MSNBC Host Makes Rob Bell Squirm: "You're Amending The Gospel So That It...

Let’s step back just for a moment and look at what is happening here.
If I were the devil, and some may accuse me of that, seeing that I object to Bell’s views so strongly, and if I wanted to undermine the gospel of Jesus Christ, here is just what I’d do:
1. I’d get a young, attractive, hip, persuasive communicator to articulate for me. Not an ugly agitator, but a wolf in sheep’s clothing so to speak.
2. Next I would undermine the gospel at crucial points of Christian doctrine. I wouldn’t do it directly, but subtly. So let’s look at Bell’s views in Love Wins taken to their logical conclusions and see if God wins, for indeed, He is love. (I Jn. 4:16)

The Fall: If we all are ultimately rescued from Hell regardless of our acceptance or rejection of the death of Jesus Christ to pay for our sins, then sin may not be so bad after all. It doesn’t require eternal punishment. Its payment did not require the substitutionary death of Christ on the cross since even those who reject Christ and that payment are rescued from it anyway.

The Great Commission: If people are ultimately saved regardless of their acceptance or rejection of Christ while on earth, then some starch is taken out of the constant harping of Jesus and Paul to take the gospel to the ends of the earth in the face of death and persecution. After all, “the lost” won’t have to suffer in hell. It will be a little easier for us now not to have to “die daily” (I Cor. 15:31) or “take up our cross daily” (Luke 9:23). We can stay close to home and live the sort of lives we deem to be morally right and worthwhile.

Discipleship: Having the load of preaching the gospel slightly lessened we will be more free to pursue our own personal goals and ideas of Christian morality, not like Jesus, who came to give his life as a ransom for many (Matt. 20:28) and to seek and to save that which was lost (Luke 19:10). Or like Paul, who could wish himself accursed in hell for the sake of his lost brothers—oops, he might have been mistaken about that! (Romans 9:3)

Scripture as the Word of God (II Tim 3:16): This point is more cause than effect. Bell does not take the scripture literally and this has led to the digression of his beliefs on the gospel. But what do you do with all those verses about Jesus warning people about hell? What do you do with all the commands to preach the gospel when convenient and when not convenient? (II Tim. 4:2). The whole problem for Bell starts when he is endeared with liberal ideas on scriptural truth. It’s not intellectually fashionable to believe in a God who creates the earth ex nihilo, or one who casts out a demon. Once the Bible becomes less than accurate on any count, the slope can slip you all the way to the bottom with nothing left to stand upon.

The Gospel itself: Paul states the essence of the gospel in I Cor. 15:3 that Jesus, David’s descendant, died for our sins and rose from the dead that we might have life. In Bell’s view, the gospel itself is minimized. Just now, after twenty centuries of broad agreement in the church about what hell is and the meaning of the gospel that saves us from it, we suddenly have a different story. In the view of Bell and other Emergents, we who believe in a literal hell are holding onto old dogma buttressed by an indefensible, outdated view of scripture.

Good and evil: Jesus says that God alone is truly good (Mark 10:18). He also says that apart from Him we can do no good (John 15:5). Yet if God will in the end accept everyone into heaven, who can truly be labeled as evil? Who can be called good? All have the same, wonderful destiny and reward. Behavior on this earth ultimately doesn’t matter.

God’s character: Immediately following from the point above, what does this say about God? Bell is very concerned about the character of a God who would punish Gandhi in eternal flames. What about a god who let Hitler into heaven without any payment for the murder of 6 million Jews? What about a god who put us through the pain and suffering of life on earth without any apparent reason? For traditional Christianity, it is clear why we suffer and why we have been put here on earth. For Bell’s disciples, the answer is unclear. If we all go to heaven, why are we apart from his presence now? Why all the suffering and death all these centuries? What was it for? What is the ultimate point? What is our true purpose? What did God do all this for? From Paul to Augustine to Aquinas to Calvin to present day we thought we knew. Now it’s different?

Who or what really wins in this scenario? Is it love and God? What if we really are accountable for our sins to a just and holy God? What if Rob Bell has been deceived, not just in terms of human logic, but in his interpretation of Scripture?

I think GOD Wins and His eternal WORD wins. Bell loses this round.