The Ehrman Project has a video of Dr. Darrell Bock explaining how the early church taught and preserved doctrine before the New Testament canon was firmed up and widely recognized…
The four means that were used to accomplish this:
Rob Bell is the pastor of Mars Hill church in Grand Rapids, MI. He has written a book – “Love Wins – A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived” that has been a NY Times bestseller due in large part to the debate that ensued (most of it before the book came out) around whether Rob Bell is a universalist. The first to respond (to the promo video) was Justin Taylor and the Resurgence has a good overview (with links) of the early responses to the promo video and the book. Since then there has been a lively discussion on hell and Bell has been interviewed several times – with Lisa Miller of Newsweek, Martin Bashir of MSNBC, George Stephanopoulos of ABC News, Morning Joe of MSNBC, and Josh Loveless of Relevant Magazine. Bell has also been featured on the cover of Time Magazine and a site has been set up to track what is now known as Hell’s Gate.
Is Rob Bell a universalist?
I guess to answer that question we first have to know what universalism is. In an interview with Lisa Miller, Bell was asked that question.
[Miller] Let’s get right to it. You have been accused in a lot of the coverage of your book of being a universalist. A universalist, in theological terms, means that everybody gets to go to heaven – everybody is allowed to go to heaven. That means Buddhists, Hindus – you can reinterpret my definition when I’m done – Buddhists, Hindus, Jews, Atheists, all get to go to heaven. Are you a universalist?
[Bell] No – if by universalist we mean there’s a giant cosmic arm that swoops everybody in at some point, whether you want to be there or not. […] So, if by universalist we mean that love doesn’t win, and God sort of co-opts the human heart and says, “You’re coming here and you’re going to like it,” that violates the laws of love. Love is about freedom, it’s about choice. It’s about, “Do you want to be here?” Because that’s what would make it heaven.
The definition used by Miller and Bell generally agrees with the definitions on several other sites:
- Christian Universalism denies pluralism and balder forms of universalism by contending that all can or will be saved, but only through the saving work of Jesus Christ. [Jesus Creed: Scott McKnight]
- Yes, everyone will ultimately be saved. Historically known as “universalism,” this view exists in multiple forms, but in each the outcome is the same: Every human being whom God has created will finally come to enjoy the everlasting salvation into which Christians enter here and now. [the Gospel Coalition: Collin Hansen]
- [Universalism] is the doctrine that states all people of all time will be saved by being reconciled to God and go to heaven, whether or not faith is professed in Jesus Christ in this life. [the Credo House]
Based on these definitions, the answer is no – Rob Bell is correct in claiming that he is not a universalist. That said, much of what he writes in Love Wins, can be seen as opening door wide on this view for others to accept – even if Bell does not.
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. [page 109]
[Note: I have written a few posts regarding whether the orthodox, Christian tradition has such claims at its center for those interested.]
What does Love Wins actually teach regarding the after-life?
Before attempting to answer that, here is a chart that lists the major theological views of the after-life. Within each of these major views there are of course multiple variations, however I have tried to summarize them in general terms as I understand them.
| pluralism | All will be saved. All religions are equally valid and lead to heaven. Jesus is not (necessarily) the means of salvation. |
| universalism (christian) |
All will be saved. Jesus is the means of salvation and everyone is saved through His sacrifice regardless of what they believe (or want). In this view there is no possibility for people to reject God. |
| inclusivism | Jesus is the means of salvation but some (unevangelized, young children) will be saved through His sacrifice even if they have not heard or responded to the gospel message. In this view it is possible that some people will eternally reject God. |
| postmortem evangelism | A form of exclusivism where Jesus is the means of salvation and a person must willingly choose to accept God’s gracious gift. If people do not accept the gift in their lifetime they will be given another chance to choose to accept Christ after they have died. In this view it is possible that some people will eternally reject God. |
| annilationism | A form of exclusivism where Jesus is the means of salvation and a person must willingly choose to accept God’s gracious gift in this lifetime. Those who have not accepted Christ are thrown into hell at the judgment. They are destroyed in hell rather than being eternally tormented and punished in hell. |
| traditional view of hell | A form of exclusivism where Jesus is the means of salvation and a person must willingly choose to accept God’s gracious gift in this lifetime. Those who have not accepted Christ are thrown into hell at the judgment. They suffer eternal torment and punishment in hell. |
Determining which of these views Love Wins is affirming is a tough question to answer because Love Wins does not advocate or defend any position regarding the after-life. Instead it poses questions and possibilities and reports on what others ask or claim. Rob Bell seems much more interested in generating discussion and stirring up debate than settling any theological questions. Referring to the traditional view of hell (page 110), Bell claims:
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.
In fact on page 115, Bell asserts that we can’t know which perspective or view is right:
Will everybody be saved, or will some perish apart from God forever because of their choices? Those are questions, or more accurately, those are tensions we are free to leave fully intact. We don’t need to resolve them or answer them because we can’t …
That said there are four strong points that the book does make regarding the after-life:
On love, hell, and choices Love Wins does make some clear assertions (points I agree with):
Love demands freedom. It always has, and it always will. We are free to resist, reject, and rebel against God’s ways for us. We can have all the hell we want. [page 113]
That’s how love works. It can’t be forced, manipulated, or coerced. … God says yes, we can have what we want because love wins. [page 119]
It is based on these statements (and similar ones in interviews) that I don’t think Rob Bell is a christian universalist (even if he leaves that door open for others).
The rejection of the traditional view of hell in Love Wins is based on the provocative questions more than any clear statements. Here is a sampling:
Can God do this or even allow this [send millions of people to spend eternity in anguish], and still claim to be a loving God? Does God punish people for thousands of years with infinite, eternal torment for things they did in their few finite years of life? This doesn’t just raise disturbing questions about God; it raises disturbing questions about the beliefs themselves. [page 2]
Will all people be saved, or will God not get what God wants? [page 98]
Is God our friend, our provider, our protector, our father – or if God the kind of judge who may in the end declare that we deserve to spend forever separated from our Father? [page 102]
Telling a story about a God who inflicts unrelenting punishment on people because they didn’t do or say or believe the correct things in a brief window of time called life isn’t a very good story. [page 110]
After reading through this that there is not much room for the traditional view of hell. And one could certainly see universalism in some of these statements.
The postmortem evangelism view is explored in Love Wins. However, the view is presented through what others ask or others claimed – opening up the possibility for the view without advocating for it directly.
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 chance” for those who don’t believe in Jesus in this lifetime. […] And then there are others who ask, if you get another chance after you die, why limit that chance to a one-off immediately after death? […] 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. [page 106-107]
The inclusivism view is explored in Love Wins. Based on the texts in Exodus 17 and 1 Cor 10, Bell draws the conclusion that since Jesus was the rock Moses struck and He was not identified then the possibility exists that others can come to Jesus without identifying Him or placing faith in Him directly too:
People come to Jesus in all sorts of ways. […] Sometimes people use his name; other times they don’t. [page 158]
[Jesus said] “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me”
This is a wide and expansive a claim as a person can make.
What he doesn’t say is how, or when, or in what manner the mechanism functions that gets people to God through him. He doesn’t even state that those coming to the Father through him will even know that they are exclusively coming through him. 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.
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 on inclusivity. [page 154-155]
And this may be the biggest problem in the book – one is left with a muddled and incoherent gospel message. But more on that later.
This quote from the Relevant Magazine interview may explain why it is hard to label Love Wins (or Rob Bell) with any particular view – he does not have one:
Serious, faithful, devout followers of Jesus have wrestled with these questions and have entered into the speculation and have all sorts of ways they thought about this and talked about this. I’m not interested in dying on any one of those hills, I’m interested in dying on the hill that says, “There’s lots of hills, and there’s lots of space here.” That’s what interesting to me.
So while Bell is saying there are a lot of hills, he seems to be far more open to the hills of universalism then he is to the traditional view on hell.
Have you read the book? What do you think, is Bell a universalist?
What view of the after-life does Love Wins teach?
I have read a couple of posts on church membership over the last few days some in favor and some against the idea. Having retweeted a post on church membership and getting into a discussion on it, I decided to post this as a spot to further the discussion beyond 140 character responses.
http://twitter.com/#!/g1antfan/status/89451582927814657
It is important to define terms in a discussion. When talking about church membership we are talking about people who attend a local church who come forward to formally (how formal that is will differ) join that instance of the universal church.
I like John Folmar’s definition of the local church:
A church is an identifiable group of believers who are self-consciously committed to each other. Their lives are not perfect, but by God’s grace they are substantially, observably different from the world around them. […] To join a local church is to agree to live together with other believers in a way that’s worthy of God’s call to live as a chosen people, royal priesthood, and holy nation. It’s to agree to display God’s glory through gospel-centered living and gospel-centered relationships. (emphasis added)
The universal church is the body of Christ that includes all those who are reborn in all times and all places. Becoming a member in a local church does not save anyone nor does it place them into the universal church. Placing one’s trust (faith) in Jesus and His promises made in the gospel (1 Cor 15:1-3), which results in being reborn through the Spirit, is what makes one a member of the universal church.
Jesus is the head of both the universal church and over every instance of it. The church (in both cases) is called the body of Christ:
And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. (Eph 1:22-23 ESV)
For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body— Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. (1 Cor 12:12-13)
Once one has become a member of the universal church, Scripture encourages becoming an active part of a community of believers (Heb 10:23-25). Many local churches have a process of becoming a member of the church. That process generally involves assenting to the following:
It is at this point that there is some debate. Should a local church have membership?
Is local church membership Biblical?
When we ask is it Biblical, what we are trying to determine is whether the principle of local church membership is commanded, supported, and/or promoted in the Scriptures. In the case of church membership I most would agree that there are no commands for the local church to have membership. However there are some passages of Scripture that can be used to demonstrate that the early church kept records over who was part of the local church (specifically lists of widows and orphans).
One of the supporting arguments for the idea of membership is the requirement for leaders of a local church to shepherd (guide, protect, teach) and oversee the people they are serving. The corollary is that the members of the church (flock) are to submit to their leaders.
Each local church has a form of governance (that model may vary from church to church) that includes a set of people (one or more) who are to lead as elders. For purposes of this post I use the term “elder” generally as the person or persons confirmed as the leaders of a local church. These men are to:
Most of these duties can be found in 1 Pet 5:1-5. Others can be found in 1 Tim 3.
1So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed: 2 shepherd the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion, but willingly, as God would have you; not for shameful gain, but eagerly; 3not domineering over those in your charge, but being examples to the flock. 4And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory. 5Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders. Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”
Membership is seen as a means of identifying the flock whom the leader is to serve and for a person to intentionally commit to being a member of the flock.
Is membership in the local church prohibited in Scriptures?
Even if we disagree that the Scriptures promote church membership, we can look at the question from a different angle. Does the Bible prohibit it either specifically or in principle? I can’t think of any command or principle that would prohibit a local church from instituting a form of membership.
Why should someone attending a local church become a member?
That is a good question. For most local churches that have membership it is required for people to serve in several areas including leadership positions, teaching, starting a home group, or serving with the children’s ministry. It is also a sign of committing one self to a local church community and may encourage people to work through difficult times rather than just leave for “greener pastures” at another church.
Why should a local church have membership?
I am certain a whole post could be dedicated to this (same could be said for the rest of the questions posed) , let it suffice to say that there are administrative, disciplinary, and legal issues that can be met with church membership. For a congregation-led church it would seem to be important in identifying “voters” – equivalent to registering to vote for elections for political leaders and ballot questions. In our culture of “sue first” ask questions later practicing church discipline, and protecting the flock may be done best within the context of membership as this article states:
Church membership is generally viewed by the courts as being a matter of contract, whereby members freely choose to associate with a particular church community and in doing so accept the benefits and duties of that association. As explained previously, since non-members have not accepted such duties, a church can encounter significant legal liabilities if it tries to exercise jurisdiction over or impose membership responsibilities on them. For example, since non-members have not explicitly consented to the confidentiality, counseling, disciplinary or conflict-resolution policies of a church, the church may face a lawsuit if it divulges any confidential information regarding the non-member, even if only between a pastor and an elder. Lawsuits also may arise when pastoral counseling fails to meet the needs and expectations of a non-member. And many churches encounter legal threats when they confront a non-member about sinful conduct or notify another church to which a non-member flees about such conduct.
I don’t believe that church membership should be used to create a “social club” or clique – though I am sure many could share stories about how that may have happened. I personally believe that church membership is a principle supported in Scripture (though certainly not required) and that it is an important way for a local church to identify its members and to protect itself legally as it tries to carry out the mission of the church to make disciples through evangelism and teaching and encouraging all to grow more like Christ. I also believe that membership encourages those attending a local church to examine their faith and their commitment to the community that they claim to be a part of.
Why What do you think?
Dead Heroes Don't Save 