Rob Bell once questioned hell: Here’s why he is now taking aim at the Bible | Religion News Service

Source: Rob Bell once questioned hell: Here’s why he is now taking aim at the Bible | Religion News Service

Here is a great interview by Jonathan Merritt with Rob Bell on his latest book, on the Bible.

Rob Bell – What Is the Bible?

I have just finished reading Rob Bell’s latest book, titled What Is the Bible?: How an Ancient Library of Poems, Letters, and Stories Can Transform the Way You Think and Feel About Everything. I really loved it and I think every evangelical should read it. The book does not say anything new, nor does the author claim to do so. It merely presents at a popular level what theologians and Bible scholars have said about it in the last hundred years.

You may ask, what is then so important about it? Here is my answer.

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RELEVANT Magazine – Is Rob Bell a Universalist?

RELEVANT Magazine – Is Rob Bell a Universalist?.

Here is an interview with Rob Bell on the crux of the matter for his book Love Wins.

Rob Bell’s Farewell Message to Mars Hill Church

dear mars hiill,

to all the brothers and sisters of this church

to those who have been here from the beginning

who remember the old building, who braved that one?

ten foot wide hallways, clogged shoulder to shoulder

with people leaving the hangar to pick up their children

who had spent the previous hour packed into oxygen

deprived classrooms,

Martin Marty – Who Wins?

“Let’s you and him fight!” The old comic-book trope is good advice for bystanders as Mark Galli’s God Wins counters Rob Bell and his book Love Wins. The two are respected evangelical leaders, an editor and a pastor, who attract headlines and readerships as they debate “Heaven, Hell” and the “Good News.” Their subject is a meaningful alternative to the otherwise preoccupying evangelicals’ debates over homosexuality and abortion. “The Good News” is a debate over whether “Love Wins” or “God Wins,” and those who hear the biblical word that “God is Love” may have trouble telling the players without a program. Both sides agree that this is all about “the ultimate fate of human beings,” a classic concern of all who believe that there is an afterlife.

Video: N.T. Wright on Bell & Hell « Musings of a Hard-Lining Moderate

Video: N.T. Wright on Bell & Hell « Musings of a Hard-Lining Moderate.

I suggest you should absolutely listen to this short comment on hell (and Rob Bell) by NT Wright. It’s brilliant and to the point. And, I am sure, the neo-fundamentalist neo-Reformed will hate it. Because it is true.

Thanks, Carson Clark.

Bill Leonard – Listening to Rob Bell

These days simply say the words “Rob Bell” where two or three are gathered together and you provoke immediate conversation, if not controversy.

Bell, a popular writer and founding pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, Mich., recently published the overnight bestseller Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and The Fate Of Every Person Who Ever Lived. When the publisher (HarperOne) first “leaked” news of Bell’s views on hell the debates began.

Hell, Bell believes, exists within and beyond this world, horribly painful, potentially redemptive; but not eternal. Both now and in “the end” God’s love prevails, as revealed, indeed personified, in Jesus of Nazareth. The God Jesus described and incarnated is ever moving “from judgment to restoration, from punishment to new life.” 

Carson Clark on Francis Schaeffer vs. Rob Bell

Carsol Clark runs a very interesting blog called Musings of Hard-Lining Moderate. The Assorted Thoughts of An Evangelical Anglican. I often find there very interesting discussions on current issues.

One of his latest posts deals with the Rob Bell debacle and brings an unlikely combatant in the field, the late Francis Schaeffer, one of the Evangelical thinkers who influenced me substantially in my young years., but with whom I cannot disagree more on the most important points.

Here are a few interesting musings from this blog post:

Two Objections to Universalism | The Blackbird Press

Two Objections to Universalism | The Blackbird Press.

Here is some interesting reading for those still interested in the Rob Bell controversy.

I’m Going to Hell (And So Are You) | The Blackbird Press

I’m Going to Hell (And So Are You) | The Blackbird Press.

Here is another article about the debate stirred up by Rob Bell’s book Love Wins.

Kevin DeYoung’s review of Rob Bell, Love Wins

In a recent article on Rob Bell’s recent book Love Wins, Justin Mulwee from Blackbird Press recommends what he describes as ‘the most thorough review of the book to surface so far (and by someone who’s actually read it!)’, that of Kevin DeYoung, pastor of the University Reformed Church in East Lansing, Michigan

Here is how DeYoung summarises the book:

Rob Bell – Love Wins

Rob Bell’s book Love Wins, that has created already a lot of debate, especially among Evangelicals, more or less oriented towards fundamentalism, will be launched on 15 March in the US.

Martin Marty – Hell’s Bell

Duccio di Buoninsegna – Descent to Hell

Americans may have thought that cracks in the façade and framework of evangelicalism would show up most visibly when serious evangelicals argued whether Sarah Palin or Mike Huckabee would be the better presidential candidate. But now we have a chance to see that other divisive issues among evangelicals beg for attention. When one of these, a theological argument, no less, makes its way to the New York Times and other papers plus many blogs, it’s time to pay attention. Bystanders who think they have nothing at stake in the non-political arguments, and who have never heard of Pastor Bob Bell of Grand Rapids, Michigan, or his critic, neo-Calvinist John Piper, may stand by in fascination, but they are likely to be reached this time. The topic? Hell, and a punishing God’s use thereof.