The Evangelical Universalist Forum

Rob Bell streaming Q&A Monday night (14 March)

My husband felt the same way. He felt like his answers were evasive and lacking depth. Both of us, over dinner, said we were not too excited to read the book, though it might offer some touching anecdotal stories. I enjoyed the depth of Universal Salvation? The Current Debate also.

I wonder why Rob Bell doesn’t come out more with his ideas? I don’t think it’s because he doesn’t understand the questions and the issues. I’m wondering if it’s because there is too big a price, bigger than just fighting off criticism that he is looking like a universalist. It also seems like in his paradigm he fights against labels so that even if he were one he would fight the label. When he answered the question that he’s not a universalist I thought his answer was that he was, just not according to their definition. He could have offered more, but he held back.

Okay: on this, I have less than no sympathy with him. Rob Bell absolutely marketed himself to be the poster child or at least the lightning rod for the universalism debate. He did so in a way that left the topic open for readers to be curious about his book pro or con; and now it’s time for him to put up or shut up if he wants to be taken seriously on the subject.

Otherwise he’s irresponsibly representing the “eonian gospel” (one way or another). If he wants to kind of vaguely hope for the salvation of all sinners, fine, he can go back to his megachurch and vaguely hope for it to whoever cares to listen to him. But if he goes out of his way to strongly diss non-universalists in a widely public manner (and he certainly does so in his book), then he has no excuse for presenting vague and sloppy theology when he finds himself in the spotlight he demanded be thrown on him.

If he was going to slap a gauntlet back and forth across the face of every non-universalist in the world and hurl that gauntlet down, then he gets no sympathy from me if he hasn’t done the pushups and kung-fu training to defend himself from being speared by them on all sides in their (quite understandable) retaliations. Especially since others of us in his school will be brought into reproach by association with his example, and so will be handicapped when having to pick up his slack.

http://www.wargamer.com/forums/upfiles/smiley/rantswitch.gif

Okay, now that I’ve vented: did anyone anywhere record the stream?

Update: thanks muchly to David below! :slight_smile: Also Javajames from the previous page, whose comment on the livestream archive I missed. (I’ll add the address to the first post in this thread, for sake of future readers.)

Hey Jason,

The stream is archived here: livestream.com/lovewins

David

Jason,

On this criticism I have to agree. I have defended Bell from the standpoint that you have to hear him out and be patient to grasp his points. However, to criticize non-universalists as he has done in the introduction of Love Wins, you better put up yourself or you are merely offering a fantasy of hope. I have not finished the book, so we will see.

He said he was not a universalist in the live cast. I wonder if he denied that from the angle that there is no hell at all.

On that website I clicked on, Bell is talking as he sits and then an orchestra appears. Is this the right video or is this the intro to his book…confused and don’t want to watch the whole thing obnly to find that it isn’t the talk that I anticipated

Roofus,

No, that is not the one. That is from Bell’s Nooma series. There should be another video at the bottom left that indicates an hour plus run time. It may picture him sitting across from a woman, the interviewer.

This post demonstrates my earnest desire for a ‘Thank-you’ button - and it is heartfelt.

This is typical of an “emergent church” teacher. It’s like trying to nail Jello to a wall. Just listen to the answer he gives to the question about the narrow gate and the wide path.

Like I said on another thread, this is why I’m not crazy about Rob Bell being the face of EU over here in North America. I’m afraid that folks will dismiss the teaching of EU as an emergent point of view and chuck the baby out with the bath water.

This was very similar to what I was feeling while watching the live stream. The gracious part of me would like to think that he just wasn’t explaining himself very well and/or was trying too hard to connect with a non-Christian audience (and therefore was too intentionally avoiding digging too deep into Biblical dissection); however, I have an unfortunate feeling that it represented him all too well. Again, I have not read his book so only have his Q&A to go from. At some point I’m sure I’ll get around to it [the book], but it just descended on the priority list after last night.

I’m curious as to how many people here have had a chance to go through some or all of his book, and what the overall impressions are.

The hardback is out of stock at Amazon (and no paperback or trade yet). This may end up being the first book I buy for my Kindle. But I can’t say I’m much looking forward to it now. :frowning:

Roofus: Kevin DeYoung quotes Rob several times in his review, and while I do take exception to some of what KDY says (including some suspicions about what he implies RB is saying and not saying), I don’t have any reason yet to believe Kevin is outright misquoting Rob.

Rob describes what KDY calls traditional Christianity as “misguided” “toxic” and ultimately “subversive” of the spread of the gospel (page viii); the traditionalists have “hijacked” Christianity (vii), but will be too close-minded to allow for maturity (ix); “An entrance understanding of the gospel [meaning some kind of non-universalism] rarely creates good art. Or innovation. Or a number of other things. It’s a cheap view of the world because it’s a cheap view of God. It’s a shriveled imagination.” (180)

Those are strong statements, and they aren’t only being made about the theology but about the people who promote the theology. If a church teacher says that sort of thing about other church teachers in a massively public book, he has an obligation to back it up.

Whatever Kevin’s problems may be with theological coherency and exegetics (which are not inconsiderable), at least he states outright what he means and is clearly more ready and willing than Rob is to defend it in depth and in public.

I thought he was did a great in the interview–I guess that makes me the odd one out! :sunglasses: That doesn’t mean I’m in agreement with every thing he said.

But I do understand the concerns people have expressed here, and agree it’s bad form to make such sweeping criticisms–as in the quote above–without clear and considerable reasoning presented. But as I haven’t read the book I’m left wondering if the context was more supportive of the accusation than has been represented.

I’m looking forward to hearing more impressions after people have read the book.

Sonia

No Sonia, I didn’t have a super negative reaction, but I think that’s because I didn’t expect him to be a universalist. In the end he sounded more open-ended toward it than I thought! :laughing: Jason, you had said that according to some he was going more of the route of C.S. Lewis in just believing that people could be saved for a certain amount of time after death, right? That’s what I was expecting.

I kept posting 1 Cor. 15:22 over and over in a question asking him what he thought of it. No dice. :neutral_face:

But if I had expected universalism, yes, I would’ve been pretty disappointed. He did deny universalism under the definition that God will just forcibly sweep everyone into heaven - but who really believes that? In that sense he was evasive. Maybe he was just trying to get people to read the book without polarizing them first. I don’t know.

Honestly though, I personally don’t mind taking up the slack for him. Seriously, send 'em my way! I’ll tell 'em what’s what! :smiling_imp: At least this gets the subject out in the wide open, and we’re not alone - a public figure has already spoken on it.

And I don’t think he was off-target in his statements, either. Foggy, but I don’t think anything he said was actually untrue and he made some semi-good points. I think sometimes he tries to get to the heart of the question without answering it literally. Not that he does it well every time because he’s evasive sometimes too, but everyone has their weaknesses. :confused:

Yes, he expressed much more of a universalist stance than I really expected him to. He seems unwilling to make definitive dogmatic statements, leaving room for freedom. He leaves the door open for salvation after this life, at the same time saying that people sometimes continue choosing “hell” when it doesn’t make sense for them to do so.

He did deny the label “universalist” if that is defined by the idea of sweeping everyone into heaven even against their will.

He does not believe we are saved by giving assent to a “creed.” :sunglasses:

If I’ve understood him correctly, he is very focused on the practical, nitty-gritty of day to day Christianity rooted in the love and grace of God towards everyone. He’s not interested in arguing doctrinal points, he’s about reaching out to real, hurting people who are crying out for healing and hope from a bigger God than the one they’ve been given. He’s painting a picture of the God he’s met and experienced.

I liked what I heard.

Sonia

Yeah, that confirmed my expectations about being Lewisian. That’s pretty much where I felt he stood for most of it. But then he seemed to make some more universalistic-seeming statements, and I’m not totally sure what to think. :confused:

Yeah, that’s what I was thinking, too. Maybe he’s striking a chord with a lot of people, people who don’t think in strict theological terms. I’ve found sometimes when you start throwing out scriptures and exegesis that alot of people just lose focus because they don’t get the relevance immediately.

That’s one of the things I appreciate him the most for. It almost seems as if he was taking more of a inclusivist standpoint than he was universalist. What’s a good label for that besides “inclusivism”? I skimmed through a book callled The Unitarians and the Universalists at the library once and the author said that the Unitarians emphasized, or came to emphasize, that faith was not strictly defined by certain creeds. Since that was my only impression of unitarianism at the time, I thought that’s what defined it until I learned that it’s their strict non-trinitarian monotheism. But now I don’t know of any nice label for that viewpoint.

Sonia: If I’ve understood him correctly, he is very focused on the practical, nitty-gritty of day to day Christianity rooted in the love and grace of God towards everyone. He’s not interested in arguing doctrinal points…

Tom: Then why write this book? He’s a smart guy. He’s knows he’s arguing theology/doctrine.


This is my question…

Why name a book “Love Wins” if you’re NOT a universalist? If you believe in the traditional ECT view OR annihilationism, then you believe love ultimately FAILS (in cases of ECT or annihilation cases, which look to comprise the vast majority of human beings—but how knows?). At worst love fails horribly. At best it fails pretty badly. The only scenario I know in which love wins—ultimately and completely—is UR. So either he’s confused or deceptive (if he titled the book) or his publishers are (if they titled it, which is common).

I’m not interested in reading it now at all—not if a nation wide Q & A still leaves people wondering what the he-double hockey sticks he believes in.

Tom

I’ll tell you what I think, but mind I don’t know much about Bell–pretty much just this interview–I might be wrong, but I here’s how I understand him …

Love Wins because it never stops loving–the door never slams shut. He believes God never stops reaching out after the lost. Hell, as he seems to view it, is allowing us to experience the consequences of our choices, while still pleading with us to turn away and stop making the choices–both now and into the future.

And Bell leaves the door open as to whether people will forever choose destruction–giving the example that we see people make bad choices when they know better–but he believes the choices are never taken from us. Will people continually reject all that is good and choose all that is bad? He doesn’t want to make dogmatic pronouncements about what people will choose, but he believes our job, with God, is to help people choose good. He implies that it would be unreasonable to think people could hold out against that forever, but he’s not going to rule out that they have the option.

I feel I have a fair understanding of what he believes in. But he–it seems to me–carefully avoided “playing the game” of theological debate on their terms. He redefined the questions based on his own paradigm, not the one the questioner was coming from. It reminded me of the religious leaders questioning Jesus to try to trip him up. Bell didn’t do nearly as good a job as Jesus–not at all!, but I had the same impression of unexpected/untheologicalish answers and trying to strike to the core issues. The core issues are not abstract scholarly ideas, but relationship with God and the people around us, how we choose to live, serving people, etc.

I think he did not write the book out of a desire to have theological debate–but to give people a better vision of God. He’ll leave the debating of details to others who have that interest and concentrate on meeting the needs of people who have been hurt by traditional teachings about God, and have the ears to hear his message.

Sonia

Sonia,

If you’re right about Bell’s view:

…then that helps.

But this is my own view (and that of the Eastern Orthodox–well, most of them the more I investigate).

But he would have been better naming the book “Love Never Fails” i.e., “Love Never Gives Up” instead of the outright “Love Wins.” But never mind the name. I agree that God will never stop loving people, and that this love creates the space/possibility for us to turn to him. But since I deny compatibilist freedom in this case (like the EO and like Bell), I can’t draw a terminus ad quem, a line in the sand, some point at which point God will say “Enough is enough, I’m saving your a** today.” (Pardon me!) I totally get Bell’s view as you describe it. God pursues and waits, and won’t stop until we are his. But he’ll never violate our capacity to reject him. No irresistible grace, and no compatibilism.

BUT…this is very easy to say and make clear to folks. But it doesn’t look like Bell has done that. Basically he’s a universalist without a stop watch or a timetable. He believes all will ultimately come home, but at any given point in time a rebellious soul (in hell) can renew his rejection of God. What that soul cannot do is irrevocably reject God and so foreclose on all possibility of turning to God (so ECT and annihilation are not options). Technically one can go on and on rejecting God, but one cannot suceed in having rejected God “eternally” since eternity will always be out in front of you. All one can do is decide to choose, for now, to say ‘no’ to God. But one can turn to God as well.

It makes it TECHNICALLY allowable to say, “Well, I’m not a universalist” (traditionally understood). I know, I’ve gone round and round on this with a lot of people. But in truth Bell (given your description) IS a universalist. He just doesn’t think God has any deadlines. But he should say so. Maybe he has. Doesn’t sound like he has though, for that would surely clarify things. Nobody would be wondering what he believes.

Tom

Alex, didn’t they loop it so you can see still see it? Bummer that you were at work. I thought for sure you were right there with the rest of us. I know you would have if you could have. It was so exciting just to see the questions being asked.

This was also my impression Sonia, that Bell was not interested in the debate about defining hell and wanted to give people a better vision of God. Maybe he was clever. I’m pretty sure, as your talk with Tom, suggests that he’s a universalist. He was denying he was one by explaining what it did not mean, but that, of course didn’t rule out that he’s really one of us. Hope that made sense. Anyway, maybe it was clever of him. He’s definitely opened up the coversation lines with questions surrounding God’s character and His purposes and I appreciate that!