Rob Bell’s Magnum Opus

Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived by Rob Bell
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 How would you summarize Christianity in 2 words?  Could you maybe say, “Jesus saves”? Or maybe something more relevant like “Got Jesus?”  For Rob Bell, Christianity is this: Love Wins.  Rob has been using the phrase for years at his church and it has even shown up as bumper stickers at my church and printed on Starbucks cups.  The curiosity has been, at least for me, what he meant by that phrase.  Does it really capture the essence of our faith?

Several years ago a read a few books by Richard Bach.  Bach, most renowned for his book Jonathan Livingston Seagull, wrote a book called One.  In the preface he talked about Seagull and another book called Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah and commented that he wrote those other books in essence to have the guts to write the book he really wanted to write: One.  Having now read every book that Rob Bell has written and watched each of his tour videos, I have to say that this book is Rob’s One, his magnum opus if you will.  This is what he has tried to say all these years and what he finally got the nerve to put down on paper and send to his publisher.

Click here to continue reading this post at the Dead Pastors Society blog.

‘Drops Like Stars’ and the Ever-Elusive Message of Rob Bell

A collection of anecdotes, personal stories, and film illustrations with a dash of Scripture, Drops Like Stars is the fourth publication by the rock-star preacher Rob Bell of Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan.  The large, full-color book has very few words for its 140 pages that can be read in under 30 minutes and at $35 that comes very close to a dollar a minute.  Bell’s stories represent a wide breadth of backgrounds and cultures.  He tells stories featuring Native Americans, the pope, music legends, actors, and at least one story about how some people believed in ancient times.

The stated thesis of the book is an exploration of art and suffering.  Through its course it becomes less about art and suffering and much more about the art of suffering.  Bell begins by sharing the story of a father whose two sons had wives who were pregnant; one miscarried and one gave birth to a healthy baby.  In exploring the ambivalence generated in this sort of polarizing experience, he builds momentum through story after story.