...or what's a heaven for?

There has been so much heat—and no small amount of light, as well—throughout the Interwebs surrounding Rob Bell's latest book, Love Wins, that I feel compelled to say something about the subject. Not about the book, mind you, nor even about Bell himself. I have not read Love Wins, and I honestly have no intention of so doing. There are some excellent reviews out there, if you are interested. I, though, find it difficult enough to keep up the good fight of reading things I believe will increase my knowledge and wisdom regarding the things of the Kingdom of God. To spend any great amount of time reading that with which I must necessarily do mental and theological battle is for me misuse my time, apologetics not being my prime calling.

While the idea of "know thine enemy" is a valid one, the depth of that knowing is something we must carefully judge. And while I am pretty certain I would not classify Bell as "enemy", he seems to ascribe to certain—well, "fuzzy" is not too unkind an adjective, I think—ways of thinking about God and the Gospel. So much of what passes as theology today is what H. Richard Niebuhr described as liberal thought: the idea that "A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a Cross"—in other words, a theology without theology, or at least such as could be recognized by the Fathers of faith. Add to this my belief that the best way to spot the counterfeit is, as the Secret Service knows, to get intimately familiar with the real, and I feel the need to reflect.

So, it seemed fitting and proper to me, during this Holy Week, to spend a little time looking at the truth of the Gospel, and why it is important. In 900 words or less. Bold, you must admit, if somewhat audacious. Please keep your appendages within the vehicle, and remain seated at all times until the ride has come to a complete stop.

The first thing to remember about the Gospel is this: it is an offense to the thinking of the world (cf. 2 Peter 2.6-8, 1 Corinthians 1.18-31). Nothing about "dying in order to live" makes any sense to the world. The notion—in a culture where it is imperative that no one ever feel bad about himself—of being broken, or (God, or Whoever, forbid!) a sinner and in need of being fixed or "redeemed", is anathema.

The Gospel, however, is clear: every human being, save One, is a fractured image of humanity, of what we were intended to be—a clear reflection of God (cf. Genesis 1.26). Every one of us. Everyone. We have rebelled against God, and in the reality of creation, those who rebel against the Creator are doomed to die. That death, again according to Scripture, is eternal and tormenting. This is the bad news; and we have to deal with the bad news before we can approach the Good News. That bad news can be summed up thusly: Without direct intervention from a Source outside ourselves, we shall surely be lost, tormented in death forever unending. This thought does not make people happy. Nor is it intended to. It is, however, the truth; and it is offensive.

But it is not the end of the story. Once we acknowledge the bad news we can pass through it to the Good News. And the Good News is this:

For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him. Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God" (John 3.16-18 ESV). 

The short version: God does not desire that we suffer the penalty we ourselves have incurred, but has indeed made a way that we should not have to suffer that penalty through the work of God the Son, Jesus Christ. Contrary to the false premise some theologians put forth, God does not condemn His creatures to Hell; He rather provides the means, through the shedding of His own blood and the giving up of His own life, for us not to have that horrific never-ending end.


God is holy, and His holiness cannot, by very nature, abide that which is unholy. Jesus is completely holy. He is also completely human. Because of that, humanity has access once again to the One True and Holy God. We are saved, not by our own doing, and not because God is too nice to let anyone spend the eternal life He gave him in the torture of unending death. No, we are saved through trusting in God's unending, unquenchable, unconditional, unfathomable love revealed through the death of God the Son by the horrific torture of the Cross. While our lot is death forever, in Jesus Christ we may have life forever. Which will we choose?

why not?

One of my readers... or perhaps I should better say "my one reader"... asked me to blog an answer to a posting at aish.com entitled Why Jews Don't Believe in Jesus. I don't really see myself as an apologist, except insofar as we each of us need always to be "prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you" (1 Peter 3.15). But as we interact with the culture around us, I think it is important that we understand the issues others might raise in contradiction to the truth of God. So, here is my thinking on the question.

First of all, the statement is a false generalization. While the argument could be made otherwise, a more honest name for the article might be: Why You Can't Believe in Jesus and Be a Jew. The subtle distinction here is one of dogmatic belief, to wit: "if you really were a Jew, or if you were a true Jew, you would not believe in such heresy." So, by argument, no true or real Jew believes Jesus is the Messiah. While this would be a more honest title, it still is false. We have historical evidence to the contrary.

Nick at Night...

First, in the Gospels, we have the stories of Nicodemus in the Gospel of John. And then we have the evidence of one of the great Pharisees of all time, Saul of Tarsus. Saul, by then known as Paul, gives his pedigree in Philippians 3, and also Acts 22. These two Pharisees, at minimum, prove that the generalization is false.

But there are also hundreds of thousands of Jews—one source says over a million—who have come to believe that Jesus, or Yeshua, to use the transliteration of His Hebrew name, is indeed the promised Messiah.

Even this, however, is not the linchpin of the argument against Jews believing in Jesus. The truth of the matter is that every one of Jesus' first disciples was a Jew. And this highlights a certain fact: there are very seldom any "pure" arguments for or against something. It is difficult to escape one's own paradigm and take a position based solely on dispassionate evidence. If I am setting out to prove that Jews don't believe in Jesus, I will likely fail to take into account evidence contradicting my premise. This is why it is vitally important that we listen to one another, and do not make our judgments in the vacuum of our own thoughts. And it is why Jesus told us, His disciples, not to meditate on what to say in defense of our position, but to trust the Holy Spirit to bring to mind what He would have us to say.

I expect that I will further fisk this article in future posts... stay tuned!