When love wins

I was reading this week in Christianity magazine about a web designer in West Yorkshire with the twitter account of @robbell. He's apparently been very concerned at the number of tweets he's been getting from mainly irate Christians, many accusing him of heresy. In one of his own tweets he asks 'Who is this @johnpiper and why is he denouncing me, did he not like a website I designed?'

Christian author (rather than web designer) Rob Bell's book, Love Wins has clearly caused a stir. Despite having, frankly too much to read already, I decided to download a copy. I don't regret it. It's a great book and I recommend you read it. I found it as moving as it was challenging as it was filled with some great insights. And I'll be reading it again. I agree absolutely with the book's main conclusion. Rob Bell believes that the God of the Old and New Testaments, the God who is ultimately revealed in the person of Jesus Christ is the most amazing, compelling, loving, consistent, and unfathomably wise person in the universe. This God is someone everyone needs to know. And if you decide to turn your back on him, you are making the biggest mistake you will ever make. And I mean 'ever'.

So what's the fuss all about? Surely most people who hold to the traditional teachings of the Christian church would agree with all this? Well the concerns people have with the book are, as far as I can see, around Christian truth and Christian mission. Rob Bell has been labelled what we call in the theological trade a universalist. Universalists believe that eventually, somewhere in eternity, everyone gets to heaven. And to many Christians that very suggestion is like a red rag to a bull.

Now if you believe in a loving God for whom nothing would be a greater joy than for all the people he has created to spend eternity with him, you might ask why universalism is a bad idea? In particular if you're not a Christian you might ask why anyone would want to believe anything else? Well it's a bad thing because it's wrong. And it's wrong about something that matters. Matters a lot in fact.

Think of it like this. God has planned an eternity he calls heaven. It's going to be full of people of different colours, nationalities, backgrounds, and cultures. For it to be a happy and successful community everyone who goes will want it to work, and God will need to know that they want it to work. Now let's say you're a racist. Let's say you seriously dislike people who are a different colour, speak with a different accent, or are from different communities. It's not unreasonable to suggest that God would not want you in heaven. More to the point, you wouldn't want to be there either. In fact, you'd hate it. So heaven must be full of people who have recognised all the rubbish that fills their lives, and have asked God to help them leave it at the door. As long as you want to hold onto it, there's no way in.

Rob Bell agrees with this. In fact the way he describes this is one of the most compelling aspects of the book. And for that reason he can't be labelled a universalist. Rob recognises that it's likely that a lot of people will never, ever, want to let go of their rubbish, whatever the consequences. And because God respects our choices, that's a decision he will never compel them to change.

And most Christians would agree with that as well. So far so good. But there is a problem. The problem (and where Rob and I will disagree) is around how many opportunities people get to put their rubbish down. Most evangelical Christians will say that in this life only do you get a chance to respond to God's grace by responding positively to his offer of salvation in Jesus Christ. Some would go a little further and suggest that, if you don't get a chance to hear the Gospel, God may accept you on the basis of how you follow your conscience. Either way it is only because Jesus has accepted in his own person the consequences of our rebellion against God, and offers to exchange our rubbish for his treasure that God accepts us.

Rob holds a view we might call 'post-mortem evangelism'. After death there is still hope that people will respond to this good news and decide to put up their hands in surrender, leave their rubbish behind, and be won over by God's love. God, Rob suggests, will never throw in the towel and give up trying to win us over. And because he is amazingly persuasive, Rob's conclusion is that for many, however long it takes, love wins.

The best we can say about this is 'Well, perhaps.' Many earnest believers, (including Martin Luther apparently) don't at a philosophical level, rule out the possibility completely. But the Christian faith is intensely practical, and on a practical level the message of Jesus is very much one of 'Don't leave it to philosophical speculation - don't leave it to chance - decide to follow God in this life.' The impression I get from reading the New Testament isn't that you might not get another chance, but to work on the premise that you won't.

Rob makes some very pertinent and telling points in his book about living for eternity. Eternal life, as Jesus described it, begins not in some future existence but now. God will eventually build a new earth, and bring his heaven into co-existence with it. As one scholar put it, at the end of time as it relates to this world, God will change his postcode and we will all be neighbours. So how we live now sets us on a course into eternity. I am not fit for heaven. There is plenty of rubbish in my life that I have to work on. But the course of my life is set by a recognition that I am ultimately powerless to deal with it. I need someone to come and take it away, and that person is Jesus Christ. Every day he helps me with the effects of the rubbish in my life and works to minimise and eradicate them. A day will come when that support will be so complete that I won't have to struggle with any of it, any more, ever again. That will be heaven indeed.

But anyone who chooses to hang on to their trash, or who have refused Christ's offer of help to remove it, has set a course that makes heaven for them an impossibility. At some point, their decision will irreversible. Ultimately I have to agree with Rob that only God knows the point that happens. But if people don't reverse that choice in this life, I can find little grounds for hope that they will in the next.

Which brings me to the last issue that has caused such a stir in Love Wins. What, in fact, is hell. Rob recognises that many people - including many Christians have a genuine problem with the idea that hell is an eternity - billions of endless years - of conscious physical torture. It is, at best, a very uncomfortable idea. For many, they can't reconcile this with their understanding of who God is. The God they know, and have read about in the Old and New Testaments, seeks mankind's redemption and recovery. He is utterly tenacious in seeking our ultimate best and even when he inflicts judgement it is with a view to bringing people to their senses and turning them from their rebellion. And you can't say that Rob is some dreamy theoretician who is not moved by the evils humanity can inflict. You can read in his book how he has been personally exposed to some of the horrific examples of the depraved humanity that infests our planet.

So what do we say to this? What, in fact, would I say to this.  Jesus used an image for hell that would resonate powerfully with people in his day. He talked about   'Gehenna'. This was the Hinnom valley outside Jerusalem - the municipal rubbish dump. It was where the stuff was thrown that would otherwise bring disease and death into the city. It was a dump that was continually burning but whose contents were never consumed. And if you listened carefully you would be able to hear the noise of the animals who scavenged there gnashing their teeth at each other as they competed for scraps of food. Jesus never gives us a scientific physical description of hell and nor do any other New Testament writers. They use images to leave an impression.

And the impression it leaves on me is this. Firstly, it's the place where everything goes that's not fit for heaven (in the last book in the Bible, Revelation, death itself is consigned to it). It wasn't made to accommodate me, you, or anyone else we know, but for the rubbish. But if you insist on living with your rubbish, the only place you can do that in eternity is the dump.

The second impression it leaves is this. Whatever hell is, it's frankly the last place in the universe you would want to be. So Jesus, and the other New Testament writers use an image that gets this message over.

Buy the book? Yes, absolutely. It's well worth it for all the stuff you will agree with. And for the stuff you don't, remember that many other people are likely to ask the same kinds of questions about the same kinds of issues that Rob Bell does. So coming up with your own answers to the questions he raises will be time well spent.

And even if you disagree with the feller you can still respect his position, his concern for the reputation of God, his desire for the well-being of people outside the church in need of a saviour, those who have left the church because of the distorted image of God they were presented with, and those in the church to help them respond to the amazing unfathomable incomparable inspiring and compelling God they serve.

So maybe we can make sure that, as far as it depends on us, Love Wins.

Comments

[Allan Fraser]

I simply must read this book, although I already feel I know that the conclusions I draw will be as stated in this blog.