“Christ Alone”– First Book about Rob Bell’s “Love Wins”
Justin Bond Filed Under: Labels: Book Reviews, Love Wins, Michael Horton, Mike Wittmer, Rob Bell
As most of you who have been reading my blog you have seen a lot of talk about Rob Bell's new controversial book Love Wins. Not long after Rob Bell published his book, Mike Wittmer was quick to defend a biblical orthodox view concerning Rob Bells New Book. With a preface from Micheal Horton, this looks like a very interesting read. You can purchase the book here and in the mean time here is Micheal Horton's preface to the book Christ Alone!
Hell has had a surprisingly prominent place in the popular imagination of cultures and religions around the world. In Christianity, too, writers and painters have produced speculative travelogues of the place of everlasting judgment. The biblical references are frightening enough, but in the vividly detailed imagery of Dante, Hieronymus Bosch, and Billy Sunday, there is a strange fascination with hell.
Hell has never functioned as a central dogma in historic Christianity. While acknowledging that everlasting punishment is clearly taught in Scripture, most Christians would say that it’s not their favorite subject. Yet the reality of hell is one of those convictions that are inseparable from a wider web of beliefs. Not all rejections of hell follow the same logic, but they all challenge orthodox views concerning God’s attributes, the person and work of Christ, and sin and redemption. And the version with the longest pedigree can be traced from Origen in the early third century to Schleiermacher (1768–1834) and his theological heirs. It’s a trajectory best summarized in H. Richard Niebuhr’s classic description of Protestant liberalism: “A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross” (Niebuhr, 1959, p. 193).
Taking for granted that Christians today know the grammar, much less the logic, of Christian faith, we now have a generation that questions its premises and conclusions. It’s neither pastorally responsible nor persuasive to dismiss these questions simply by invoking settled dogmas. We have to return to the Scriptures, examining the relevant passages for ourselves, in order to join the orthodox consensus as participants rather than mere spectators.
Rob Bell’s Love Wins has sparked remarkable controversy. Of course, he’s not the first evangelical to have challenged traditional Christian teaching on hell. Nevertheless, for a variety of reasons—not the least being his knack at popular communication—his book has attracted media hype as well as stern dismissals.
That’s exactly why I’m delighted with Michael Wittmer’s Christ Alone: An Evangelical Response to Rob Bell’s “Love Wins.” The current controversy will fade away as quickly as it burst on the scene, but the widespread doubts to which Bell gave voice are deeper and wider than we probably imagine. So in a sense, he gave us a wake-up call and Michael Wittmer has answered it. Although he engages with Love Wins directly, Wittmer’s case is just as relevant for the many other expressions of Bell’s thesis that we are sure to encounter in coming years.
Offering more light than heat, Christ Alone appreciates the attractiveness of Bell’s questions and conclusions. Avoiding caricature and personal attack, he carefully evaluates Bell’s interpretations of Scripture. It’s not a careless diatribe against a book, but filled with pastoral wisdom for perennial questions. For example, he does not offer easy answers to the problem of evil: “Better to believe that God is all-powerful and all-loving and wrestle with evil than to weaken one aspect of God to make room for evil” (p. 14). Wittmer shares Bell’s critique of “Platonized” versions of heaven. Yet here, as elsewhere, Wittmer points beyond false choices to a lush biblical landscape.
A close and sympathetic reader, Wittmer explains the senses in which Rob Bell’s argument is and isn’t universalist and how he follows Origen (emphasizing the human will) over Barth (emphasizing divine grace) in his account. Along the way, Christ Alone is peppered with thought-provoking statements. If Bell’s account of God, sin, and salvation is accurate, then what makes the gospel surprising?
Something more than what the average pagan already believes? Furthermore, “Why would a God who ‘loves’ enough to empty hell want to frighten people now with numerous warnings that sound like hell lasts forever?” (p. 22). Wouldn’t that be a kind of sadistic deity, if in fact he has no intention of actually doing what he warns us about? Yet the chief insights of the book are found in Wittmer’s careful and simple (though not simplistic) interpretation of the relevant passages in Scripture.
A good critique must be charitable as well as corrective. The views of others must be represented fairly, in terms that the other person would recognize as his or her own. Such opposing views must be stated in terms of what the proponent actually says, and not in terms of what one thinks they must say even thought they don’t. Further, a good critique targets the actual content of the arguments that are public, not personal character and motives that remain hidden. Finally, a good critique not only tears down bad arguments, but builds a positive case. On all of these points, Christ Alone scores high marks, in my view. So let’s avoid hand-wringing lamentations and follow Michael Wittmer’s lead, making the most of the current controversy to deepen our own understanding of what we believe and why we believe it.
Michael S. Horton, Ph.D.
J. Gresham Machen Professor of Systematic Theology and Apologetics, Westminster Seminary California
http://www.christalonebook.com/preface/
Hell has had a surprisingly prominent place in the popular imagination of cultures and religions around the world. In Christianity, too, writers and painters have produced speculative travelogues of the place of everlasting judgment. The biblical references are frightening enough, but in the vividly detailed imagery of Dante, Hieronymus Bosch, and Billy Sunday, there is a strange fascination with hell.
Hell has never functioned as a central dogma in historic Christianity. While acknowledging that everlasting punishment is clearly taught in Scripture, most Christians would say that it’s not their favorite subject. Yet the reality of hell is one of those convictions that are inseparable from a wider web of beliefs. Not all rejections of hell follow the same logic, but they all challenge orthodox views concerning God’s attributes, the person and work of Christ, and sin and redemption. And the version with the longest pedigree can be traced from Origen in the early third century to Schleiermacher (1768–1834) and his theological heirs. It’s a trajectory best summarized in H. Richard Niebuhr’s classic description of Protestant liberalism: “A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross” (Niebuhr, 1959, p. 193).
Taking for granted that Christians today know the grammar, much less the logic, of Christian faith, we now have a generation that questions its premises and conclusions. It’s neither pastorally responsible nor persuasive to dismiss these questions simply by invoking settled dogmas. We have to return to the Scriptures, examining the relevant passages for ourselves, in order to join the orthodox consensus as participants rather than mere spectators.
Rob Bell’s Love Wins has sparked remarkable controversy. Of course, he’s not the first evangelical to have challenged traditional Christian teaching on hell. Nevertheless, for a variety of reasons—not the least being his knack at popular communication—his book has attracted media hype as well as stern dismissals.
That’s exactly why I’m delighted with Michael Wittmer’s Christ Alone: An Evangelical Response to Rob Bell’s “Love Wins.” The current controversy will fade away as quickly as it burst on the scene, but the widespread doubts to which Bell gave voice are deeper and wider than we probably imagine. So in a sense, he gave us a wake-up call and Michael Wittmer has answered it. Although he engages with Love Wins directly, Wittmer’s case is just as relevant for the many other expressions of Bell’s thesis that we are sure to encounter in coming years.
Offering more light than heat, Christ Alone appreciates the attractiveness of Bell’s questions and conclusions. Avoiding caricature and personal attack, he carefully evaluates Bell’s interpretations of Scripture. It’s not a careless diatribe against a book, but filled with pastoral wisdom for perennial questions. For example, he does not offer easy answers to the problem of evil: “Better to believe that God is all-powerful and all-loving and wrestle with evil than to weaken one aspect of God to make room for evil” (p. 14). Wittmer shares Bell’s critique of “Platonized” versions of heaven. Yet here, as elsewhere, Wittmer points beyond false choices to a lush biblical landscape.
A close and sympathetic reader, Wittmer explains the senses in which Rob Bell’s argument is and isn’t universalist and how he follows Origen (emphasizing the human will) over Barth (emphasizing divine grace) in his account. Along the way, Christ Alone is peppered with thought-provoking statements. If Bell’s account of God, sin, and salvation is accurate, then what makes the gospel surprising?
Something more than what the average pagan already believes? Furthermore, “Why would a God who ‘loves’ enough to empty hell want to frighten people now with numerous warnings that sound like hell lasts forever?” (p. 22). Wouldn’t that be a kind of sadistic deity, if in fact he has no intention of actually doing what he warns us about? Yet the chief insights of the book are found in Wittmer’s careful and simple (though not simplistic) interpretation of the relevant passages in Scripture.
A good critique must be charitable as well as corrective. The views of others must be represented fairly, in terms that the other person would recognize as his or her own. Such opposing views must be stated in terms of what the proponent actually says, and not in terms of what one thinks they must say even thought they don’t. Further, a good critique targets the actual content of the arguments that are public, not personal character and motives that remain hidden. Finally, a good critique not only tears down bad arguments, but builds a positive case. On all of these points, Christ Alone scores high marks, in my view. So let’s avoid hand-wringing lamentations and follow Michael Wittmer’s lead, making the most of the current controversy to deepen our own understanding of what we believe and why we believe it.
Michael S. Horton, Ph.D.
J. Gresham Machen Professor of Systematic Theology and Apologetics, Westminster Seminary California
http://www.christalonebook.com/preface/
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