Carbon tetrachloride is a common chemical used for stain removal or stripping polish and varnish from surfaces.  I discovered that I could buy a bottle for less than a pound (that’s less than $2 US dollars), pour a few drops onto a cloth, and then place the cloth over my nose and mouth.  One bottle could keep me intoxicated for an entire day.  Solvent abuse is incredibly dangerous, each episode causes hallucinations that culminate in a juddering shock to the body that makes you feel as if your heart is bursting out of your chest.  Sometimes I could hear my heart stop beating, and in my befuddled state I would wonder whether this was the time I would die or whether I would come back to full consciousness again.

For the next two or three months I spent most of my waking time either high on solvents or drunk.  At fifteen years of age I was too young to claim welfare payments legally, so I did so under a false name.  This was before the computer age, and I figured that by the time the welfare office could receive all the relevant paperwork from Belfast, I would have moved on to another district of London.  So I used the name and date of birth of an older boy at school who had once bullied me.  I don’t know if the term ‘identity theft’ had been coined in 1978, but that is what it was.  In a grim act of revenge I used his name to collect welfare payments and build up a substantial criminal record of petty theft, public order offences, bad loans and unpaid fines.

Occasionally I would earn a few pounds working as a roadie for bands, carrying their equipment into venues and setting everything up.  The band I was living with was never successful enough to pay roadies.  Although musically challenged, they tried to gain notoriety by courting controversy.  They were called ‘The Raped’ and released a record called ‘Pretty Paedophiles.’  Every now and again a letter would appear in the music press expressing disgust at them – but in fact these letters were written by their manager in an attempt to generate publicity.  They weren’t even significant enough to cause genuine offence to anyone.

Eventually my craving for solvents and alcohol became so all-consuming that I had no money left for food or rent.  My weight began to drop alarmingly, and I ended up being evicted from my room in the house at Hendon.  I wandered the streets of London for a few days, sleeping at night in shop doorways.  When the weather turned wet I would shelter during the daytime in public libraries.

Even though my life was sliding downhill on an ever accelerating track to destruction, there was still a stubborn irrational glimmer of hope within me that things could be better.  My fascination with other countries continued to grow.  I would read books in the library that introduced me to the great writers of other nations’ literature.

One day I felt as if I had touched rock bottom.  In fact I still had further to fall, but this day still represented a new low for me.  I sat on the pavement of Tottenham Court Road and begged for coins.  I wasn’t seeking to get food, or even alcohol.  I just wanted enough coins to buy a bottle of solvent so I could put a rag over my face and inhale some oblivion.  As I sat begging, with a piece of card in front of me bearing some hastily scrawled lie of a sob-story, I was two-thirds of the way through reading a book that I had stolen from a library.  A well-dressed man stopped in front of me with a kindly expression on his face.  I looked up and tried to appear needy and pathetic.

“What’s that book you’re reading?” he asked.  I showed him the book cover.  It was ‘The Brothers Karamazov’ by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.  He shook his head in amazement.  “There probably aren’t even twenty young men your age in this entire city who have an interest in reading that kind of literature.  Yet you’re begging on the street.  Don’t you know that God could do so much more with your life?”

“I’m an atheist.” I replied, “There is no God.”  For a moment I thought I had offended him, stopping him from giving to me.  But he still dropped a few coins into the box in front of me.  I remained begging on the pavement on Tottenham Court Road until I had finished my book, but I didn’t follow through with my plan to straight away buy a bottle of solvent.  Instead I retraced my steps to the library from which I had stolen that book, and I put it back on its shelf alongside Dostoyevsky’s other novels.

Then I went to another shelf and pulled down a big illustrated atlas.  I opened it up at a map of the world, and one-by-one I began to touch the outlines of the different countries.  “One day,” I whispered to myself, “I’m going to touch the nations!”

The Print Version of “From Touching Rock Bottom to Touching the Nations” will be available in approx 3 weeks time.  But the e-book version (for Kindles, iPads, or any other e-Reader) is already for sale at amazon.com     Just search for ‘Nick Park’ in the Kindle Store section.

I had popped into my office to finish some outstanding paperwork after our Monday night Prayer Meeting. Some of our church members had stayed behind after the Prayer Meeting to fellowship.

On this occasion I left my office about 11pm. The last two stragglers from the Prayer Meeting had gone out a few seconds ahead of me. As I was locking the door I heard shouting coming from the front of the Church.

The two ladies were standing by their vehicles in the car park. Two young men on the street outside were screaming abuse at them. It was a particularly offensive form of racial abuse, full of liberal use of the ‘N’ word and threats of violence.

Racist abuse

The men saw me and, being brave specimens of manhood, quickly retreated to the other side of the street at the sight of a middle-aged white-haired overweight pastor. I moved quickly to stand between them and our two ladies – and, although there were no more threats of violence, they continued to spew forth racist abuse.

Our two ladies left, and the loudmouthed racists carried on down the street. Now, here’s the weird thing. The young men were white. I’m white. And the two Church ladies are white. Yet these men were screaming hatred purely because of our Church’s reputation as a multicultural and multiethnic Church.

Driving home I confess that I struggled to stay sanctified. Part of me really wanted to turn the car around, to confront those young men and to administer the sorely-needed clip round the ear that their mothers evidently neglected to give them. But I kept on driving. After all, pastors beating up young men on the street doesn’t generally bring good publicity to a Church.

But I found it difficult to sleep that night. I’ve been subjected to abuse before, but somehow racism has a viciousness that disturbs my spirit. Then a sobering realisation sank into my heart. If racist abuse has such an impact, even when it’s from a white person directed at other whites, then how must it affect the black members of our Church?

A few evenings later I was in another prayer meeting with about a dozen black friends from our Church. I shared what had happened. I began to say, “I’m sure this is nothing new. Some of you have probably faced worse abuse sometimes…”

Every single day

I got no further. One guy just about exploded. He said, “Pastor! Not just ‘sometimes’ – make that ‘every day’!” He related how, as a bus driver, he had been subjected to racist abuse every single day of his working life in Dublin.

One day, the abuse was so nasty and vindictive that my friend’s patience snapped. He started shouting back at his tormentor. As a result he has now lost his job.

My friend is a large imposing man. And I’m sure his outburst was upsetting for some passengers. But as I listened to him I realised that a whole section of our Church is experiencing stuff of which I have little or no concept.

I’ve recently been reading “Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America” by sociologist Michael Emerson. It has almost become a cliché that 11am on a Sunday morning is the most segregated hour in American society.

But, more disturbingly, studies reveal that Evangelical Christians’ attitudes tend to perpetuate rather than to diminish racial divisions and injustices. It’s not that they are overtly racist – but their worldview leads them to ignore inequalities in society.

So, are we headed towards a similar scenario in Ireland? Is the future of Evangelical Christianity in this land to be one of white Churches and black Churches with little interaction and little understanding of the problems each other face?

Don’t misunderstand me. I am not so naïve as to imagine that every Church should be multicultural and multiethnic. Our histories and different people’s preferences in worship and preaching style mean we will always have white-majority Churches, Churches composed predominantly of immigrants and every conceivable mixture in-between. 

Part of the problem or part of the solution?

But, and this is a huge ‘but’, studies from the US also demonstrate that where black and white Christians form relationships with each other, then Evangelical Christians become part of the solution to racial tension rather than being part of the problem.

Evangelical Alliance Ireland is moving to address this by promoting an event called “If My People” on the November 11 2011. Pastors from diverse backgrounds will be planning prayer events all over Ireland with a view to building relationships with one another and between their congregations.

Let’s join together and set an example in the Church that can show the way ahead for our nation.

To find out how you and your Church can be part of this initiative then please contact Mary Dwyer at EAI networking@evangelical.ie

Or else we honor non-violent heroes who nevertheless stuck determinedly to their task until they achieved their lofty goals.  The stories of men like William Wilberforce or Martin Luther King, for example, inspire us to believe that a flawed individual can indeed change the policies of nations for the better.

But Dirk Willems fits neither of these categories of heroes.  He never fought in any battles or killed anyone.  Nor did he succeed in persuading any government to pursue actions of righteousness.  His heroism was not in winning any battles or changing any laws.  In fact, in most people’s eyes, he died a failure.  The only thing he really succeeded in doing was in being a Christian.

Dirk Willems was a Dutch Anabaptist at a time when the Netherlands were under Spanish rule.  He came to believe that baptism was an act for believers, not a rite to be enforced on infants.  This conviction, which was opposed by both the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant Reformers in the 16th Century, led him to be baptized again as an adult – and for this he was imprisoned by the Catholic authorities.  One winter’s day he escaped from prison and ran away across the frozen moat.  A guard pursued him across the ice.  Just as he was reaching dry land, Dirk heard a crack behind him, and he turned to see that his pursuer had fallen through the ice.

Dirk turned back and bravely saved the life of the drowning guard.  As a result he was captured and returned to his prison cell.  There he was placed in a more secure cell and locked in the stocks until the 16th of May 1569, when he was duly condemned by the Catholic authorities as a heretic and burned at the stake.

As an Anabaptist, Dirk Willems’ convictions were that a Christian should not use violence to take the life of another, and in this case he interpreted that as meaning that he could not allow another man to die as a result of his own actions – even though such principles resulted in his own death.

Over the next few posts I intend to explore the ideas that led Dirk Willems to his radical act.  How do we square the words of Jesus with our modern day attitudes towards war and violence?  What have been the historic attitudes of Christianity?  How do such ideas work if we are threatened by an intruder in our home?  What if the intruder is threatening our family?  If we were all like Dirk Willems, then who would have stopped Hitler?  These are the kind of questions we need to consider.

If we could go back 2000 years or so and try to think like the Early Church, then we would see the Day of Pentecost as being the greatest day of the year – the day that marks out Christianity as being different from every religious system on earth.  The Day of Pentecost is what makes us Christians rather than “Chruslims”.

A “Chruslim” is a Christian who thinks like a Muslim.  By that, I mean that they do all the things that a good Muslim is expected to do.  Now, note that I’m talking about ‘a good Muslim’.  Of course you get Muslims who don’t do the stuff I’m about to talk about – just as you get church members who don’t do what they are supposed to do.  But we’re not talking about the exceptions here, we’re talking about the behaviour that characterises a sincere obedient Muslim (as well as a sincere obedient church member).

1. Muslims Belong to a Community

A good Muslim belongs to a community of fellow believers.  They might have chosen this community – but more likely they were born into it.  And within this community they learn to care for each other and show love and concern for each other.

2.  Muslims Attend Worship

A good Muslim isn’t a Muslim in name only.  They meet with other members of their community to worship in the Mosque.  Often they sacrifice opportunities to work on Friday (their holy day) so they won’t miss going to the Mosque.

3.  Muslims Pray Regularly

Good Muslims believe in prayer.  In fact they are expected to pray five times a day (How many church members do you know who do that?)  If you’ve ever visited a Muslim country you will have heard the ear-piercing calls to prayer being broadcast from the Mosque very early in the morning.

4.  Muslims Read Scripture

Good Muslims regularly read, recite, and memorize the Koran.  In fact, if you look up the Guinness Book of Records you’ll find that some of the most prodigious feats of memory are those of Muslims who have memorized their entire holy book.  How many Christians do you know who can commit the entire Bible to memory?

5.  Muslims Avoid Certain Sins

A good Muslim is very careful to abstain from what they see as sinful patterns of behaviour.  These rules, although different from some of what we do in church, are carefully followed.  No alcohol, no pork, no adultery etc.

6.  Muslims Give Money

A good Muslim practices something called Zakat.  This obliges them to give a fixed percentage of their income (usually 2.5%) to the poor and to charity.  This is in addition to what they give for the upkeep of the Mosque.  True, it isn’t a tithe – but, then again, ask any Pastor how many church members really tithe!!!!

7.  Muslims Spread Their Faith

A good Muslim is passionate about spreading their faith.  In fact, most of the problems we have with Muslims in the world today occur because they are too passionate about spreading their faith!

8.  Muslims Will Die for Their Faith

Many Muslims are prepared to lay down their lives for what they believe.  In it’s most radical and perverted form this leads to the actions of suicide bombers.  But other Muslims have been prepared throughout history to be killed rather than to renounce their religion.

9.  Muslims Believe in Heaven

A good Muslim believes that when they die then they will be rewarded by spending Eternity in Paradise while the wicked roast in Hell.

You know what’s really strange?  Look back over the nine points that I’ve just listed, then try to think how much of the preaching you hear in church is concentrating on trying to get us to do these very same things!  I would hazard a guess that 90% of the preaching I’ve heard over the last 31 years of being a Christian has been based on trying to get me to do the things that Muslims are already doing.

Wow!

Hours of preaching encouraging me to belong to my community (church), attend worship, pray, read my Scriptures, avoid sinful habits, give money to the church (and the poor), spread my faith to others, even be willing to die for Jesus, and to believe that if I do all this then I can be sure of going to Heaven when I die instead of going to Hell.

Once again – Wow!

90% of Christian preaching teaching me how to do the stuff that good Muslims do.  90% of sermons encouraging me to be a good “Chruslim”.

Now, of course there’s nothing wrong with those nine things.  And, to be sure, they are the things that should quite naturally characterize our lives as followers of Jesus Christ.  But just doing those things alone will cause us to fall far short of being children of the Living God (even if they will make us respected in our churches and loved by our pastors).

Jesus didn’t die to create another religion.  There are already plenty of religions in the world.  We didn’t need yet another religion.

Jesus didn’t come to earth to turn Jews and Gentiles into Chruslims.

Jesus told us why He came to earth:

Let’s look again at our opening Scripture from Romans:

Jesus came so we could have God the Holy Spirit residing in our hearts by faith, releasing life more abundant as our daily experience of God.  Jesus died so that the resurrection power that raised Him from the grave on Easter Sunday would flow through us and make our lives truly extraordinary.  That’s what Pentecost Sunday is all about.  It’s what separates dynamic born-again rejoicing sons of God from simply being Muslims – or Chruslims!

This Pentecost Sunday, why not look to Jesus afresh and cry out for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit in your life?  Don’t be satisfied with anything less than a glorious manifestation of life more abundant on a daily basis.  Don’t settle for being a Chruslim!

From what we’ve looked at so far, I think it’s pretty clear that I differ from Rob Bell on the issues addressed in “Love Wins”.  In some ways I feel a disappointment that someone who can write and communicate well has produced such poor arguments for his position.  It’s a bit like watching a sports team, one you know can do so much better, playing poorly (an experience I’m well used to as a supporter of Arsenal Football Club).

However, I’ve also been extremely disappointed by the antics of John Piper and others who seem to take delight in writing off Rob Bell as a heretic.

This morning, in the Solid Rock Church in Drogheda, I preached from 2 Samuel 11:1-4.  We looked at David’s temptation and sin with Bathsheba.  There is one particularly telling phrase in verse 4 where it says, “She came to him, and he slept with her. (Now she was purifying herself from her monthly uncleanness.)”

Did you get that?  David and Bathsheba were concerned that she observed her ritual purifying – yet they jump into bed together to commit the extremely impure act of adultery.  Talk about an exercise in missing the point!

We do that kind of thing a lot as Christians.  We observe the niceties and formalities of being Christians – but then we treat one another with an appalling lack of love.

I was really tempted to entitle this morning’s message “Why I Think Rob Bell is Wrong About Hell But I’d Still Rather Have What Rob Belll’s Got Than What John Piper’s Got” – but I decided not to, partly because it wouldn’t squeeze onto the Powerpoint slide, but also because 99% of the congregation have no idea who Rob Bell and John Piper are!

We can be really precise about having all the correct doctrinal beliefs, and what we believe is important, but it doesn’t really count for much if we can’t treat one another with love.

When it comes down to it, belief in hell is not one of those defining doctrines that marks you out as being a Christian or not.  There are certain beliefs that are essential to being a Christian (eg the deity of Christ, His atoning death, His bodily Resurrection).  It is difficult to see how anyone can deny such truths and still be called a Christian – but belief in everlasting punishment is not such a doctrine.  If Rob Bell differs from me concerning hell then I think he is wrong – but he is still my brother in Christ.

But I do hope his next book will be better!

“If God is so loving then how can He condemn people to be tormented in burning flames for all eternity simply because they don’t believe in Him?”

At first glance this seems like a fair question. Most civilized societies today have outlawed torture, and even the death penalty is viewed by an increasing number of people as constituting ‘cruel and unusual punishment.’ Also, in the Western world we’ve long ago moved on from the idea that anyone should be punished because they hold to a different set of religious beliefs. So, it seems fair to ask, isn’t the whole idea of hell really just like a divine version of the Spanish Inquisition but with far crueler methods of torture?

As Christians we instinctively cringe at the idea of anyone going to hell. No reasonable person can enjoy the thought of anyone, even their greatest enemy, suffering for all eternity. In fact C.S. Lewis once used the doctrine of hell to argue against those who tried to suggest that Christianity was all just wishful thinking invented by people who couldn’t face up to the fact that we all just disappear like a puff of smoke when we die. Lewis argued, very reasonably, that if we were going to invent a set of beliefs then wishful thinking would never come up with a place where human beings, including some of our loved ones, will suffer for all eternity! It’s a good point, but it doesn’t help us answer the question as to why a loving God would send people to suffer eternally in hell just because they don’t believe in Him.

A Man of Straw

Let’s begin by correcting one huge misunderstanding that is contained in that question. Christians do not believe that anyone gets sent to hell simply because they don’t believe in God. That is what we call ‘a strawman.’ This is a rather dishonest debating technique where you set up a gross distortion of your opponent’s position, then you proceed to attack and demolish that distorted position. If you are dishonest enough to be solely interested in winning an argument, rather than actually finding the truth, then a strawman can be a very effective tool in a debate. It has to be a lie that is close enough to your opponent’s position to fool onlookers, but can still be easily demolished in an argument.

First of all, simply believing in God is not the measure of whether someone is saved or not. The Bible tells us that even demons believe in God (James 2:19), but that doesn’t mean they are saved. What is important is putting our faith and trust in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, not merely a mental assent to the existence of God.

Secondly, leaving aside for the moment just what hell is like, the historic Christian position is that people go to hell because of their sins, not for what they believed or didn’t believe. So anyone in hell will be there because of their greed and selfishness, because they exploited and abused others, because of their cheating, lying and stealing, and because of a load of other sins that we’ve all committed.

It is true, of course, that God has given us all a totally undeserved escape route and offer of a free pardon. And it is true that faith is the key to receiving that free pardon, but that is a very different thing indeed to the dishonest claim that anyone is sent to hell simply for not believing.

I’m reminded here of the old joke about a guy in prison who was asked by another inmate why he had been jailed. He replied, “I’m in prison because of my beliefs!” “Really?” responded his questioner, “How come?” “I broke into a house and I didn’t believe the alarm system was working.”

The reason that joke works is that we all understand that the guy was sent to jail for the crime of breaking into a house, not for his beliefs. Having the correct beliefs about the alarm system might have led him to change his actions and so avoid going to jail, but his beliefs are not the crime for which he was jailed.

In the same way, having the correct beliefs about who Jesus is can lead us to take the necessary actions (accepting Him as Savior and following Him as Lord) to avoid going to hell, but our beliefs are most certainly not the crime for which anyone goes to hell.

However, even when we’ve disposed of that strawman, our basic question doesn’t go away. If we go to hell for the sins we’ve committed, that still leaves us with a massive problem. While we might see why child rapists or serial killers should deserve to go to hell, most of us don’t feel that our particular lists of sins actually warrant being burned for all eternity. It’s not so much the idea of punishment itself that seems unreasonable – it’s that the punishment seems to be out of all proportion to the crime. Isn’t the idea of an eternal hell, when weighed against our rather petty list of crimes, a bit like sentencing someone to death for stealing a loaf of bread?

Giving Hell an Extreme Makeover

If we suspect that the traditional concept of hell seems to be a case of the punishment not fitting the crime, then we’re left with one of two options. We either look at the crime more closely, or we reinterpret the punishment. And, since the whole concept of sin tends to be somewhat unfashionable these days, it’s hardly surprising that many Christian thinkers have tried to give hell an extreme makeover. Maybe hell isn’t quite so ‘hellish’ after all?

One aspect of this makeover is to suggest that hell is not eternal. Maybe, it is suggested, the words that we translate as ‘everlasting’ could simply mean a long time? Perhaps the biblical writers were like a teenage girl who complains that she had to wait “for ever” for a bus? It is often pointed out that Origen, one of the Early Church Fathers, held such a view. He believed that the punishments of God would be restorative, turning the wicked back to God until everyone, even Satan, would eventually worship God and be saved! By the way, if anyone thinks that Origen’s endorsement of such a doctrine clinches the argument then be careful. You really don’t want to follow Origen in everything. Remember, this is the guy who castrated himself because he wanted to be a eunuch for the sake of the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 19:12)!

The problem with this idea of ‘everlasting’ actually being somewhat less than everlasting is that you have to do a fair bit of twisting of the Bible to get there. For example, Jesus said, “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.” (Matthew 25:46) Now, it doesn’t matter whether you translate this word (in Greek it is aionios) as ‘everlasting’ or as ‘eternal’. The point is that the self same word is being used, in the same sentence, to refer to both the life and the punishment that come after the final judgement. It would be totally unreasonable and dishonest to try to pretend that Jesus somehow switches the meaning of a word mid-sentence.

So, if eternal punishment were only to mean a long period of time, then to be consistent we would have to say the same about eternal life. Does any Christian really want to go down that road? Do we really think that the eternal life that Jesus promised us is one where, after a few thousand years, God says, “OK guys. Out you go. Time’s up. We’re closing now!”

There are good biblical reasons why Christians have historically understood that ‘everlasting’ really does last for ever. In the words of John Newton: “When we’ve been there ten thousand years, Bright Shining as the sun, We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise, Than when we first begun.”

The other aspect of hell’s extreme makeover is obvious. If the Bible does not allow us enough wiggle-room to diminish the duration of hell, then the only other option is to modify the intensity of hell’s sufferings. Perhaps hell is not really as bad as that flaming pit of fire that we’ve all imagined? Could hell be nothing more and nothing less than separation from God’s presence?

Such an idea can claim some measure of Scriptural support. Are we not told that the King will say to those who have demonstrated that they don’t belong to Him “Depart from Me, you who are cursed” (Matthew 12:41)? Is it not possible that the language of fire and flames is just symbolic, and that hell is really just a state of being where we are eternally separated from God? Not so much hell, perhaps, as just an absence of heaven?

Such a notion sounds attractive to many people, particularly unbelievers. Many of them seem quite happy now living without the presence of God, so spending an eternity separated from Him doesn’t sound too bad at all to them.

I’m not so sure that a simple separation from God would be such a benign experience. Imagine a planet populated by everyone that has ever chosen to reject God, but where nobody ever dies. Hitler, Genghis Khan, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot will have an eternity in which to compete for dominance. Death will never intervene to halt their maniacal schemes, nor will their victims be able to cherish the hope that death might bering them a release from their sufferings. Such an existence sounds pretty hellish to me.

But my major quarrel with this notion of hell as nothing more than separation from God is that it stems from a desire to soft peddle the spiritual realities that Jesus taught. Let’s remember that some of the most graphic language about hell in the Bible is not culled from the pages of Daniel or Revelation, but rather it comes directly from the lips of Jesus in the Four Gospels. (Significantly, much of Christ’s warning about hell is directed to the disciples, not to unbelievers or to the Pharisees. Jesus saw the doctrine of hell as a motivation for His followers to love the lost rather than as a stick to frighten unbelievers into getting saved.)

Today many Christians have become diplomats rather than ambassadors of Christ. Our fear of seeming intolerant or of giving offence causes us to use watered-down language. So, for example, if we are asked if something should be considered as a sin we say, “Well, it’s not God’s best for you.” That conveys the impression that committing acts which the Bible describes as sinful are in fact like flying Economy Class instead of First Class – they’ll still get you to where you’re going, but you could be doing even better. Of course nobody wants to be rude or offensive for the sake of it, but in the end the Gospel is a stumbling block (1 Corinthians 1:23) rather than an escalator! We have to be honest enough to call a spade a spade and to call a sin a sin!

Being eternally separated from God is undoubtedly a huge part of what hell is all about. But to pretend that is the whole story fails to do justice to what Jesus taught. Earlier we quoted His words, “Depart from Me, you who are cursed.” But we neglected to complete the entire sentence: “Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” (Matthew 25:41)

Yes, the Bible does indeed use symbolic language, and Jesus Himself frequently used metaphors, parables and figures of speech to teach spiritual truth. But we need to ask ourselves why Jesus would use such a metaphor. Was He in the habit of using metaphors to exaggerate things? To make them seem bigger and more scary than they really were? Would Jesus use the metaphor of fire and then say, “Actually chaps, it’s nothing like as bad as fire, but I thought I’d just get your attention by scaring you out of your wits”? Or is it more likely that Jesus would use a metaphor to express something that was so great as to defy ordinary human language? Is it possible that He was saying, “The reality of dying in your sin is so horrible that your limited human vocabulary is insufficient for Me to describe it, so I’m going to do the next best thing and use the imagery of fire to impress upon you how awful it would be to die without having your sins forgiven”?

This is not a case of searching for isolated proof texts to prove a point. If I take the teaching of Jesus as a whole, and the way He used symbolic language, then I am persuaded that if His talk of hell as fire is symbolic, then He is saying that hell is something worse than eternal flames – not something milder. Yes, hell is indeed separation from God, but it is a separation that is even worse than the traditional concept of a pit of fire.

So our makeover of hell has not answered our troubling question about how a loving God could send a sinner to hell. If anything it has made the question more urgent. So how can we answer the accusation that the idea of an eternal hell, when weighed against our rather petty list of crimes, is a bit like sentencing someone to death for stealing a loaf of bread? The answer is not to try to give hell a makeover. The answer is to realize that, according to Jesus, our sin problems go much deeper than stealing a loaf of bread.

Godwin’s Law of Sin and Death

Part of our problem is that we persistently underestimate the awfulness of sin. We might sometimes wax indignant at the sins of others, but we have a wonderful capacity for minimizing our own wrongdoing. We even employ a host of euphemisms to avoid calling sin what it is. Instead we have our faults, our weaknesses, our little slips and our failings.

Yet every now and again something happens that brings us face to face with sin in such a naked form that we can’t dress it up as if it were something else. Then, just for a moment, we start to see sin as God Himself sees it.

Several years ago I had the privilege of visiting Jerusalem as part of a team of pastors organized by a Christian TV station. It was certainly not a sight seeing trip. For most of the time we were ensconced in a hotel room that overlooked the Old City and we prayed continually. But one morning we took the time to visit Yad Vashem, the primary Holocaust museum and memorial in Israel. It was sobering to see the history and the evidence of that terrible genocide that was perpetrated by the Nazi regime.

One of the final exhibits in the museum was a hall of mirrors. Countless little mirrors lined the walls and ceiling. And in the center burned a single candle, so that its reflection was multiplied over and over thousands of times by the myriad of mirrors. A plaque on the wall informed us that each reflected candle we could see in that hall represented a Jewish child who died in the Holocaust. As I gazed at those thousands of reflected lights I felt overwhelmed by sadness and anger.

In 1994 my wife and I had the grief of seeing our young daughter die at just four years of age. Our little girl, Grace, was born severely underweight and suffering from an extremely rare genetic condition. Throughout her short life an army of doctors, nurses and social workers labored to keep her alive and to make her life more comfortable and enjoyable. We were living in the UK, where medical care was free, and occasionally I tried to calculate how much was spent in medicines, equipment, medical staff and so on in keeping Grace alive. I estimated that the State had invested more into my daughter’s life over those four years than I will ever earn in my entire lifetime. But no-one ever questioned whether all the effort was worthwhile. We all operated on the assumption that a child’s life is priceless.

Yet those reflected candles in Yad Vashem tell me that seventy years ago a child’s life was not priceless. For the perpetrators of the Holocaust a child’s life wasn’t even worth the price of a candle. We boarded our bus to return to our hotel, and everyone was silent. When you are confronted with sin in all its awfulness then what is there left to say? The first person to break the silence was a Pentecostal pastor from Birmingham who was seated beside me. He turned to me, and uttered words that I never expected to hear from any Christian, least of all a pastor. He said, “By God, I’m glad that there’s a hell!”

And you know what? I know exactly what he meant. If there is no hell then God will owe an apology to every child that is represented in the Hall of Mirrors at Yad Vashem.

We recognize that the Holocaust represents sin in all of its unvarnished horror. But we like to kid ourselves that what happened in Germany in the 1930s and 1940s was a one-off event, a never to be repeated orgy of demonic cruelty. But to think that way is the pinnacle of self-deception. What about the genocide committed by the Turks against the Armenians in 1915? What about the slaughter in Rwanda in 1990? What about the crimes against humanity committed in the Balkans by Serbs and Croats in the early 1990s? And then, when we begin to read history, we see that such cruelties are not isolated events. The history of the human race, including Church History, is a long record of sin that cries out for judgement.

There is a principle on internet discussion boards known as Godwin’s Law. This basically states that the longer a discussion continues, the more likely it is that someone will invoke a reference to the Nazis or to the Holocaust. Actually, when you think about it, Godwin’s Law is rather pointless and banal. After all, the longer a discussion continues then the more likely it becomes that any subject will be mentioned! But Godwin’s Law has become famous because people misunderstand it and misuse it as if they think it forbids any mention of the Nazis whatsoever. So if, in an internet discussion, anyone draws a comparison with Nazi Germany some poor simpleton is likely to chip in with, “Ha! Godwin’s Law! You lose!”

This abuse of Godwin’s Law is based on a terrible misunderstanding, namely that somehow the Holocaust that occurred under the Nazis was so unique, so special, that it can never be compared to anything else. But the truth is much more disturbing. The Holocaust is only one of a series of historical events where sin was stripped of its mask and revealed to us in all its horrible depravity. And the Scriptural teaching is even more shocking. It is only our tendency to ignore and justify sin that blinds us to the fact that all sin is grossly offensive to God and cries out for judgement.

Let’s forget about all the fingerpointing at others. Let’s stop pretending that every one of the ordinary German people who joined the Nazi Party were evil in a special way that none of us ever could be. What if all of our lives are characterized by deeds, words and thoughts that cry out for judgement – either judged in the Person of Christ upon the Cross or in some other way? What if there are things in your history and my history that are so wrong that God would owe the universe an apology if He were to leave us unjudged?

Therese Raquin and the Power of Guilt

When we talk about hell from our modern worldviews we often fail to understand that there are plenty of things that are worse than physical suffering. Soldiers, for example, will endure all kinds of physical injuries rather than have their comrades think them to be cowards. A parent that has known the tragedy of being bereaved of a child knows that any physical pain would be preferable to the overwhelming grief that such a loss brings. Can any physical torture really compare with the horrors felt by a betrayed spouse or a scorned lover?

Émile Zola was one of the more profound and thoughtful authors of the 19^th Century. His novels, at times both poetic and gruesome, often use beautifully written language to describe the ugliness of poverty, crime and human misery. Zola was reviewing a novel which described the murder of a man by his wife and her lover, and their subsequent arrest and trial. He commented to friends that the story could have been much more powerful if it had concentrated on divine, rather than human, justice. What would such justice look like, he mused, if the murderers had escaped human detection but then been tormented by their consciences?

Zola’s answer to this question formed the basis for his novel “Therese Raquin.” Therese is a shopkeeper trapped in an arranged marriage to her sickly cousin Camille Raquin, whom she secretly despises. She embarks on an affair with Camille’s friend Laurent, and the lovers plan to murder Camille so they can be together permanently. One day the three all go boating together, and Laurent, urged on by Therese, seizes Camille and drowns him in the river. As Laurent seizes Camille, however, his intended victim struggles violently and manages to bite a chunk of flesh out of Laurent’s neck.

I have read enough novels and watched enough movies to know that such a detail always has consequences. So, when I first read this, I was already wondering how this bite on Laurent’s neck is going to play out in the story. Will they find the lump of flesh from Laurent’s body still in the mouth of Camille’s corpse? Will a perceptive detective match the teeth marks on Laurent’s neck with Camille’s dental records? (As you can tell, I’ve probably watched too many episodes of CSI!)

But a masterful story-teller like Zola is better than that. Therese and Laurent get away with their crime. In fact Laurent is celebrated as a hero who tried to save his friend’s life. His subsequent care and attention towards Camille’s elderly mother leads her, after a decent period of mourning, to suggest that Laurent should take her son’s widow as his wife! So Therese and Laurent’s plan works to perfection. They have committed the perfect murder and have got exactly what they wanted.

But that is where divine justice kicks in. Both Therese and Laurent are tormented by guilt at what they have done. They imagine that they see Camille’s face at every turn. They become jumpy and afraid of the dark. When they sleep they run a gauntlet of dreams about the murdered man. Laurent tries to distract himself by working as an artist, but every figure he draws bears an uncanny resemblance to Camille. Every time Laurent dresses in the morning he sees the scar on his neck where Camille bit him. The more he dwells on things, the redder and more angry the scar becomes. He imagines that it is hot and burning him. Sometimes, as he is shaving, he is tempted to use his razor to cut the flesh out of his neck and to erase the mark of his victim’s teeth.

When Laurent and Therese do get married they feel no love for one another. In fact their motive for marriage is no longer lust, but rather because each has found their guilt too intolerable to bear alone. They cannot even sleep together, feeling that Camille’s ghostly presence is somehow wedged between them. Just to touch each other causes all kinds of imagined burnings and pain. They spend their wedding night seated in armchairs opposite each other, staring at one another in horror and longing for morning to come. They argue incessantly, blaming each other for the murder. They seek distraction in partying, in work, in extramarital affairs, in sobs of repentance – but nothing eases their guilt. Eventually Therese provokes Laurent into beating her, finding that the pain of the blows and kicks proves a welcome distraction from her self-condemnation.

Gradually Therese and Laurent grow to hate each other, but they cannot separate because of the fear that the other might confess everything to the authorities. So they follow one another, and threaten one another, trapped together in mutual guilt and loathing. Each comes to see murdering their spouse as the only option left to them – not to remove their guilt altogether, but at least to make it more bearable. They separately hatch plans to kill each other, but this time with no thought of evading detection. Each would be prepared to risk arrest and execution if they could reduce their torment even temporarily. Finally, each realizing what the other is planning, they unite in a suicide pact, finding death itself preferable to their lives of constant guilt and fear.

Zola, with his keen perception of human nature, understood something that is largely overlooked in our discussions about eternal punishment and hell. Our innermost feelings and emotions have a much greater power to pain us than any physical fire. What if hell is simply a state of being where, like Therese and Laurent, we are continually confronted with the shamefulness and sinfulness of our actions? Imagine an eternity of reflecting on our actions, but where we have reached a maturity of thought and understanding by which all our excuses are stripped away, where we see our sin as God sees it. Might we, like Therese Raquin, long for kicks, for blows, for any kind of physical sensation (including fire) that would distract us from the horror of being confronted by the enormity of our actions.

Suffering and Shame

The Hebrew writers of the Old Testament, and indeed the communities in which the New Testament was born, were typically Middle Eastern in the ways that they valued honor and saw shame and disgrace as the ultimate evil to avoid. Indeed, in such societies people are willing to endure all kinds of physical suffering rather than to ‘lose face.’ The worst imaginable punishment, in their eyes, is not physical, but is to be disgraced. The more public and permanent the disgrace, the closer they approach to the idea of hell. Curiously, our modern Western minds get fixated by every reference that suggests pain yet we gloss over their obvious horror of shame and disgrace.

For example, the prophet Daniel describes the resurrection of the dead and their subsequent judgement: “Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.” (Daniel 12:2). This sounds strange to our way of thinking, conditioned as we are to thinking of pain as the ultimate evil, but it made perfect sense to the Hebrew reader. The opposite of everlasting life was not everlasting punishment. It was not even everlasting death. The opposite of everlasting life was shame and everlasting contempt!

This idea runs throughout the Scripture. Those who look to the Lord for help are promised that “their faces are never covered with shame” (Psalm 34:5) while we are admonished to avoid pride because it is followed by disgrace (Proverbs 11:2). The Book of Hebrews, in referring to the Cross of Jesus Christ, stresses its shame more than the physical pains of crucifixion.

“Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12:2)

“And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through His own blood. Let us, then, go to Him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace He bore.” (Hebrews 13:12,13)

When the apostles were flogged for preaching in the name of Jesus, the Word tells us that they left “rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name” (Acts 5:41). If we read today about some similar act of persecution against believers then our thoughts immediately fly to the physical pain that they suffer, but the apostles’ emphasis was on the issue of disgrace.

Think also of Mel Gibson’s movie “The Passion of the Christ.” The first time I watched it I remember thinking that it did a great job of emphasizing the physical suffering of Christ on the Cross, but failed to even begin to convey the immensity of Christ’s spiritual suffering. Yet what happened spiritually on the Cross was much more important to our salvation than the mere physical pain that Jesus endured.

The old Gospel song, ‘The Old Rugged Cross,’ describes the Cross as “the emblem of suffering and shame.” Without wishing to over-simplify things, it would be accurate to say that modern western Christians dwell on the suffering of the Cross, whereas the Early Church was more concerned about the shame of the Cross. Perhaps our concept of hell is twisted because our emphasis on avoiding pain has made us a people without shame!

A Moment of Clarity

When I was eight years old, growing up on the outskirts of East Belfast, I squabbled in the school playground with a boy named Robert. He taunted me about the death of my mother, so I warned him that if he ever said anything like that again I would knock his teeth out. Robert replied, “You can’t do that, because my Auntie is the Playground Supervisor.” At that we both looked over at the Supervisor – a big round woman with white hair like the Fairy Godmother in Disney’s Cinderella. Playground Supervisors were volunteers who kept an eye on the kids during lunch breaks. They had no authority to discipline the children, but they reported what went on to the staff, and their version of events would determine who got punished and who didn’t. If I was to start punching a Playground Supervisor’s nephew then things were going to go badly for me.

I suspected Robert was lying to get out of a beating, so what followed was one of those typical childish arguments. “Oh no she isn’t!” “Oh yes she is!” “Oh no she isn’t!” And so on. Finally Robert ran up to the Playground Supervisor. “Aren’t you my Auntie?” “Why, of course I am, Robert.” she replied. “Yah! I told you so!” shouted Robert, and at that he burst into tears.

That was when things got weird. Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother took one look at me and turned into the Wicked Witch of the West! She snarled, “What have you been doing to this poor boy?” and, grabbing my arm, dragged me straight to the Principal’s office. By the time we got to the office I was the one who was crying, trying to understand what was going on. The Wicked Witch of the West (formerly the Fairy Godmother) spun a tale to the Principal that I had been bullying her poor nephew who had been afflicted with polio. Heck, I didn’t even know what polio was. I actually had to look it up in the dictionary when I got home that night. I hadn’t even noticed that Robert walked with a bit of a limp – as far as I was concerned he was just the kid who had taunted me about my dead mother! But somehow I never got the chance to give my side of the story. I was severely disciplined for bullying a crippled boy. All afternoon in class, as I sniffed back my tears and felt the heat in my backside where I had been caned, I could see Robert gloating at me out of the corner of my eye. I was too humiliated and upset to look back at him directly, but inside I burned with a thirst for revenge.

A few days later the opportunity for revenge came my way. We lived about two miles from the school, and I was walking home with a couple of friends. Suddenly I spotted Robert walking alone ahead of me, and this time there was no Auntie Playground Supervisor to protect him. At first my plan was simple. I would run and catch him up and give him six punches in the teeth, one for every stroke of the cane I had received from the Principal.

But, as I walked faster and gained ground on Robert, I noticed something. He did have a limp! In fact, when he looked over his shoulder and quickened his pace at the sight of me behind him, his limp looked quite comical. And then something inside me rejoiced as I hatched a diabolical plot. My eight-year-old mind, tainted by generations of human sin, realized that I could exact a revenge on Robert that would be far sweeter than a few punches in the mouth.

I stayed about twenty feet behind Robert and began to mimic his limp. At first my two friends started laughing, but soon they got in on the act as well. They started to limp too. Now there were three of us limping along behind Robert. Other kids, including a group of girls, saw what we were doing and thought it looked great fun, so they started limping along with us as well. The more of us gathered, the faster Robert tried to get home. But the faster he moved, the more comical his limp looked, and the more children joined in. It was only a mile from the school to Robert’s house, but by the time we reached his front door the crowd of limping children had swelled to over a hundred. I was gratified at how well my revenge was working out, but I was also scared. I had unleashed something bigger than myself and had created forces beyond my control. I was leading a mob!

When Robert reached his house he tried to get inside, but no-one was at home and the front door was locked. Such things happened all the time. We all knew that you could play in the street, or if it was raining you could go to a neighbour’s house until one of your parents got home. But none of us had ever been in the position of being trapped in front of your own locked door by a mob of kids who were all mimicking you. Robert stood facing us on the little patch of grass in front of his house, and we stood on the other side of a low brick wall. Everyone fell silent and wondered what was supposed to happen next. We all stared at Robert, and he stared back at us. Some of the kids were nudging me in the back as if I was supposed to say or do something, but I didn’t know what to do. I hadn’t planned for all this to happen. My idea had gone no further than one person mimicking another for a few minutes to get revenge. I had no plan to form a lynch mob!

Then something happened that will live with me for the rest of my life. Robert’s face crumpled into tears and he fell to his knees. In impotent fear, rage, and frustration he began to punch the grass. His little fists were beating the ground faster than the eye could follow them, and all the while he was making a whimpering noise like a wounded animal. All around me the other kids were hooting and jeering at him, but I could only stare in stunned silence. I was watching a human being disintegrating in front of my very eyes and I had caused it.

Eventually a neighbour came to Robert’s help and gathered him up into her arms. She shook her fist at the crowd of kids and started cursing at us for being the cruel little brats that we were. Most of the children ran off at that point, but those who knew about my caning a few days earlier gathered round to congratulate me at what a great trick I’d played on Robert. I couldn’t accept their congratulations. I couldn’t smile. I wanted to cry but tears would not come. I was only eight years old, but I knew that I had just crossed a line that human beings weren’t meant to cross. I wished with all my heart that I could travel back in time and undo what had just happened. I had no belief in God, and no ability to think in religious terms, but I knew that I was a sinner and that what had just occurred had been a window into my inmost being. I had glimpsed for an instant who I really was, what I was capable of, and I hated what I had just seen.

Over the next ten years I was to commit many acts which in most people’s eyes (and certainly in the eyes of the law) would be considered much worse than one young boy mimicking how another boy walked. I engaged in acts of violence, wallowed in immorality, committed armed robberies, and on one occasion stood watching as fellow gang-members kicked a man to death. Yet, in the dead of the night when I was all alone, I would find myself pressing my fists against my eyes to try to erase the image of a young boy with polio being mercilessly teased and taunted by the crowd I had created. I would wonder why that one incident persisted so stubbornly, and the pain it caused me could never be numbed by alcohol or other substances. Did everyone else have things that troubled them in this way? Was it just me? Sometimes I wondered if I was losing my mind.

When I was eighteen years old I had a Damascus Road-type experience of Christ. I knew what it was to have the assurance of sins forgiven, and I rejoiced in my salvation. But perhaps the most liberating feeling of all was to know that God had forgiven me for what I had done to Robert ten years earlier. I fully appreciate that God has removed my transgressions from me as far as the East is from the West (Psalm 103:12). Yet, forty years later, I still sometimes wake up in the night and I see Robert surrounded by jeering children and beating the ground, and I remember the evil that I am capable of.

Why has that one incident affected me so deeply? I believe that for one moment in my life God, as an act of grace, enabled me to see sin as He sees it. All my self justifications (the unfairness of being caned for something I hadn’t done) and my excuses (I was only eight years old) were swept away. That one single moment of clarity and understanding prepared the way in later life for the Holy Spirit to convict me of sin and to lead me to repentance. That is why I view that moment of self-awareness, as I stood stunned in front of Robert’s house, as an act of grace rather than as an act of punishment. Indeed, if I were a wiser man than I am, proper reflection on that moment would undoubtedly have spurred me on to be a much better person than I have been over the last forty years.

An Eternity of Clarity

But what if God were to enable me to see all of my life as He sees it? What if I were to have a similar revelation and understanding of every sinful deed, word or thought that I have ever committed? Such a constant self-awareness would not be a blessing, for it would render life intolerable. The continual pain and shame of such an existence would, like Therese Raquin, make me long to feel physical pain just to distract me from the reality of truly knowing myself and my sin.

Now, imagine an eternal existence where there is nothing but a similarly perfect clear understanding and memory of your sins. No flames of fire. No demons with pitchforks. Just memories that fill you with shame and hold up a never-failing mirror that reflects your own selfishness, greed and hatred. And you know that there is no prospect of redemption, no possibility of forgetfulness, and no excuse that can ever mitigate your guilt. In this eternal existence God is not punishing you, for God is nowhere to be found. You have received exactly what you asked for – to be left alone. You have received exactly what the first human beings were promised when they were first tempted to sin – your eyes have truly been opened to know good and evil (Genesis 3:5). Perfect knowledge and an eternity without God sounds like the atheist’s idea of paradise. But when that perfect knowledge includes knowing our sinful selves, then the hoped-for paradise can be seen as the deepest pit of hell, compared to which flames and fire would be a welcome relief.

Such an understanding of hell, I might add, does not deny or conflict with even the highest views of Scriptural inspiration and inerrancy. This is not some vague shadowy concept that tries to make hell seem nicer. I am suggesting that hell might, in fact, be very much worse than the traditional idea of non-stop physical flames. By this understanding the language that speaks of eternal fire is not an exaggeration. It is the best the biblical writers could do to describe something much more horrible! If you were a Jew, living thousands of years ago, then how would you describe a concept such as I have outlined in this Chapter? Given that your cultural understanding of shame was that of a condemnation that burned within your heart. Given that the greatest disgrace was to be cast out from the people of God to skulk outside the camp where the garbage was burned and human excrement was dumped. What language would you use to convey these ideas of perpetual shame and separation? You would talk about flames, about pain, and about ‘outer darkness’ where you were utterly and completely alone with no-one or nothing to distract you from yourself.

Of course such an understanding of hell is speculative. We can never be fully sure of such things this side of eternity – and no sane person will want to know and experience them on the other side of eternity! But I offer it as one suggestion of how hell can be viewed as a biblical reality, yet one that is totally just and compatible with our understanding of the love and mercy of our God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ.

In fact, the question could be not whether a just and loving God would allow such a hell to exist, but whether God can be truly loving and just without allowing people to go to such a hell! Think about it for a moment. If people truly choose to reject God, and if they really insist that they want to gain knowledge, then what could be fairer than allowing them to exist separate from God and with a full and perfect knowledge of themselves? It would be a violation of their moral freedom for God to drag them screaming and kicking into His presence when they have made it abundantly clear that they want nothing to do with God. And it would be equally wrong for God to allow them to live in some delusional state where they hide themselves from recognizing their own true natures. If we truly believe that humans are morally responsible beings with eternal souls, then it would seem perfectly fair that a loving God would allow those who reject him to exist for all eternity with a perfect knowledge of themselves.

Perhaps the only reason we see such an interpretation of hell as somehow nicer than literal fire and brimstone is because we are foolish and prideful creatures that insist on thinking of ourselves as if we were infinitely better than we really are. And that, when all is said and done, is the essence of our sinfulness which got us into this whole mess in the first place!

Let’s look at a few of Rob Bell’s other points and arguments in “Love Wins”.

Bell pokes fun at the various answers given as to just what somebody has to do to be saved.  For example, he criticises emphasising having ‘a personal relationship’ as the key to salvation, saying

“The problem is that the phrase ‘personal relationship’ is found nowhere in the Bible.  Nowhere in the Hebrew scriptures, nowhere in the New Testament.  Jesus never used the phrase.  Paul didn’t use it.  Nor did John, Peter, James, or the woman who wrote the Letter to the Hebrews.  So if that’s it, if that’s the point of it all, if that’s the ticket, the center, the one unavoidable reality, the heart of the Christian faith, why is it that no one used the phrase until the last hundred years or so?”

Of course the problem with this line of argument is obvious.  Just because a phrase doesn’t appear in Scripture, it doesn’t follow that the concept itself is unscriptural.  After all, the word Trinity is found nowhere in the Bible.  But we hold to the Trinity, don’t we?

In fact, when we look at the Bible as a whole, the motif of God’s marriage with His bride is part and parcel of both Old and New Testaments.  And, if you stop to think about it, you can’t get a much more personal relationship than a marriage.

Another argument Bell uses is to point out all the promises God makes to Israel about future restoration.  If God is all about restoration, after all, then why can’t we believe that He will one day restore everybody?  This seems to me to be a really weak argument.  The Old Testament certainly speaks much of Israel’s restoration – but it also speaks about the judgment of other nations.  God doesn’t promise restoration to the Amalekites, or to Midian – so why should we suppose that His promises of restoration are all inclusive to every individual, irrespective of whether they embrace the promises or not?

However, the biggest weakness I found in “Love Wins” is Rob Bell’s tendency to rigorously examine the traditional beliefs on Hell in the light of culture and history – yet he fails to do the same to his own beliefs.

For example, he lays great stress (in my opinion too much stress) on the idea that most of Christ’s warnings about judgment to come were about the Roman destruction of Jerusalem that would occur in 70 AD.  He warns:

“Because of this history, it’s important that we don’t take Jesus’ very real and prescient warnings about judgment then out of context, making them about someday, somewhere else.  That wasn’t what he was talking about.”

Yet, interestingly enough, he doesn’t do the same thing with all Jesus’ promises of eternal life and salvation.  For some reason the warnings are all to do with the events of 70AD, but none of the promises are about escaping the events of 70AD.  Strange that, isn’t it?

Also, as with the references to Gehenna, flames and the gnashing of teeth, Bell stresses that we should recognise these as cultural allusions to being cast into the rubbish dump – we’re not to suppose that they actually describe a reality in the future.

Yet, later in the book, he sees great significance in the description of the New Jerusalem in the Book of Revelation – particularly the detail about the gates never being shut.  He takes this to mean that people will always be free to come and go.

But, if we are as careful at recognising cultural allusions as we were with Gehenna, then we will readily understand what this means.  Cities used to shut their gates at a set time each evening to protect the inhabitants.  A city whose gates were never shut, then, was a city that dwelt in such peace and security that no attack was ever feared.  To take that, and turn it into a promise that people will keep getting extra chances after death to accept the Gospel is really a case of grasping at straws.

Similarly, Bell takes the phrase Jesus used about Capernaum in Matthew 10 where He says, “It will be more bearable for Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for you.”  This leads Bell to write:

“There’s still hope?  And if there’s still hope for Sodom and Gomorrah, what does that say about all of the other Sodoms and Gomorrahs?”

Come on!  We use phrases like that all the time.  For example, if someone says “You’d be better off dead” then does that mean we can say, “Oh death might not be too bad then?  And if death isn’t so bad then maybe other things aren’t so bad either?”  I’m sorry, that just doesn’t cut it as an argument.

Yet, in the next breath, Bell writes,

“This story, the one about Sodom and Gomorrah, isn’t the only place we find this movement from judgment to restoration, from punishment to new life.”

Hang on.  Jesus used Sodom and Gomorrah as an example of real wickedness.  The only reason he mentioned them was to say things would be even worse for Capernaum.  That’s it.  There’s no hint in that of Sodom and Gomorrah somehow shifting to restoration, let alone new life!

So, for me, Rob Bell’s arguments came across as weak and unconvincing.  I like his style, but this time the substance is lacking.

But, in one area at least, I think Bell’s points deserve closer attention.  He argues that the ideas of flame and fire were symbolic.  Now, I don’t have a problem with that idea per se.  After all, the Bible contains many symbols.  None of us take the Bible completely literally.  For example, none of us really think that Jesus was a literal vine with branches sprouting out of the top of his head.  Nor do we think Herod was a real literal fox with a red bushy tail.  So, no matter how much we claim that we believe the Bible literally, all of us recognise that at least some things are symbolic.

Jesus described hell both in terms of fire and of outer darkness.  Now that, to me, suggests that a bit of symbolism is in play here.  Fire gives light – so it seems unlikely that anyone is going to burn in literal fire and still be in literal outer darkness.

But, and I think this is a key point to grasp, symbols in the Bible are not exaggerations to scare us – like a bogey man.  If Jesus used fire as a symbol for hell, then He wasn’t saying “Ah, it’s not that bad really. Just like sitting on your own in a dark room for a while.”  The likelihood is that, if Jesus did indeed use fire as a symbol, then He was using it as a symbol for something even worse – a spiritual reality that human language can’t describe.

Tomorrow I’m going to share some suggestions of my own that might help us comprehend this spiritual reality we call hell – eternal separation from God – and how it fits in with human freedom, God’s love, and God’s justice.  This will inevitably involve much more of my own thinking and go far beyond simply reviewing “Love Wins.”

Then, on Sunday, I’ll wind this series up by looking at how all this should cause us to look at Rob Bell.

An Analysis of Rob Bell’s Arguments on Accountability and Free Will

Early on in “Love Wins” Rob Bell pokes fun at the concept of children reaching ‘an age of accountability’ when they are responsible for their actions.  Picking on the notion that this age might be at 12 years old he writes,

“What happens when a fifteen-year-old atheist dies?  Was there a three-year window when he could have made a decision to change his eternal destiny?  Did he miss his chance?  What if he had lived to sixteen, and it was in that sixteenth year that he came to believe what he was supposed to believe?  Was God limited to that three-year window, and if the message didn’t get to the young man in that time, well, that’s just unfortunate?”

The problem, of course, is that you can use this logic against any concept of a child reaching the stage where they become accountable for their actions.  So, for example, most of us think it would be wrong to treat an infant as if they were an adult in a court of law.  But they do reach a stage where they become accountable.  And quibbling over precisely when that point occurs (is it exactly on their birthday?) does not invalidate the concept.

While making the same point Bell proposes the following argument:

“If every new baby being born could grow up to not believe the right things and go to hell forever, then prematurely terminating a child’s life anytime from conception to twelve years of age would actually be the loving thing to do, guaranteeing that the child ends up in heaven, and not hell, forever.  Why run the risk?”

I’ve heard atheists arguing along similar lines, but I can’t describe how disappointed I am to see this coming from Rob Bell’s pen.  Is this a different Rob Bell from the one I’ve heard in the past?

The Rob Bell I’ve admired teaches that Christianity is about so much more than getting a trip to heaven.  He teaches that Jesus gives us what we neede to be truly human and to live life now.

Developing as a human being made in God’s image is worth any risk!  God doesn’t wrap us in cotton wool to avoid anything nasty happening to us.  This, for me, is the only possible explanation for evil in the world.  The potential of who we can become as people in Christ, people who learn to love, is worth the risk of creating a world where free will exists – a world where betrayal, torture, genocide and child abuse are very real and terrifying possibilities.

I’m a parent myself.  When I brought a daughter into the world (OK, I know, my wife Janice played a part as well ) I did it in the full knowledge that there were risks.  There was a risk that she would get sick and die. When I taught her how to ride a bike there was a risk that she would ride into the path of a truck and be killed.  When I allowed her to travel to College alone then there was a risk that she could be attacked and gang-raped.  When I tried to teach her how to live as a responsible follower of Christ there was a risk that she would reject and throw off everything I ever taught her.

Does this scare me?  Yes, sometimes it does.  Having a child is risky business – ask every parent that has ever suffered bereavement of their child if there is any heartache to match it!  But most of us still choose to have kids.  Why?  Because bringing a real, live, loving human being into the world is worth the risk.  Holding your baby in the hospital delivery room, watching her take her first steps, blowing out the candles on her birthday cake with her because she’s still to young to do it herself, proudly applauding her at her graduation, walking her up the aisle on her wedding day – even the potential of such things make every risk I;ve mentioned worthwhile.

I heard once of a father who played it safe, who kept his daughter safe and avoided all these risks.  He never let her ride a bike in traffic.  He never ran the risk of her being attacked on the way to College.  His name?  Josef Fritzl.  His twisted idea of ‘loving’ and ‘protecting’ his daughter made her a prisoner in a cellar.  He wasn’t a loving father – he was a monster.

Surely, out of all the book titles imaginable, one entitled “Love Wins” should get this truth?  And especially one written by someone like Rob Bell who has for years so eloquently stressed and taught the importance of living a life where we receive God’s love and love Him in return?  Yes, there is a terrible risk that we will misuse our freedom to self-harm rather than to return God’s love.  It is this risk that makes us children of God, rather than being his pets.  And if that risk is of a great danger, even one as terrible as an eternity of shame separated from God, then that does not diminish love – it makes it more precious!

Love Wins!  Hallelujah.  But it doesn’t win by pretending that hell doesn’t exist.  It wins by confronting the risk of hell head on – in the Person of God the Son.  Love is so important to God the Father, so much the very fabric of His being, that He created you and me with the free will to either love Him back or reject Him – even though that carried the risk of an eternal hell.  And the incredible, revolutionary, mind-blowing truth at the heart of the Gospel is that Jesus Christ, on the Cross, endured every pang and pain of an eternal hell so we could get back into that love-relationship with the Father.

When God the Father saw His Son on the Cross, the risk of love became a reality.  It was every father and every mother’s worst fears and nightmares for their children being played out in front of their eyes in graphic and gruesome slow-motion.  The Father’s heart broke (a concept so scary for us that some Christians in the 4th Century classed it as a heresy and instead proposed a bone-headed and profoundly unChristian doctrine called, heaven help us, ‘Divine Apathy’).

And yet, even as we contemplate this broken-hearted God, the Scripture still tells us, “Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush Him and cause Him to suffer.” (Isaiah 53:10).  How?  How can that ever be true?

The answer is that hell is not, in Rob Bell’s own words, a matter of God shrugging “God-sized shoulders”.  It is rather a matter of tears running down God-sized cheeks, while the omnipotent Creator of the universe looks at our baby-steps in loving Him and one another and Father and Son saying in unison “Yes!  This is worth it all.  Love wins!”

OK, it’s 1am in Ireland, and I’m getting so excited about this that I long ago moved from reviewing a book to preaching instead!  I’m going to take a break from blogging and come back to this tomorrow.  My plan of action is:

Friday – We’ll examine some of Rob Bell’s other arguments for his position on hell.

Saturday – I have a long piece ready to post (actually a Chapter for a forthcoming book) that explores the significance of the biblical imagery of flames in hell.  Is Rob Bell correct in seeing this as symbolism?  If so, then we need to ask a further question – is biblical symbolism a bogey-man exaggeration of something else in order to scare us?  Or does biblical symbolism speak of things that are to be heeded more seriously than the symbols themselves?

Sunday Night – Where does all this leave us with Rob Bell?  Since I disagree profoundly with him on some issues highlighted here, does this give me the right to glibly dismiss him with a “Good Bye, Rob Bell”?  Do we have the right to call his views heretical. or to label him a heretic?  Does it negate what he has done for the cause of Christ up till now?  Or does the Cross of Christ point us to a better approach?

So What Does Rob Bell Believe?

As I mentioned in my last post, Rob Bell tends to make thought provoking statements without pinning himself down to too many definitive statements of what he does and doesn’t believe.  This has, in the past, provoked considerable anger and frustration from other evangelicals.  We belong to a section of Christianity where, in order to satisy other’s concerns about your orthodoxy,  you have to not only state what you do believe – but also distance yourself from all the possible errors that you don’t believe!

In “Love Wins” Bell asks some questions without actually giving an answer.  But the way the questions are phrased leave little doubt as to where his own beliefs lie.  For example:

“Of all the billions of people who have ever lived, will only a select number ‘make it to a better place’ and every single other person suffer in torment and punishment forever? Is this acceptable to God? Has God created millions of people over tens of thousands of years who are going to spend eternity in anguish? Can God do this, or even allow this, and still claim to be a loving God?”

“Does God punish people for thousands of years with infinite, eternal torment for things they did in their few finite years of life?”

At other points Bell stops asking questions and makes his own opinions abundantly clear:

“A staggering number of people have been taught that a select few Christians will spend forever in a peaceful, joyous place called heaven, while the rest of humanity spends forever in torment and punishment in hell with no chance for anything better…. This is misguided and toxic and ultimately subverts the contagious spread of Jesus’ message of love, peace, forgiveness, and joy that our world desperately needs to hear.”

Some reviewers of “Love Wins” have made the mistake of being over-simplistic.  To listen to them there are only two options.  You either believe a or b:

a) That only Christians who have consciously received the Gospel go to heaven, and everybody else goes to hell.

b) That everybody ultimately goes to heaven and no-one spends eternity in hell.

However, in reality there a number of different beliefs between these two extremes.  These include (on a sliding scale of exclusivity – inclusivity):

1.  Only Christians who have consciously received the Gospel go to heaven, and everybody else goes to hell.

2. Christians who have consciously received the Gospel go to heaven, but Jewish believers such as Abraham are included too by believing the promises of the Messiah to come. Everybody else goes to hell.

3. Christians, those like Abraham who lived before the Cross but trusted God’s Promises, and young children who die before reaching the age of knowing right from wrong all go to heaven.  Everybody else goes to hell.

4. All those mentioned so far, plus people who never got to hear the Gospel in this life go to heaven.  Everybody else goes to hell.

5. Not only do all those mentioned so far get to heaven.  But even those who rejected the Gospel get a second chance after death.  Not all of them will take this chance – but some do.

6. Everybody gets not only a second chance, but also an infinite number of chances to accept the Gospel.  Sooner or later they will accept one of these opportunities – so ultimately everybody gets saved.  This view was advanced by Origen, one of the earlky Church Fathers.  (Before anybody gets too convinced by the fact that one of the Church Fathers backed this view – don’t forget that Origen was also the guy who castrated himself to avoid temptations of lust.  So you probably don’t want to agree with him on everything!!)

To avoid complicating matters too much I am ignoring those positions that argue for the wicked being annihilated rather than enduring conscious punishment.

To be honest, I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of Christians I’ve met who believed in Option 1.  Yet this is the view that Bell sometimes presents as the position which he is opposing.  This, once again, strikes me as being a bit of a lazy strawman that is easy to argue against.

Most Christians I know would embrace one of positions 2, 3 or 4.  They envisage a heaven populated by Christians, believing Jews who lived BC, and young children who died in infancy.  A good number of Christians are also open to the possibility that they will be joined by non-Christians who responded to what they knew of God, but were never presented with the Gospel.

Bell’s statements in “Love Wins” lead me to believe that he embraces either position 5 or 6.

Sometimes he seems to veer towards the view that there are people whose adherence to wickedness is so great that they will forever remain in darkness.  So:

“There is hell now, and there is hell later, and Jesus teaches us to take both seriously.”

“So will those who have said no to God’s love in this life continue to say no in the next?  Love demands freedom, and freedom provides that possibility.  People take that option now, and we can assume it will be taken in the future.”

At other times he appears to be arguing that ultimately everybody will be saved.  For example:

“Will all people be saved, or will God not get what God wants?  Does this magnificent, mighty, marvelous God fail in the end?”

“Will God, in the end, settle, saying: Well I tried, I gave it my best shot, and sometimes you just have to be okay with failure?  Will God shrug God-sized shoulders and say, You can’t always get what you want?”

So it is unclear exactly which position Bell is taking – but either way it is certainly much more inclusive than that held by most evangelical Christians.  I personally suspect that he is trying to go for position 5, but that his eagerness to justify this is so strong that he seizes on any argument that supports his case.  And, if you follow these arguments to their logical conclusions, then they lead to position 6 (where everyone winds up getting saved) rather than position 5.

It is this eagerness to seize on any argument he can which, in my opinion, is the fatal flaw in Bell’s book.  Many of his arguments are rather weak and, when subjected to the same rigor he applies to his opponents, cannot stand up to scrutiny.

My work schedule is lighter than usual tomorrow, so hopefully I can post the final part of this book review tomorrow night.  In it we will look closer at some of the arguments Rob Bell uses to support his position.  We will also ask how much it really matters.  Are such views really sufficient, even if wrong, to label someone a heretic?