my overly simple review of Love Wins…
Because I’m asked about Love Wins almost daily, here are some overly simple (and probably unhelpful) thoughts on Rob Bell’s book Love Wins:
- We need to be extraordinarily careful when using the “h” word. We are way too flippant in playing the heresy card. I do not think Bell’s view of repentance after death is heresy, nor is the idea that hell is empty. This is not to say I agree with it, because I do not.
- Asking questions is not dangerous. Not asking questions, or not allowing people to ask questions, is very dangerous.
- Rob Bell is not a universalist. Universalism has to do with salvation outside of the realm of choice and discounting the uniqueness of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The idea that hell is empty is not the same as universalism. Christians should hope that hell is indeed empty.
- Christian mission is not driven by the fear of hell. Christian mission is driven by the love of God.
- Heaven and hell are indeed present realities in this world.
- God’s love must include our freedom to choose.
- Now, with all that said…I expect more from Rob Bell. His exegesis is weak and unconvincing. I expected this book to be on par with Sex God, and Jesus Wants To Save Christians It is not.
- Where are the end-notes? How do you write a book like this and challege such traditional ideas without including detailed notes, as in Velvet Elvis, Sex God, and Jesus Wants To Save Christians?
- Do not argue this book until you have read it. Blog posts about a book do not count as reading a book. (Hear Rob Bell’s rant on this one).
I would be happy to elaborate any of these points further.
Monday Morning Joy Report
Each Monday I like to take a little time to name some of those holy moments from our time together on Sunday.
1. Baptisms! I was able to baptize 8 Confirmation students this week. I could do that every week!
2. I hate that Ben Kilgore lost his voice, but I loved seeing Jon Odom and Noelle Kilgore step in an lead the set.
3. A person after VenuePM told me that she has been wrestling with some direction from God and the message confirmed some thinking for her. I am amazed that God sometimes gives me worthwhile words. I am even more amazed by the people I run across at Asbury and how seriously they take God’s call for them.
4. I was not a part of this one, but sharing an office with Jon Odom let me see several of our new small group leaders coming in for a check-in meeting. I love what I’m hearing come out of these small groups. God is in the middle of these groups. I hope you’re a part of a small group at Asbury.
I would love to hear what you saw. Feel free to comment and leave your joy report…
People have been asking Rob Bell for clarity…
No personal comments here, just posting it for the conversation.
How do you define heresy?
I’ve been in a few conversations lately that are making me ask some questions about heresy.
I bet you can guess what book these questions are in reference to.
Obviously the heretic word is being thrown around from all corners of the church right now. If you can look past this partiulcar case and ask in a more general sense, how do you define the word heresy? When would you use it? What issues might warrant the heresy card being played?
Please comment and share your thoughts.
After You Believe, week 4
I hope you’re still tracking along in After You Believe. If you’ve just recently bought the book, you might want to look over the reading plan I’m following, as well as week 1, week 2, and week 3.
There seems to be this idea among Christians that once someone is “saved” (you can read some thoughts on salvation here, here, here, again here , and finally here) that we should expect to now be able to finally “be good.” For some reason, we think that the transformation the Bible describes should be instaneous and come with little to no struggle.
The benefit of this chapter, and this book, is to bring us back to the idea that the Christian life is going to be a struggle, a victorious struggle. If you are a person aiming for holiness, you need to throw away the idea that there is a quick-fix out there that will transform you all of a sudden. Throw away the idea that if you read the right book, heard the right sermon, believed the right way, or just willed yourself hard enough than you would arrive at holiness.
Holiness takes time, and usually a long time. I’m currently reading Eugene Peterson’s book A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, which argues this same point. Peterson writes this,
The world is no friend to grace…One aspect of the world that I have been able to identify as harmful to Christians is the assumption that anything worthwhile can be acquired at once.
Wright teaches us a similar idea in this chapter, as well as the whole book, that we need to train ourselves. This is not an easy idea. Training is hard work. Any athlete can testify to that. Wright teaches that training ourselves
is a matter of consciously deciding, again and again, to do certain thins in certain ways, to create patterns of memory and imaginations.
Patterns of memory. Patters of imaginations.
Paul told us,
set your minds on things above
Why do we think this is going to be easy? Why do we think this is going to be quick?
God has given us a new life in Christ, but the aquisition of virtue is going to take a long time, like a lifetime. Are you willing to walk this journey with no quick-fixes, no easy solutions, but also a life that is filled with the Holy Spirit and is empowering us to take each new step?
Give a Bible…
After You Believe, week 3
Hope you’re tracking along with us in this study of After You Believe. You might want to visit the reading plan, my notes on week 1 and week 2 to catch-up.
The Christian life can sometimes feel like an never-ending, up-hill, struggle where we just try to be good but not really making any headway towards the holy life. We need to listen up to what Wright has to say in this chapter when he says things like this
Virtue belongs within an end that has already begun, an eschatology that has already been inaugurated. Virtue, in the great philosophical tradition, has always said, “become what you will be.” Christin virtue says, “What you will be is what you already are in Christ.” (p. 117)
We need to pause and listen to this idea.
Virtue as you’ve probably thought of it is to slowly “get better” and in this you will be happy. Happiness becomes the end. Happiness becomes the reason for being virtuous.
For Christians, happiness is not our end.
We use the word eschatology to describe our end. Eschatology is a technical word having to do with things like the coming of God’s kingdom, the new earth, the marriage supper of the Lamb. Our End is not happiness, but God’s kingdom. This is a very different way of thinking about life.
Take this another step. Because of the Resurrection, God’s Kingdom is not for some other time and place, but for us today. Most Christians ignore this. God is breaking into this world with his Kingdom. The life of virtue then is the life God is using in his kingdom.
Does that describe your life?
Before you beat yourself up because you’re not living like this remember something else. Most Christians also ignore this next idea too. Most of us think that in order to be virtuous we need to try harder. Remember Wright’s words, “What you will be is what you already are.” The holy life doesn’t come from a good dose of try-harder, but by learning to depend more and more on Christ.
Saved!, putting it all together (or also known as part 5)
Now to put all these posts (Saved! post 1, post 2, post 3, and post 4) together and ask the question so what?
Let’s start with a controversial idea: Infant baptism.
Have you ever wondered why Methodists baptize a baby? The baby has never made a confession of faith. The baby has never thought of Jesus and his atoning sacrifice. Is it just part of an out-dated tradition?
Infant baptism makes no sense unless we think about it in terms of previennient grace. That’s a technical word for saying this: God gives us grace that goes before any decision we make. Salvation isn’t about us at all, it’s about God and the grace he gives us. Contrast that idea to how we normally think of baptism and salvation: it all happens when we make a decision to follow Jesus.
But, when we say things like God gives us grace before we’ve ever made a decision for him or that God has been always been saving us, why would we not baptize an infant? We’re reminded of that profound mystery of salvation. Grace.
This is also why we don’t re-baptize people. Grace. The power of baptism (and salvation) isn’t in our decision, but in God’s grace.
Let’s play with this baby’s future for a minute. Let’s say at 6 years old this kid finally gets that Jesus loves him and wants him to go to heaven so he prays that prayer from sinners-prayer.com. Is it at this point that the kid is finally “saved”?
Clearly, the kid doesn’t understand the full implications of that prayer. To be honest, I don’t know that I have a full understanding of that prayer either. Clearly this kid doesn’t know about theology and doctrine and can’t explain things like atonement, and trinity, and inspiration of Scripture. So what does it mean for a small child to pray that prayer? Are they really saved at this point?
Instead of focusing salvation on what is required to be saved (like have you prayed this prayer, or believed this doctrine) maybe the better way is to once again start with God’s grace. At this point in this kid’s life, he is simply responding to grace as best he understands.
And I think God loves that.
Let’s say that child turns 13 and is confirmed. He stands before the church and declares his faith in Jesus. He may have a better grasp on theology, but do you really think he knows what it means to trust Christ for his salvation? I doubt it. But, once again, if we focus on God’s grace we see something different. The kid is older, and is experiencing God’s grace a little differently and once again, the child is responding to grace as best as he understands.
I think this is true for our whole lives. We’re continually changing and growing and understanding God differently. At 30, we will respond to grace differently than we did at 13. We will simply have a different understanding of what God requires from us. Hopefully we continue to develop and grow, so at 50 we will respond differently then at 30. And at 80 we respond differently than at 50. As we grow, as we mature, as we come to understand more fully, we will continue to respond to grace as best we understand. This isn’t to say that the faith at 80 is better than the faith at 6, it levels it all out to saying faith is faith and grace is grace. God’s grace prevails where our understanding falters.
So maybe salvation isn’t this one-time decision we make, but all the ways God is pursuing us and saving us and making us whole.
How liberating is that idea?
Salvation is not just this legal declaration: You are forgiven. It is the way God seeks after you. And continues to seek after you. It is the way that God lead you to himself. And continues to lead you to himself. It is the way God shows you grace. And continues to show you grace. It is the way God saves you. And continues to save you.
Salvation isn’t this prayer we pray and then wait to experience it in another world. Salvation is today, and again tomorrow, and the day after that. Salvation is God training you to say yes to his Kingdom, which we recognize has already come upon us (in technical terms we call this Sanctification). Salvation is us learning to align ourselves with God’s mission to heal and make right.
With each step we take we are saved not just from hell, but towards God!
I love the insight into God’s heart we receive by looking at salvation like that. It frees us from legalism, because it puts all of our attention on God and his grace. It frees us from this torment of wondering if we’ve done enough because it draws our attention away from us and back on grace.
What does it meant to be saved?
One word: grace.
Monday Morning Joy Report
Mondays are rough for me. Sunday is a long day and Monday always exists in a gloomy haze. To beat these gloomy days I like to think back to how I saw God move among us on Sunday. I used to call this “Monday Morning Reflections” but that’s lame…Joy Report is much cooler.
- I missed having Ben and Noelle out on Sunday night, but I love it when Jon Odom steps up to lead our worship in the VenuePM. What can’t that guy do? I love seeing a full volunteer band come in and lead our worship. I hope you take some time and say thanks to that band each week. By the way, Ben and Noelle were in Texas recording a worship album with Don Chaffer (of Waterdeep).
- We had a full-house in the VenueAM service! There’s something really cool about being in a packed out room singing our worship of God.
- I hope you’ve had a chance to jump on board with the Congo Bible Initiative. My practice for Lent is to give towards this project, I hope you’ve been able to partner with us. Here’s a video about that project:
Saved!, part 4
You may want to start with:
The last two posts we explored the idea of when salvation occured. The bigger question for me: What happens right now?
Paul said things like
work out your salvation with fear and trembling- Philippians 2:12
and
today, is the day of salvation- 2 Cor 6:2
What does it mean for us to be saved today?
It all depends on what you think happens when people experience justification. A common way of thinking is to think of justification as being saved from going to hell. Certainly, this is a reality. But, it’s not close to the full reality.
An intersting idea is to look in the New Testament at some of the words we use for the word saved. One word used for saved is an interesting Greek word sozo. Look at how this word is used:
For by grace you have been saved (sozo) through faith- Ephesians 2:8
Nothing shocking there, but look at this one:
And wherever he went—into villages, towns or countryside—they placed the sick in the marketplaces. They begged him to let them touch even the edge of his cloak, and all who touched him were healed (sozo). – Mark 6:56
Save and heal.
Or you could say it like this: salvation is things being made right, or being made whole (or healed, saved). Salvation is God bringing order, which is why salvation has to start with the creation of the universe. God brought order. God has always brought order God still brings order, even today.
So often we think of salvation in such narrow terms and we miss a HUGE part of the mystery. Yes, it is forgiveness of sins, but it is so much more than that. Salvation is God is making the world right, including the way God is making me and you right. This means that salvation is not done when we pray at the altar. This means that today as we trust Christ we are being saved. You are being saved towards God and away from sin. Today, as you trust Christ you are being formed into being more in line with God’s will.
So if we limit salvation to being saved from hell, our salvation-thinking stops when that is accomplished. Salvation becomes static. But if we think about salvation as the way God is making the world right, then our salvation is expanded into a never-ending process of becoming whole.
We’ll do one more post to put it all together.
