Justin Taylor's Blog, page 349

MSNBC: Martin Bashir's Interview with Rob Bell

Martin Bashir is a reporter impatient with evasive answers. He even quotes from Kevin DeYoung's review and asks Rob Bell to respond. Bashir gives his own take on Bell's book: "You're creating a Christian message that's warm, kind, and popular for contemporary culture. . . . What you've done is you're amending the gospel, the Christian message, so that it's palatable to contemporary people who find, for example, the idea of hell and heaven very difficult to stomach. So here comes Rob Bell, he's made a Christian gospel for you, and it's perfectly palatable, it's much easier to swallow. That's what you've done, haven't you?"

How Should Preachers Preach on Hell?

Ligon Duncan wisely and winsomely addresses questions like:

So how do you address these difficult truths? How does the reality of hell and endless punishment make a difference in your preaching? How do you tackle them in a responsible and appropriate way? What do you need to avoid when treating them? How should we preach hell and eternal punishment (if at all)?

His counsel is organized under the headings of seven exhortations:

Address Hell Textually
Address Hell Decisively
Address Hell Pastorally
Address Hell Correctively
Address Hell Apologetically
Address Hell Exegetically
Address Hell Christologically

Does God Get Upset When We Disobey?

After receiving more questions after his initial answer to this question, David Powlison talks again about God's disposition toward us when we sin. An outline follows the video:

Outline:

00:45 – Summary of what was said in part one.

02:08 – How is God different from earthly fathers?

05:15 – How can God be disappointed in us if He has complete foreknowledge?

07:46 – The importance of understanding our union with Christ.

09:45 – The comfort of forgiveness and redemption for those who are fearful.

Rob Bell (Selective) Roundup

No, I don't want to keep blogging on Rob Bell forever.

In fact, my intention is to make this the last week to talk directly about Bell on this blog.

But I do intend to continue blogging about the issues he raises, since they are perennial, eternal issues that are worth discussing and contending for.

It seems to me that everyone with a blog or a Twitter account has weighed in thus far—and 96.325% of the commentary is a variation on the same few themes.

So I wanted to highlight a few things that especially caught my eye and that I think may be worth looking at in this ocean of discussion.

If you are looking for a chapter-by-chapter summary of the book, Denny Burk's review is helpful. His rewriting of the table of contents is a helpful way to get a feel for Bell's conclusions.

In all the discussion about Bell on hell and heaven and universalism, I'm afraid that many are missing the central problem: Bell's misunderstanding of who God is (cf. 1 John 4:10 on God's demonstration of true love!) and his emptying the cross of its meaning and power. I was happy to see Russell Moore focus on Bell's dismissal of the blood of Jesus. The key line: "If you drain the blood out of the church, all you are left with is a corpse."

I was secretly hoping that someone with good techie skills might edit Bell's video to say "Hitler" instead of "Gandhi" in order to make a point, but in lieu of that, Jeremy Grinnell provides a parody of Bell's video questions, looking at it from another angle.

Trevin Wax provides an illuminating metaphor regarding the response to Bell's critics: "If we had a thermometer for the evangelical movement, we'd find a raging fever. But some evangelicals are responding to the fever in unhelpful and pastorally-damaging ways." He looks at two responses: (1) "the fever is the problem," and (2) "the body is okay with infection."

So You Wanna Blog?

Here are a few recent posts with some good basic counsel and cautions on blogging:

Matthew Paul Turner, "9 Ways to Become a Better Blogger"
Michael Hyatt, "My Advice to Beginning Bloggers"
John Dyer, "Not Many of You Should Presume to Be Bloggers"

And here a couple of things that I've found helpful in the past:

Bob Kauflin, "Blogging to Worship God"
Trevin Wax, "Covetousness vs. Contentment in Blogging"

CRASH Japan

Makoto Fujimura has recommended this organization if you want to give to help in the rescue and recovery:

CRASH Mobilizes Volunteers in Japan

Tokyo, Japan – March 14, 2011 – CRASH (Christian Relief, Assistance, Support, and Hope) volunteers in Tokyo are mobilizing to provide aid to victims of the magnitude 9.0 earthquake that struck the northeastern coast of Japan on Friday, March 11, 2011 at 2:46 PM.

The earthquake was the largest in Japan's recorded history, resulting in a series of tsunami that reached heights of up to 23 feet and caused widespread damage. The Tohoku region was hardest hit in the coastal cities of Sendai and Fukushima, where hundreds are confirmed dead, and thousands are still missing.

CRASH Japan, working closely with JEMA (the Japanese Evangelical Missionary Association), has a large network of experienced volunteers who know the culture and language. CRASH Japan's 24-hour fundraising goal is $100,000. In the last few years, CRASH leaders have coordinated relief efforts in China, Haiti, Indonesia, New Zealand, and other major disaster areas.

On Monday, March 14th, CRASH sent four survey teams to the Tohoku region by train, car, and motorcycle as early as 12:00 am to assess the damage, find staging grounds, and make contact with local communities to prioritize their needs. Additional survey teams will be sent out later in the week.

Teams are facing a situation that is complex, dynamic, and challenging. Communication has been difficult. Cell phones in Tokyo are overextended, and service is unavailable in affected disaster areas. Gas and electricity are being rationed in Tokyo and are incredibly scarce in disaster areas. According to CRASH hospitality worker Bola Taylor, food provisions are also short: "There were 150 people waiting in line at the grocery store for simple ramen, rice, and toilet paper. The shelves were all empty; it was very unnerving."

CRASH Japan is using funds to purchase vital equipment, such as satellite phones, printers, computers, and wireless routers. This equipment will be used to facilitate communication between the Tokyo command center and cities where infrastructure has been weakened or destroyed. According to Intel Coordinator David Sedlacek, satellite phones are the most crucial tool in making contact with disaster areas and isolating relief needs.

A vast majority of Japan identifies religiously as either Buddhist or Shinto, or both. Only 1.5% of Japan's population identifies as Christian, but churches all over the country have volunteered their resources in a coordinated effort with CRASH to offer aid to those who are suffering.

According to JEMA President Dale Little, "CRASH is the second-to-none relief network in Japan. No other agency is able to assess the needs on the ground like CRASH, and then take steps toward meeting those needs. The effectiveness of CRASH includes linking closely with local churches in Japan."

JEMA Vice-President Ken Taylor also commented, "CRASH held its first strategy meeting today (March 13). Many were in attendance from mission agencies and other interested parties. There is a spirit of cooperation and desire to assist in reaching those in need effectively, relevantly, and spiritually."

About the disaster, CRASH Japan director Jonathan Wilson made the following statement: "Many of us are wondering how we can best respond to the news of the earthquake and tsunami that have devastated Japan. As the television screens pour out images, we pour out our hearts to the Creator to take care of this great nation.

CRASH Japan, a non-profit established for just a time as this, exists to help victims of disasters. We have experienced people who know the culture and language on the ground ready to assess the situation and take appropriate action. Please consider how YOU might be able to help right now by giving a donation that will "kick start" our Tokyo based disaster relief initiative."

Click HERE to donate!

How to Protect Yourself Online

An anonymous hacker offers some tips on how to protect yourself online:

Part One – General Overview
Part Two – General Tips
Part Three – Social Networking
Part Four – Banking and Shopping
Part Five – Privacy

Dr Lloyd-Jones Documentary on George Whitefield

The great 20th century preacher talks about the great 18th century preacher:

(Phil Johnson says this will only be available online temporarily.)

Beale Lectures on the Old Testament in the New

Announcement below from Southern Seminary:

Dr. Greg Beale will deliver lectures on "Recent Challenges to the Study of the Old Testament in the New" at Southern Seminary this week. Dr. Beale is Professor of New Testament and Biblical Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary. You can watch a live stream of the lectures on Southern's website:

Tuesday, March 15

1:00 p.m. (Eastern), Lecture 1: "Recent Developments in Old in the New Studies that Challenge the Organic Integrity of the Testaments"

2:30 p.m., Lecture 2: "A Classic Proposed Example of the Misuse of the Old Testament in the New: Hosea 11:1 in Matthew 2:15″

Wednesday, March 16

10:00 a.m., Lecture 3: "The Problem of Allusion and the Implications for Interpretation and Biblical Theology"

Rob Bell's Love Wins: A Response

Kevin DeYoung has invested an enormous amount of time to provide the Church with a careful, comprehensive, and compelling review of Rob Bell's new book, Love Wins. I could not recommend this review more highly. With Bell realizes it or not, Kevin is serving as a biblical friend to him. I pray God gives Bell ears to listen.

The Gospel Coalition has produced a PDF version of the review for easier reading, printing, and distributing.

Kevin's opening paragraph summarizes the book's thesis and argument:

Love Wins, by megachurch pastor Rob Bell, is, as the subtitle suggests, "a book about heaven, hell, and the fate of every person who ever lived." Here's the gist: Hell is what we create for ourselves when we reject God's love. Hell is both a present reality for those who resist God and a future reality for those who die unready for God's love. Hell is what we make of heaven when we cannot accept the good news of God's forgiveness and mercy. But hell is not forever. God will have his way. How can his good purposes fail? Every sinner will turn to God and realize he has already been reconciled to God, in this life or in the next. There will be no eternal conscious torment. God says no to injustice in the age to come, but he does not pour out wrath (we bring the temporary suffering upon ourselves), and he certainly does not punish for eternity. In the end, love wins.

After listing some of the book's virtues, he summarizes why it is so troubling:

The theology is heterodox. The history is inaccurate. The impact on souls is devastating. And the use of Scripture is indefensible. Worst of all, Love Wins demeans the cross and misrepresents God's character.

He also explains why this is such a difficult book to review; namely, that one doesn't know where to begin:

Love Wins is such a departure from historic Christianity, that there's no easy way to tackle it. You can't point to two or three main problems or three or four exegetical missteps. This is a markedly different telling of the gospel from start to finish.

He ends up organizing the book's problems under the following ten headings:

Not Your Grandmother's Christianity
Historical Problems
Exegetical Problems
Eschatological Problems
Christological Problems
Gospel Problems
A Different God

Kevin closes with a "Pastoral Postscript," and it is worth reproducing in full:

The tendency in theological controversy is to boil everything down to a conflict of personalities. This is the way the world understands disagreement. This is how the world sells controversy. It's always politician versus politician or pastor versus pastor. But sometimes the disagreement is less about the men (or women) involved and more about the truth.

This is one of those instances.

I have not spent hours and hours on this review because I am out to get another pastor. I may be a sinner, but with four young children and a very full church schedule, I have no time for personal vendettas. No, this is not about a single author or a single church. This is about the truth, about how the rightness or wrongness of our theology can do tremendous help or tremendous harm to the people of God.

No doubt, Rob Bell writes as a pastor who wants to care for people struggling with the doctrine of hell. I too write as a pastor. And as a pastor I know that Love Wins means God's people lose. In the world of Love Wins, my congregation should not sing "In Christ Alone," because they cannot not believe, "There on the cross where Jesus died, the wrath of God was satisfied." They would not belt out "Bearing shame and scoffing rude, in my place condemned he stood." No place for "Stricken, Smitten, and Afflicted" with its confession, "the deepest stroke that pierced him was the stroke that Justice gave." The jubilation of "No condemnation now I dread; Jesus, and all in him, is mine!" is muted in Love Wins. The bad news of our wrath-deserving wretchedness is so absent that the good news of God's wrath-bearing Substitute cannot sing in our hearts. When God is shrunk down to fit our cultural constraints, the cross is diminished. And whenever the cross is diminished we pain the hearts of God's people and rob them of their joy.

Just as damaging is the impact of Love Wins on the nonbeliever or the wayward former churchgoer. Instead of summoning sinners to the cross that they might flee the wrath to come and know the satisfaction of so great a salvation, Love Wins assures people that everyone's eternity ends up as heaven eventually. The second chances are good not just for this life, but for the next. And what if they aren't? What if Jesus says on the day of judgment, "Depart from me, I never knew you" (Matt. 7:23)? What if at the end of the age the wicked and unbelieving cry out, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb" (Rev. 6:16)? What if outside the walls of the New Jerusalem "are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood" (Rev. 22:15)? What if there really is only one name "under heaven given among men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12)? And what if the wrath of God really remains on those who do not believe in the Son (John 3:36)?

If Love Wins is wrong—if the theology departs from the apostolic good deposit, if the biblical reasoning falls short in a hundred places, if the god of Love Wins and the gospel of Love Wins are profoundly mistaken—if all this is true, then what damage has been done to the souls of men and women?

Bad theology hurts real people. So of all the questions raised in the book, the most important question every reader must answer is this: is it true? Whatever you think of all the personalities involved on whatever side of the debate, that's the one question that cannot be ignored. Is Love Wins true to the word of God? That's the issue. Open a Bible, pray to God, listen to the faithful Christians of the past 2000 years, and answer the question for yourself.

Bell addressed an invitation-only meeting at Mars Hill Church on Sunday night and began by saying that he is not a universalist, that he believes in heaven and hell, and that he believes Jesus is the only way to God. Kevin's review will help you see what he really means in each of these three areas.

I am praying that God uses this review, among others, to strengthen God's church in sound doctrine and to protect the church from deceptive teaching. May God's name be glorified.

You can read the review here:

God Is Still Holy and What You Learned in Sunday School Is Still True:

A Review of Love Wins