Some communities don’t permit open, honest inquiry about the things that matter most. Lots of people have voiced a concern, expressed a doubt, or raised a question, only to be told by their family, church, friends, or tribe: “We don’t discuss those things here.”
My hope is that this frees you. There is no question that Jesus cannot handle, no discussion too volatile, no issue too dangerous. At the same time, some issues aren’t as big as people have made them. Much blood has been spilled in church splits, heresy trials, and raging debates over issues that are, in the end, not that essential. Sometimes what we are witnessing is simply a massive exercise in missing the point. Jesus frees us to call things what they are. (RB)
I started this blog post as a personal rant... and then as I started copying and pasting some of Rob Bell's quotes in... I realized that he did all the ranting for me... in the book "Love Wins" and even in the documentary "The Heretic".
To say it again, eternal life is less about a kind of time that starts when we die, and more about a quality and vitality of life lived now in connection to God.
Eternal life doesn’t start when we die;
it starts now.
It’s not about a life that begins at death;
it’s about experiencing the kind of life now that can endure and survive even death. (RB)
Maybe Eternity isn't as long as it seems to be. I think the concept of existing forever to be... undesirable... but maybe that isn't what Eternity is about. Maybe it is more about the moment now, than about a destination after death. This makes now... the NOW that I find myself in... to matter. Now has to matter for me. Because Now is that I'm sure that all I have.
If you believe that you’re going to leave and evacuate to somewhere else, then why do anything about this world? A proper view of heaven leads not to escape from the world, but to full engagement with it, all with the anticipation of a coming day when things are on earth as they currently are in heaven.
When Jesus tells the man he will have treasure in heaven, he’s promising the man that taking steps to be free of his greed—in this case, selling his possessions—will open him up to more and more participation in God’s new world, the one that was breaking into human history with Jesus himself. (RB)
I don't know if the chapter "Here is the New There" encourages me or discourages me. I wanted to find something that would encourage me that I don't have to exist forever, because in my limited mind... existing forever doesn't line up with how Love has expressed itself in my life. Love lives in my limits. How would Love look in a redeemed place, when Love has blossomed in the manure of my life? I am still not drawn into the forever aspect of eternity, but the Now aspect of eternity that he talks about... now that I can get inspired about. That "heaven" is more about Here and Now... than it is about the There and Then. This is still a very grey area for me. I have no conclusions.
First, heaven.
Now, hell. (RB)
But, simply put, the Hebrew commentary on what happens after a person dies isn’t very articulated or defined. Sheol, death, and the grave in the consciousness of the Hebrew writers are all a bit vague and “underworldly.” For whatever reasons, the precise details of who goes where, when, how, with what, and for how long simply aren’t things the Hebrew writers were terribly concerned with.
Next, then, the New Testament. The actual word “hell” is used roughly twelve times in the New Testament, almost exclusively by Jesus himself. The Greek word that gets translated as “hell” in English is the word “Gehenna.” Ge means “valley,” and henna means “Hinnom.” Gehenna, the Valley of Hinnom, was an actual valley on the south and west side of the city of Jerusalem.
Gehenna, in Jesus’s day, was the city dump. (RB)
So Hell in the Old Testament refers to the place of the dead, which wasn't a big topic of conversation. Hell in the New Testament is the city garbage dump. So my question... if this is obvious to biblical scholars... why have millions of people been told that Hell is a place of eternal conscious torment for people who don't sign up to be part of Christianity's club? When I look for an answer to this question... I can only come up with words like power, control and fear. There is no Love painted in this of portrait of Hell.
Many people in our world have only ever heard hell talked about as the place reserved for those who are “out,” who don’t believe, who haven’t “joined the church.” Christians talking about people who aren’t Christians going to hell when they die because they aren’t . . . Christians. People who don’t believe the right things.
But in reading all of the passages in which Jesus uses the word “hell,” what is so striking is that people believing the right or wrong things isn’t his point. He’s often not talking about “beliefs” as we think of them—he’s talking about anger and lust and indifference. He’s talking about the state of his listeners’ hearts, about how they conduct themselves, how they interact with their neighbors, about the kind of effect they have on the world.
Jesus did not use hell to try and compel “heathens” and “pagans” to believe in God, so they wouldn’t burn when they die. He talked about hell to very religious people to warn them about the consequences of straying from their God-given calling and identity to show the world God’s love. (RB)
I am more and more drawn to the idea that "beliefs" don't make one iota of a difference to the Creator... Love in action is the real deal. That is definitely evident in the storyline of Jesus. This is GOOD NEWS! I will struggle with what I "believe" until my last breath... but until I breathe my last... I can love. There is no struggle for me in that directive!
And then, last of all, please understand that nothing in this book hasn’t been taught, suggested, or celebrated by many before me. I haven’t come up with a radical new teaching that’s any kind of departure from what’s been said an untold number of times. That’s the beauty of the historic, orthodox Christian faith. It’s a deep, wide, diverse stream that’s been flowing for thousands of years, carrying a staggering variety of voices, perspectives, and experiences.
If this book, then, does nothing more than introduce you to the ancient, ongoing discussion surrounding the resurrected Jesus in all its vibrant, diverse, messy, multivoiced complexity—well, I’d be thrilled. (RB)
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