ROB BELL’S ARTICLE IN THE NEW YORKER RAISES INTERESTING QUESTIONS

By on Dec 4, 2012 in Current Issues, Features, Rob Bell

By John Downey of Writer’s Block

In a recent article in TheNew Yorker, former pastor Rob Bell is profiled. Not only does the article reveal that Rob was far more liberal, far longer than anyone realized. It also chronicles his search for “a more forgiving faith.”

I have a lot of trouble with this idea, I ask you, what is a more forgiving faith that Biblical Christianity? What is a more forgiving faith than a free gift?

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Rom. 6:23

The admissions and statements Bell makes in this article just goes to show that, like so many others, Rob Bell doesn’t understand the gospel at all.

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.  Eph. 2:8-9

A free gift that we don’t have to work for and that we don’t earn and don’t keep by our works. What is more forgiving than that? Nothing…in fact every time you try to take this aspect of the gospel away you’re left with nothing but works.

No other world religion offers this free gift…and yet by the thousands people reject it, including Bell. The extreme “Christian” liberalism that Bell promotes is the same side of the coin as extreme Christian legalism, because it’s all on you to earn your salvation, as the Bible says is impossible.

Yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified. Gal. 2:16

Most surprisingly though the article prompts me to feel sorry for Bell, sorry because he is trying to do the impossible…find a more forgiving faith than Christianity.

I feel sorry for Bell because he is leading himself and others down the broad road that leads to hell.

The original appears here.

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