I am, by now, sick of thinking and reading about Rob Bell’s new book, Love Wins. Last week I did a short post related to it and thought that would be it because I wasn’t all that interested and I don’t do band wagons.
But I live in the real world. I know a few lovely folks who have read Rob Bell and liked his books. (I bet you do, too, especially among the young people you know.) On Monday, someone suggested that I buy the full set of Nooma videos for the church library. As it turns out, I don’t have funds for a rather expensive single purchase, but I am willing to bet that another in a position with access to a bigger purse will be approached with the same request.
Usually my strategy is to simply promote sound authors and books and pray that people will be drawn to what is solid instead of what is squishy. But it seems that Bell’s latest book is worse than just squishy, because at it’s core, it gets the matter of first importance—the gospel—wrong. I’m afraid that some people I know and love will be influenced to likewise leave the center by an author they’ve enjoyed previously.
The gospel, Paul says, is that “Christ died for our sins,” and we know from what Paul says elsewhere that, yes, this means that “Jesus rescues us from God,” an idea that Bell seems to belittle. To put it more accurately, Paul writes that God loves us by sending his Son to save us from God’s wrath. What’s more, there is only one way to escape the wrath of God, and that’s by faith in Christ in this life. This is the gospel that saves.
Getting the gospel wrong kills. “Another gospel” gives no hope—or worse, false hope.
Since Bell’s teaching could harm people close to me (and close you, too), I’m linking to a few more articles that have been written since my last post. These pieces will help identify the issues and give reasonable talking points in any real life discussions regarding the teachings of Rob Bell.
And may this be my last post ever on this subject, ever! But you never know.