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459 reviews for:
Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived
Rob Bell
3.79 AVERAGE
459 reviews for:
Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived
Rob Bell
3.79 AVERAGE
hopeful
informative
fast-paced
This really challenges the status quo and I think that's a good thing. Too often we as Christians see ourselves as "in" and everyone else is out. I challenge everyone, Christian or not to read this and draw your own conclusions.
I really can feel the heart of Rob Bell in this book. I feel like it's full of the questions of a man who cares immensely about the eternity of others. I think it's this tremendous heart that leads him in this direction. Bell doesn't ever assert that this or that is right or wrong, but really asks a lot of questions with not as many answers. I would need to see a lot more scriptural basis for some of his assertions. I recommend reading this and then following it with Erasing Hell by Francis Chan. This way you can get both sides and decide for yourself
Great read for anyone on a deconstruction journey that has been disillusioned with the American Church and Christianity. This book gives perspectives that are so much bigger and open ended.
"May you experience this vast expansive, infinite, indestructible love that has been yours all along. May you discover that this love is as wide as the sky and as small as the cracks in your heart no one else knows about. Any may you know, deep in your bones, that love wins."
"May you experience this vast expansive, infinite, indestructible love that has been yours all along. May you discover that this love is as wide as the sky and as small as the cracks in your heart no one else knows about. Any may you know, deep in your bones, that love wins."
I did not kniw that there was controversy around this book until I was done with it and reading reviews. I doubt that would have changed my thoughts and experience reading this book though. This book was a validation of the God that I was raised on, that God LOVES, not that God turns his back but that he loves and is always there for you to come back to. It appears that the controversy was over "no hell", I guess I didn't get the impression that there is no hell but that this is not something that is forever. I personally appreciated the explaination of language and interpretation of language used in the Bible and the different meanings that words have. Overall, this book made me feel warm inside reading it and did make me feel loved.
This book needed to be longer. It feels more like the introduction to something absolutely marvelous and live changing than a complete and comprehensive work. What is here is very good and necessary and something every Christian needs to read. But it could be so much more.
For one thing, I'm disappointed that Revelations with all its hellish imagery is not explored. Perhaps the author did not feel up to the task or decided to leave it to another book, but I think it would have fit well here and the book feels incomplete without it.
I must also say that I'm among those who found the writing style off putting, though not dreadfully so. It reads more like a sermon or a speech with the line breaks and stanzas and it's just unnecessary and at times irritating. It's not a deal breaker and I was able to ignore it most of the time, but it wasn't a good choice.
However, this was still a very good and very necessary book and I recommend it to all Christians.
For one thing, I'm disappointed that Revelations with all its hellish imagery is not explored. Perhaps the author did not feel up to the task or decided to leave it to another book, but I think it would have fit well here and the book feels incomplete without it.
I must also say that I'm among those who found the writing style off putting, though not dreadfully so. It reads more like a sermon or a speech with the line breaks and stanzas and it's just unnecessary and at times irritating. It's not a deal breaker and I was able to ignore it most of the time, but it wasn't a good choice.
However, this was still a very good and very necessary book and I recommend it to all Christians.
"Love Wins" has become a kind of cultural phenomena...or atleast it was last year. Being that is a fact, I had to read for myself and discover exactly what the Mars Hill pastor had to say about heaven, hell, and the fate of every person who ever lived.
The first chapter I found mind-grating and annoying. Bell asks a series of rhetorical questions (loaded questions according to his perspective) which mostly serve as straw man arguments for people who believe differently than him.
He then calms down from there and launches into his thesis. Basically, he is attempting to argue that a longtime theological definition of hell has been misunderstood or is completely wrong. Bell doesn't believe in hell in the traditional sense. He believes that people who trust in Christ will be with God in His Kingdom. People who do not trust in Christ will be left outside the Kingdom...but are always welcome to come into the kingdom...even post-mortem.
Of course, Biblically there are mega problems with this perspective. What about the Bible passages which talk about punishment? Are these all just metaphors? What about the urgent call of the New Testament for people to repent? I suppose there would be no need to repent if people could just wait around until the afterlife to find out what they believe.
Bell, of course, would argue that Christ brings abundant life and why not know Him now. I certainly concur here but we are talking about why the Bible would have such warnings about not knowing Christ and dire predictions about the future kingdom/afterlife.
The aspects that are interesting in the book is the discussion of what hell may be like (remember: Bell only believes in hell in the sense of "someone left outside the kingdom"). This may be somewhat accurate. Fire often serves as a metaphor for purifying in the New Testament...to test the true value of faith (such as for the Corinthian believers). Are people tortured forever and ever? Maybe not, but that is up to God.
The real offensive parts of Bell's book is when he reaches the end and discusses that people who don't believe in Jesus may be believing "in Him" through practicing another religious faith. This is just absurd and so cute that it is completely annoying. Bell tries to get around John 14:6 but doesn't even mention Acts 4:12- there is no other name to be saved but by the name of Christ. Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
Not only did I find my disagreements with Bell, I didn't think this was particularly well-written. It contains factual errors when related to Biblical translation and not incredibly compelling writing. It is also unbelievably short when dealing with such a major theological topic with a lot of historical development and Bible work having gone in before. It is almost arrogant of Bell to think he can cover this topic in less than 200 pages.
The positive is...he brings up an important issue. This is a theological issue that must be discussed.
The first chapter I found mind-grating and annoying. Bell asks a series of rhetorical questions (loaded questions according to his perspective) which mostly serve as straw man arguments for people who believe differently than him.
He then calms down from there and launches into his thesis. Basically, he is attempting to argue that a longtime theological definition of hell has been misunderstood or is completely wrong. Bell doesn't believe in hell in the traditional sense. He believes that people who trust in Christ will be with God in His Kingdom. People who do not trust in Christ will be left outside the Kingdom...but are always welcome to come into the kingdom...even post-mortem.
Of course, Biblically there are mega problems with this perspective. What about the Bible passages which talk about punishment? Are these all just metaphors? What about the urgent call of the New Testament for people to repent? I suppose there would be no need to repent if people could just wait around until the afterlife to find out what they believe.
Bell, of course, would argue that Christ brings abundant life and why not know Him now. I certainly concur here but we are talking about why the Bible would have such warnings about not knowing Christ and dire predictions about the future kingdom/afterlife.
The aspects that are interesting in the book is the discussion of what hell may be like (remember: Bell only believes in hell in the sense of "someone left outside the kingdom"). This may be somewhat accurate. Fire often serves as a metaphor for purifying in the New Testament...to test the true value of faith (such as for the Corinthian believers). Are people tortured forever and ever? Maybe not, but that is up to God.
The real offensive parts of Bell's book is when he reaches the end and discusses that people who don't believe in Jesus may be believing "in Him" through practicing another religious faith. This is just absurd and so cute that it is completely annoying. Bell tries to get around John 14:6 but doesn't even mention Acts 4:12- there is no other name to be saved but by the name of Christ. Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
Not only did I find my disagreements with Bell, I didn't think this was particularly well-written. It contains factual errors when related to Biblical translation and not incredibly compelling writing. It is also unbelievably short when dealing with such a major theological topic with a lot of historical development and Bible work having gone in before. It is almost arrogant of Bell to think he can cover this topic in less than 200 pages.
The positive is...he brings up an important issue. This is a theological issue that must be discussed.
challenging
informative
fast-paced
this guy sure is a pastor. his favorite book is the bible, but a thesaurus is a close second.