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, etc., is that Bell affirms Jesus is present in all of these different religions that claim to be salvation or divine attainment in some form. It’s like reverse religious universalism, in a way. Instead of all paths leading to the same God, Bell appears to be saying that Jesus is present in all of these paths.
So Jesus is the prophet Mohammad to Islam.
Jesus is nirvana—the place of Enlightenment.
Jesus is Vishnu, Brahma, Shiva, Shakti, or any of the number of Hindu gods.
For some reason, this idea seems really offensive to me. As if Jesus isn’t accessible in his own form, in his own way, he must materialize in different forms like a shape-shifter of the universe. I think I’d be just as offended if a Muslim told me that Mohammed was a shape-shifter who appears as Judeo-Christian Messiah to bring salvation to Jews and Western Gentiles. My mind can’t fully grasp the idea Bell is throwing out here.
Again, we’re back to religious universalism: yes, all paths do lead to the same God because as Bell seems to say since Jesus is present in all these religions, everyone in these religions reaches the same God.
It’s the most astounding mental gymnastics I’ve ever encountered.
Jehovah God, the Old Testament God was clear that many of the gods and idols that non-Israelites set up were not Him and that He was not present or blessing any of those rituals. (“Baal” is a notable god that Jehovah had a special holy hatred for.) Jehovah was pretty exclusive about that.
But the inclusivity on the side of exclusivity is that He was willing to draft Gentiles who were willing to believe in him (Rahab, Ruth, and Job being prominent examples).
There’s your mental gymnastics from me, but I think Bell wins the gold medal in this competition.
So how does any of this explanation of who Jesus is and what he’s doing connect with heaven, hell, and the fate of every single person who has ever lived?
Bell’s essential answer is that since Jesus is everywhere and in everything, believers in Christ need not worry about the eternal destination of others because “God’s got this.” (Not a Bell quote.)
We are not threatened by this,
surprised by this,
or offended by this.
Sometimes people use his name;
other times they don’t.
I agree that Jesus can be encountered in different ways by different people and perhaps he may not even be known to some people as Jesus or Yeshua. But we must also consider that Jesus warned his disciples about false prophets in Matthew 7 and Matthew 24 (speaking of exclusivity, one of those verses has Jesus mentioning “the elect” whoever and whatever that means).
So while “none of us have cornered the market on Jesus, and none of us ever will,” I don’t believe Jesus was as vague or confusing with his statements as Bell makes him out to be. I do, however, wholeheartedly agree with the following quote from Bell:
It is our responsibility to be extremely careful about making negative, decisive, lasting judgments about people’s eternal destines.
So is Gandhi in hell? Do we know this for certain? No, I don’t think we do. But we can all hazard guesses for now.
Additional note:
Bell goes on to say that Jesus says “he ‘did not come to judge the world, but to save the world’ (John 12)” but if you continue to read on in that same passage, Jesus speaks of an ultimate judge (the assumption from other Biblical texts is God the Father) who issues judgment or (as the NIV puts it) condemnation. Another way Bell is able to raise questions and ably dodge them because his readers are unable to ask all of the questions he raises by completely ignoring their existence.
[This is part XI of a multi-part series on Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins. Note: Chapter 6 is two parts.]
Image from communities.canada.com
I really want to push through chapter 6 for fear I’ll dwell here for days on end like I did with chapters 3 and 4 (which were major chapters really), but I do have a few things I want to point out and we’ll see where things take us.
Bell is pretty straightforward in this chapter, and as the title says, Bell indeed talks about rocks. He details the story in Exodus 17 in which the Israelities are thirsty and can’t find water. God tells Moses to strike the rock and the rock produces water. Bell and his readers jump to I Corinthians 10 in which Paul explains to his audience that “those who traveled out of Egypt ‘drank from the spiritual rock that accompanies them, and that rock was Christ.'”
Paul, however, reads another story in the story, insisting that Christ was present in that moment, that Christ was providing the water they needed to survive—that Jesus was giving, quenching, sustaining.
Jesus was, he says, the rock.
According to Paul,
Jesus was there.
Without anybody using his name.
Without anybody saying that it was him.
Without anybody acknowledging just what—or, more precisely, who—it was.
… Paul finds Jesus there,
in that rock,
because Paul finds Jesus everywhere.
From this brief passage, one gets the sense that Bell is making two points here:
The Israelites were saved in the wilderness by Christ who is the “living water” (John 4:10-15), which Bell really could’ve and, in order to strengthen his argument, should’ve mentioned here. Before the Israelites even knew who was saving them from physical death, the Messiah was already present providing them with the water of life.
Christ can be present in nearly anything, anywhere; the implication being that the saving work of Christ can be present in almost any form. This starts to get loaded.
Here’s the deleted portion of the previous passage:
Paul’s interpretation that Christ was present in the Exodus raises the question:
Where else has Christ been present?
When else?
With who else?
How else?
This opens up a can of worms, in a way. In Velvet Elvis, Bell is careful to show that Paul finds secular truth in Greek philosophy and poetry and doesn’t hesitate to incorporate it into one of his sermons.
[Paul] is speaking at a place called Mars Hill (which would be a great name for a church) and trying to explain to a group of people who believe in hundreds of thousands of gods that there is really only one God who made everything and everybody. At one point he’s talking about how God made us all, and he says to them, “As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offering.'” (ENDNOTE!: Acts 17:28) He quotes their own poets. And their poets don’t even believe in the God he’s talking about. They were talking about some other god and how we are all the offspring of that god, and Paul takes their statement and makes it about his God. Amazing.
Paul doesn’t just affirm the truth here; he claims it for himself. He doesn’t care who said it or who they were even saying it about. What they said was true, and so he claims it as his own.” (Velvet Elvis, p. 079)
And I’m with Bell with the ability to affirm truth wherever it is because God exhibits truth and truth is an extension of God.
But I tread carefully on the ability to find Jesus’ saving work in anything because God can do anything and use anything He pleases for salvation. But the Bible is clear that God isn’t present in everything so Bell’s questions make me a bit iffy on the ways Christ has been present, can be present, and in what ways he can be present. I won’t make any definitive assertions except to say that while I don’t believe God is present in sin or evil, He can (and often does!) use the outcome for good that can lead to salvation.
Jesus died and rose again. As a result of that action, he has forever reconciled us to God the Father.
This is not controversial stuff.
As a result, there’s not much that I need to ponder over or challenge because in this chapter, Bell lays out Jesus’ sacrifice and he does it in a way that is typically Bell-esque: with original analogies and beautiful images. (When Bell says something clearly, it’s like bursting into a magnificent, clear blue sky after having endured dark shadows and lingering gray storm clouds.)
Bell makes an interesting point that I’ve never heard of before (but find interesting): he speaks of John (the Gospel writer) numbering signs all throughout his gospel. In John 11, Lazarus’s resurrection from the dead is the seventh sign of Jesus outlined in the gospel.
Now ask: Is the number seven significant in the Bible?
Does it occur in any other prominent place?
Well, yes, it does. In the poem that begins the Bible. The poem speaks of seven days of creation.
But there’s one more sign in John’s Gospel. In chapter 20 Jesus rises from the dead. Now that’s a sign. The eighth sign in the book of John. Jesus rises from the dead in a garden. Which, of course, takes us back to Genesis, to the first creation in a . . . garden.
I’d never thought of things that way. Reading that blew my mind. Either John was a very clever fiction writer or God is the most amazing storyteller I’ve ever read.
What is John telling us?
It’s the eighth sign, the first day of the new week, the first day of the new creation. The resurrection of Jesus inaugurates a new creation, one free from death, and it is bursting forth in Jesus himself right here in the midst of the first creation.
… John is telling a huge story,
one about God rescuing all of creation.
I love it. John continually points his readers back to Genesis, constantly linking Jesus to God the Father, Creator of all things from the get-go (Jn 1:1) and here it is even in the final chapters of John and I totally missed it. It’s beautiful to see.
As I’m breathless and taken away by this beauty of discovering the symbolism in everything Jesus does, Bell kind of ruins it for me in “wait-a-minute-this-is-a-book-about-heaven-hell-and-the-fate-of-every-person-who-ever-lived-moment.”
How many people, if you were to ask them why they’ve left church, would give an answer something along the lines of, “It’s just so . . . small”?
No one I know really. They’d have tons of other reasons but it wouldn’t be that.
Of course.
A gospel that leaves out its cosmic scope will always feel small.
A gospel that has as its chief message avoiding hell or not sinning will never be the full story.
A gospel that repeatedly, narrowly affirms and bolsters the “in-ness” of one group at the expense of the “out-ness” of another group will not be true to the story that includes “all things and people in heaven and on earth.”
And I think to myself, this is not the gospel. No one I know or have ever heard in Biblical Protestantism (ok, and Anabaptism) preaches a message like this. (I’m not sure whether to classify this as a false dichotomy.) The main message of the gospel, which can often be “ye must be born again,” is always Christ and Him crucified.
Why was Christ crucified? To reconcile us to God. Why do we need to be reconciled to God? That’s a question, or more accurately, a tension we can be free to leave fully intact.
[This is part IX of a multi-part series on Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins. Note: Chapter 4 has been broken up into four parts. Chapter 4, part I can be found here, part II can be found here, and part III can be found here.]
Let’s work on closing out Chapter 4 of this book.
“Many people find Jesus compelling, but don’t follow him, because of the parts about ‘hell and torment and all that.’ Somewhere along the way they were taught that the only option when it comes to Christian faith is to clearly declare that a few, committed Christians will ‘go to heaven’ when they die and everyone else will not, the matter is settled at death, and that’s it. One place or the other, no looking back, no chance for a change of heart, make your bed now and lie in it . . . forever.
Not all Christians have believed this, and you don’t have to believe it to be a Christian. The Christian faith is big enough, wide enough, and generous enough to handle that vast a range of perspectives.“
“Speaking of Jesus, I don’t find many non-Christians that are hung up on the idea of hell. Most I know are hung up on the idea that Jesus is the only way. And that the Bible says seemingly contradictory things and you’d be stupid/silly to believe it. “
Doctrinally, I’d say that’s been my experience too. In general, I’d say non-Christians tend to be averse to Christianity because of the hypocrisy that runs rampant among many of its believers. (Side note: Tim Keller makes a great point in regard to why this behavior occurs among Christians in Chapter 4 of The Reason for God.)
As for the bolded part about not having to believe in eternal punishment/torment/hellfireandbrimstone to be a Christian, I start to get a little twitchy. Because even though the basic rule of being a Christian is being an obedient (“as best as you can”) follower of Jesus, there are all these doctrines and tenets that have kind of been hung around his neck as part of the package and it’s difficult to distinguish whether you can have Jesus without hell.
[This is part VIII of a multi-part series on Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins. Note: Chapter 4 has been broken up into four parts. Chapter 4, part I can be found here and part II can be found here.]
The other issue I have with Bell here about the talk of restoration, renewal, and if you will, “second chances,” is that gives people no real need to come to Jesus. If all things will be restored in the end anyway, what does it matter if I murder someone I don’t like? Even if I get fried in the electric chair, I still eventually go to heaven maybe after a brief punishment for my sins.
Although hell is an unlikable place to be or to think about (if you take it seriously), the purpose of it is for judgment. When a criminal is deemed guilty in a court of law and sentenced to life in prison, he is sent to jail until death. Hell is the jail that never ends.
But let’s take a step back. And we’ve got to follow Bell’s suppositions (maybe? he is careful to never outright say he believes these things) about what ultimately brings God glory in the end: restoration, reconciliation, and renewal.
Think of a terrible, gruesome time during the 20th century. I’ll give you a hint of where I’m going with this: think of a specific dictator who murdered tens of millions of people. There are at least three you can choose from.
1 . . .
2 . . .
This is kind of like an annoying email forward now, isn’t it?
3.
I’ll choose Hitler since Stalin and Tse-Tung (Zedong) don’t seem to strike the same kind of terror into Westerners’ hearts.
Adolf Hitler is estimated to be responsible for at least 12 million murders during World War II. When Hitler shot himself in the head on April 30, 1945, his soul plunged into eternity.
Now, tell me:do you think it brings God more glory to simply excuse such heinous and irresponsible actions and allow Hitler into heaven on the basis of restoration and reconciliation or does it bring God more glory to judge Hitler and punish him for the atrocities he committed while he was on this earth? Because remember, he was never tormented in the way that he tormented so many others (not just the Jewish and the Polish but anyone who either opposed him or didn’t fit his ideal Aryan race).
Maybe I’m a cold, heartless bitch, but I want God to make Hitler pay for the things that he never had to pay for on earth. It’s a little disappointing to think that Hitler could toy with the lives of 12 million people and after death still be reconciled to God after maybe a “season” in hell.
God is God, and yes, He could totally restore Adolf Hitler to himself in the era of restoration to come, but I just don’t see humans (who would have exacted the harshest sentences possible on Hitler before executing him) being more lenient than God.
Then Bell says things that make me wonder, Does this jive with scripture?
“To be clear, again, an untold number of serious disciples of Jesus across hundreds of years have assumed, affirmed, and trusted that no one can resist God’s pursuit forever, because God’s love will eventually melt even the hardest of hearts.”
Maybe. But again, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it remains that way forever. I think specifically of Pharaoh who had a rather hard heart against the people of Israel who wanted to be freed and even “repented” (!) of his temporarily “melted” heart (after a series of wearying plagues) and decided to go after them as they made their way out of Egypt. The Bible gives no indication that Pharaoh ever repented of his re-hardened heart.
“Could God say to someone truly humbled, broken, and desperate for reconciliation, ‘Sorry, too late’? Many have refused to accept the scenario in which somebody is pounding on the door, apologizing, repenting, and asking God to be let in, only to hear God say through the keyhole: ‘Door’s locked. Sorry. If you have been here earlier, I could have done something. But now, it’s too late.’
As it’s written in 2 Timothy 2, God ‘cannot disown himself.'”
These many who have refused need to reread the Parable of the Ten Virgins in Matthew 25:1-13. Not that I like the idea of a door being shut permanently, but if we’re going off of scripture, we have to seriously consider what it says.
“At the center of the Christian tradition since the first church have been a number who insist that history is not tragic, hell is not forever, and love, in the end, wins and all will be reconciled to God.”
And in Christianity, there are some people who choose not to directly align themselves with views they believe so that they may not be tied directly with these specific beliefs therefore they speak of themselves in generalities so that it is almost impossible to pin them down with what they believe.
[This is part VII of a multi-part series on Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins. Note: Chapter 4 has been broken up into four parts. Chapter 4, part I can be found here.]
Image by dan | FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Bell continues to expound on the concept that “In the Bible, God is not helpless . . . powerless . . . and [not impotent].” Then he goes through a series of his Socratic questions about God’s attributes and why people were created. And he frames the discussion in a way where it’s either God gets what God wants by all people being saved or God doesn’t get what God wants because some do not.
“God in the end doesn’t get what God wants, it’s declared, because some will turn, repent, and believe, and others won’t. . . . Although we’re only scratching the surface of this perspective—the one that says we get this life and only this life to believe in Jesus—it is safe to say that this perspective is widely held and passionately defended by many in our world today.”
There’s your orthodox Christian view of hell.
“Others hold this perspective (that there is this lifetime and only this lifetime in which we all choose one of two possible futures), but they suggest a possibility involving the image of God in each of us.”
I have no idea what perspective this is. A Christian mystic perhaps?
“. . . And then there are others who can live with two destinations, two realities after death, but insist that there must be some kind of ‘second change’ for those who don’t believe in Jesus in this lifetime. . . . At the heart of this perspective is the belief that, given enough time, everybody will turn to God and find themselves in the joy and peace of God’s presence. The love of God will melt every hard heart, and even the most ‘depraved sinners’ will eventually give up their resistance and turn to God.”
Bell never comes right out and says it but the reader gets the sense that this is the view Bell aligns with. And this view sounds a bit like purgatory in the sense that there’s judgment for wrongs committed in this lifetime but that eventually God will soften a person’s heart and allow him or her to turn to God’s presence. It’s a nice view but one that I don’t see supported by the Bible despite Bell’s support of Jesus saying in Matthew 19 that “there will be a ‘renewal of all things’ and Paul in Colossians 1 says that through Christ “God was pleased to . . . reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven.” (The context of Colossians seems to actually make Bell’s argument weaker because Paul mentions a few verses later “if indeed you continue in the faith” giving me the impression that one needs to believe in Paul’s teachings.)
To add further support to his argument, Bell drops heavyweight names like church fathers Clement of Alexandria and Origen from the third century and Gregory of Nyssa and Eusebius in the fourth century. Clement of Alexandria appears to have been a gnostic Christian (a Christian form widely rejected by mainstream and orthodox Christianity), Origen was Clement’s student, and Eusebius seems to have been a student of Origen (although Eusebius seems to be considered well-respected church father). Bell pushes the idea that “the ultimate reconciliation of all people to God” was a common belief in early church history. (Hence, how Bell gets away with saying at the beginning of the book that he’s not saying anything new.)
Although Bell tries to shift the wording slightly to attribute it to these early church fathers, the reader can tell that Bell’s leanings are in this category:
“Central to their trust that all would be reconciled was the belief that untold masses of people suffering forever doesn’t bring God glory. Restoration brings God glory; eternal torment doesn’t. Reconciliation brings God glory; endless anguish doesn’t. Renewal and return cause God’s greatness to shine through the universe; never-ending punishment doesn’t.”
I am really, really resisting the urge to fire Socrates-like hypothetical questions after that quote because it haughtily assumes that Bell knows the mind of God and what brings Him glory in the end. Do I want suffering, torment, anguish, and punishment to be what brings God glory? No. And does it? From my perspective, I don’t think so either. But I can’t determine anything from God’s perspective. Since I am not God, I cannot definitely determine or define what brings Him glory.
I spent time with some friends today in which we were able to catch up on our lives after not seeing each other for a while but also discussing some theological issues. (Ah! I like this topic much too much!) After learning about their theological stance, I began to pour out my heart on theological issues too.
But it wasn’t theology. Or was it?
I began blurting out all of the things that I was upset about in my spiritual life and in my church. It became a few minutes of which I began airing my spiritual grievances against myself and the world.
The fact of the matter is that I am hunger for God. I read TONS of books on the Christian faith, Jesus, hell, desiring God, parables in the Bible, Reformed doctrine, and being Christ’s hands and feet to those in need. I want to do something. I’m also aware I need to spend a good bit of time being, but I’m also itching to do.
Day after day I’m torn up over my spiritual state because I am angry at myself for forgetting about Jesus when I’m working or not telling others about the freedom that he’s given me.
I want to do practical things to reach out to others in the name of Christ.
I want to be so earthly minded that I’m heavenly good.
I want to wake up on Sunday bursting at the seams to worship Jesus, the God-man who’s done amazing things for me.
I want to be joyously obedient to the Lord out of love and happiness.
I want to connect with other members of Christ’s family through Bible studies where we learn how to transform our lives by applying God’s word.
My husband always admonishes me that I’m too concerned with the big picture. I do want to be part of the big picture. I want to be one of the tiny puzzle pieces that fit to make a beautiful picture when it’s all put together. Right now, I don’t know what I’m doing or where I’m going. I’m drifting out to sea trying to manage this boat of faith all on my own.
The more I think about the church I visited last week, the more I think I’d like to go back. Maybe because it’s shiny and brand-spankin’ new just like a kid who gets a new toy and plays with it until he’s tired of it and wants something new.
I want solid doctrine, I want love and community, and I want to share my enthusiasm for a powerful, loving God (who, yeah, I have issues with at times) who cared enough about this earth to send his only begotten son to this earth to save sinners.
There are a ton of blogs that are currently bashing Rob Bell, labeling him as a universalist, bewailing that he’s walked away from the orthodox Christian faith, and written him off as a heretic.
I see Rob Bell being used of God in unimaginable ways to His honor and His glory.
Bell has jumpstarted the conversation on heaven and hell—who gets to those places and who doesn’t. His recent book, Love Wins, and interviews have challenged Christians to coherently defend what they believe (I Peter 3:15) on this issue. It used to be easy to say “Those who believe in the gospel of Christ go to heaven; those who don’t go to hell.” But now Christians have been challenged to put an attitude of love behind this statement or whatever they believe about hell, and that’s not so easy.
I’m not sure I agree with Mr. Bell on many aspects of this issue. (I’ll reserve definitive judgment until I complete my reading of his recent book.) I believe Scripture is clear that hell exists in some form: whether it be the literal torment of hellfire and brimstone or simply eternal separation from God (which would be a colloquial description of “hell” compared to heaven in God’s presence) as exemplified through C.S. Lewis’s The Great Divorce. Perhaps Mr. Bell believes this too.
Mr. Bell’s aims, however orthodox Christians may interpret them, are noble. (Some may use the terminology “sincerely wrong” here.) Bell, with Love Wins, is attempting to bridge that nasty gap between Christians who seem to say “Nanny nanny boo boo, I’m going to heaven, and you’re going to burn in a lake of fire” and unbelievers who think “even if I live a good life, remain a law-abiding citizen, and don’t blaspheme God, I still go to hell? That’s just not fair.”
It’s not. And the truth is, God isn’t fair.
But Christians need to be sensitive to the fact that the doctrine of hell is an offensive doctrine and any explanation of it should come from an attitude of love and not one of haughtiness. This is what Mr. Bell is attempting to do. I give him tons of credit for the attempt. Whether the execution comes off well (in my opinion) will remain to be seen.
Dollhouse image from cutiebeauty.com, House images from hpadesign.com
Whenever I beat myself senseless over my sinfulness and wretchedness, I need to quote this to myself:
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father…so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God. —Ephesians 3:14, 17-19
Humans are awful, sinful, wretched people—before God and others. There is truth in “worm theology,” but a Christian cannot stay there. A Christian must move past the idea of being a horrible, terrible person (an idea on which I tend to dwell) and move into the light of God’s grace and forgiveness. Yes, my sin is big but the love of God is so much bigger.
Think of your sin as being the size of a dollhouse. Now think of the magnitude of the bedroom that the dollhouse stays in. That’s pretty big, right? Now, imagine the house that holds the room (and other rooms) that the dollhouse resides in. The house is enormous compared to the size of the dollhouse. The dollhouse dwarfed by the size of the house; it is swallowed up and certainly not a major focal point in the home.
This is a feeble human analogy in how God’s love swallows up our sin. In God’s love, our sin is not a major focal point even though it is there. Just as someone walking into a home would not dwell on a small dollhouse in a large home, so God does not want us to dwell on our sin in comparison to His great love.
Yes, this is what I have learned today, and that’s the verse I have been challenged to memorize.
Whenever I can’t come up with a blog post, I think I’ll just refer you to my favorite hymn, “In Christ Alone” because right now, I’m struggling with so much and need to remember that everything I need is indeed in Christ alone.
Ashes were used in ancient times, according to the Bible, to express mourning. Dusting oneself with ashes was the penitent’s way of expressing sorrow for sins and faults.
I had planned on going to an Ash Wednesday service at a local Roman Catholic Church today but for various reasons, won’t be able to do so.
In 1998 when I became a born-again Christian in an independent fundamental Baptist (IFB) church, the pastor (a former Roman Catholic) bashed Catholicism in nearly every possible way. Even though I finished my schooling in a Roman Catholic school 2 years later, I walked away with a dismal view of Catholicism, its doctrines, and practices.
In 2007, I joined the Presbyterian Church of America (PCA). The PCA is a Christian denomination that still holds to Bible-based preaching but offers a liturgical structure similar to that of the Roman Catholic Church. After nearly a decade of being away from a liturgical service, my first experience back was a little jarring. After years of making the Bible as my only authority for Scriptural practices as an IFB, becoming a Presbyterian had me reconsidering church traditions as a supplement (not a replacement) to the Bible for Scriptural practices. (Let me state here that the Bible’s authority takes precedence over church traditions and church traditions clearly in conflict with Scripture should be modified or discarded.)
An acquaintance on a message board who went from born-again Protestant Christianity to Roman Catholicism once suggested that Catholicism may appeal to me again in the future. The likelihood of my becoming a Roman Catholic again is slim, but in a way, he was prophetic: the structure, reverence, and church traditions within Catholicism have reappealed to me and continue to do so the older I get (in age and in faith). Continue reading “Ash Wednesday and the Beginning of Lent”→
Let’s work on closing out Chapter 4 of this book.
Image from mysticalchrist.wordpress.com
Dollhouse image from cutiebeauty.com, House images from hpadesign.com
Image from goldenspikelutheran.files.wordpress.com
This Journey Is My Own 