"Love Wins" by Rob Bell

[Publisher]

Since Border’s is closing I went to their sale this past week end and got two books at a discounted rate…I’m all about discounts in these tough economic times…anyway…I have been reading “Love Wins” as part of my devotionals in the AM this week…I must say…I am surprised at how thorougly I have enjoyed the book…and friend Rob’s insights into scripture.

Has anyone else read the book? I am now on the section about hell…all the varied nuances the English word translated “hell” looses from “sheol”, “tartarus”, “hades” in the originals…I would recommend the book so far…his insights have touched me…I will probably look into some of his other books now.

 

[Contarini]

Bell’s scholarship is often shaky, so I wouldn’t follow him uncritically on linguistic/historical issues. But I think the book is a great challenge to conventional evangelical thinking.

You can read my thoughts on it here (the posts before and after also refer to it).

 

[I_Thirst]

Bell’s scholarship is often shaky, so I wouldn’t follow him uncritically on linguistic/historical issues. But I think the book is a great challenge to conventional evangelical thinking.

You can read my thoughts on it here (the posts before and after also refer to it).

Excellent review. Thanks for linking!

 

[Publisher]

You have some good points friend…I’m not necessarily reading friend Rob’s book to “poke holes” in it…but to understand the man and where he is coming from…I am not a fan of the megachurch either…his views concerning that salvation occurs NOW and that the Kingdom is a present and future reality is very “Quakerly”.

That God is all about restoration of broken relationships…his insights that “Sodom and Gomorrah” will be restored as His work continues in relation to those who seem to get some “joy” from thinking that sinners are going to “burn” forever was insightful. (I may be reading some of my own thoughts into his)

I am about two pages into the chapter on “Hell”. I looked up each reference to hell made in scripture…and he is correct…there just aren’t that many.

I found myself nodding when he spoke of the “hell” of rape and torture and famine and disease that exist now…and God’s desire to restore humanity.

My own opinion…we often seek to “speak for God” concerning who and who is not “saved” way too much…which clouds and colors how we as the People of God deal and treat others in our midst.

 

[Izdaari]

I have not yet read that particular book. But I have other books and videos by Bell, and in general I like him a lot. He’s not a top academic theologian for sure, and I wouldn’t even say he’s 100% orthodox even from a Protestant perspective, but he has good common sense insights and expresses them well, and is very thought-provoking.

 

[Contarini]

I have not yet read that particular book. But I have other books and videos by Bell, and in general I like him a lot. He’s not a top academic theologian for sure, and I wouldn’t even say he’s 100% orthodox even from a Protestant perspective, but he has good common sense insights and expresses them well, and is very thought-provoking.

This may be a quibble, but the word “even” implies that Protestant standards of orthodoxy are broader than those of Catholicism. It depends. There are points (including many of the points at issue with regard to Bell’s latest book) where evangelical Protestants have a narrower understanding of what is orthodox than do contemporary Catholics.

Hans Urs von Balthasar may be considered a bit on the edge by conservative Catholics, but he was never condemned and is supposedly the favorite theologian of Pope Benedict. And he was a hopeful universalist, like Bell.

Evangelicals are much more nervous than are mainstream Catholics (and by “mainstream” I mean folks like the Pope) about the idea that people who don’t explicitly believe in Jesus might go to heaven. They are also often more rigid in their understanding of Biblical inspiration/inerrancy.

Edwin

 

[AlwaysCurious]

I remember some of my Protestant friends getting tied up in knots over this book, and one of them posted Martin Bashir’s MSNBC interview with Bell (you can see it here youtube.com/watch?v=Vg-qgmJ7nzA). The reporter keeps asking Bell whether our response to God matters in this lifetime, as it regards our eternal destiny, if God is going to “win” in the end anyway. Sounds like a good common sense question to me. And Bell, in this interview anyway, can’t seem to make any sense out of his own position. There are a lot of feel-good gospels abroad in the land right now; maybe this is one more.

I looked over a couple of reviews and between those and the interview, it seems like my time is better spent elsewhere. Life is short. Right now I’m reading The Divine Comedy, which I suspect will be around long after Bell has been forgotten.

 

[Contarini]

I remember some of my Protestant friends getting tied up in knots over this book, and one of them posted Martin Bashir’s MSNBC interview with Bell (you can see it here youtube.com/watch?v=Vg-qgmJ7nzA). The reporter keeps asking Bell whether our response to God matters in this lifetime, as it regards our eternal destiny, if God is going to “win” in the end anyway. Sounds like a good common sense question to me. And Bell, in this interview anyway, can’t seem to make any sense out of his own position.

That wasn’t my response to that interview at all. I thought Bashir was badgering Bell, refusing to accept any answer that didn’t fit Bashir’s own (conservative Calvinist) perspective.

I think that the question is an extraordinarily bad one. If God is God, then we should respond to God because God is God, period. We shouldn’t have to be told that if we don’t something very nasty will happen to us. And even if we do, then just the fact that we would be missing out on union with God for a few years or decades or centuries is enough to make a huge difference.

Isn’t it obvious that living in a loving union with God is very different from not so living?

The question makes no sense in the first place.

Edwin

 

[Publisher]

That wasn’t my response to that interview at all. I thought Bashir was badgering Bell, refusing to accept any answer that didn’t fit Bashir’s own (conservative Calvinist) perspective.

I think that the question is an extraordinarily bad one. If God is God, then we should respond to God because God is God, period. We shouldn’t have to be told that if we don’t something very nasty will happen to us. And even if we do, then just the fact that we would be missing out on union with God for a few years or decades or centuries is enough to make a huge difference.

Isn’t it obvious that living in a loving union with God is very different from not so living?

The question makes no sense in the first place.

Edwin

As he states early on in the book…Eternal Life is a state we LIVE IN AT THIS VERY MOMENT…“Life” and “Death” are states of being we exist within NOW…why would we NOT want to enter into Life?

I didn’t see the program…but after reading as far into the book as I have…just finished “Hell”…I can’t imagine friend Rob would have any problem answering as best he could…whether the interviewer would accept his answer is another matter entirely.

The further I get into the book…the more “Quakerly” his ideas sound…I wonder if he has any Quaker ties? I know Philip Gulley is one of his fans…“If Grace Is True” and “If God Is Love” are two of Friend Philips books I enjoy and have read a couple of times…I probably will pass “Love Wins” around as well.

 

[Izdaari]

This may be a quibble, but the word “even” implies that Protestant standards of orthodoxy are broader than those of Catholicism. It depends. There are points (including many of the points at issue with regard to Bell’s latest book) where evangelical Protestants have a narrower understanding of what is orthodox than do contemporary Catholics.

Hans Urs von Balthasar may be considered a bit on the edge by conservative Catholics, but he was never condemned and is supposedly the favorite theologian of Pope Benedict. And he was a hopeful universalist, like Bell.

Evangelicals are much more nervous than are mainstream Catholics (and by “mainstream” I mean folks like the Pope) about the idea that people who don’t explicitly believe in Jesus might go to heaven. They are also often more rigid in their understanding of Biblical inspiration/inerrancy.

Edwin

Yeah, that’s a fair point. And thanks for letting me know about Hans Urs von Balthasar, whom I hadn’t heard of, and will be interested in checking out.