quote:

ORIGINAL: GroupW

quote:

ORIGINAL: earthless

quote:

ORIGINAL: GroupW

Thanks! Wish I could look at them - my computer doesn't like YouTube apparently.

Wow, how old is your PC?

It's a work 'puter. Left my regular laptop at home today so I can't use it. I get corporate nasty-grams when I click on the links.

quote:

At 28, he founded a megachurch that threw out the conventional sermon-and-worship service and instantly drew thousands of attendees. He has sold hundreds of thousands of books with titles like Velvet Elvis and Sex God that find the sacred in the profane.

quote:

Bell comes of faithful stock: his parents met at Wheaton College, known as the Evangelical Harvard. But his first ambition was to be David Letterman. ("The birth of irony," he jokes. "The Betamax was a portal to another world.") Next came rock. As a student at Wheaton, he fronted a band that seemed poised to break nationally. When it didn't, he attended Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif., and apprenticed at a megachurch before founding Mars Hill just outside Grand Rapids. The town is notoriously well churched, but Bell saw an untapped audience: some were his music fans, others Christians left cold by traditional services. "A hundred people a day were calling and saying, 'Dude! Give us the real thing.' I was like, If someone could speak to these people in their mother tongue, they'd be here in droves." Fifteen hundred people, alerted by word of mouth, came that first Sunday. Nine years later, Mars Hill tallies 11,000 weekly.

quote:

Bell is currently on tour promoting his second book, Sex God, due in March. His first, Velvet Elvis, became a best seller. It also caused quite a stir when he seemed to question the virgin birth by saying that in the Hebrew language, the phrase "born of a virgin" also refers to "a child whose mother became pregnant the first time she had intercourse".

quote:

When asked about homosexuality, Witherington describes Bell's response as evasive, disturbing and unbiblical.

Here are some bulleted excerpts from Witherington's blog about Bell's answers:

* First of all, Rob made the blanket statement that you have no moral authority to speak on this issue unless you have gay friends and understand their struggle.
* Secondly, Rob then makes an argument from silence which is in fact misleading. The argument is this -- "Jesus never said anything about homosexuality".
* Rob then raises the issue of hypocrisy.... that all sexual sin should be taken equally ...
* Rob then raises the point that the Bible says nothing about sexual orientation.

quote:

I do not want to let my disagreement with Rob on some issues overshadow the fact that I think in many ways God is using him for good to reach young people. It is clear he deeply loves God and is striving to please God and help many people connect with Jesus. I am grateful for this.

But since God has provided him with such a forum, he must be all the more careful to speak in a way that honors what the Bible has to say about important subjects, and be clear about what it says, even if at present he finds it hard to accept. He needs to commit himself to studying more carefully the Bible in its proper contexts so that he will avoid needless off hand comments that reflect a lack of understanding of God's Word. And above all he must not fall into the trap of so identifying with the culture he is trying to reach, that instead of actually critiquing that culture from a Biblical point of view, he baptizes certain prevailing cultural values and calls them good, and even mistakes them for Biblical values.

quote:

In fact, in "A Generous Orthodoxy" he concretely affirms that the evangelical understanding of salvation is indeed accurate, but also that our understanding of salvation can be made more complete if we incorporate ideas from some of the other traditions (eastern orthodoxy, roman catholicism, etc) that have had something to say on the topic.

quote:

"I can't find one place in the teachings of Jesus, or the Bible for that matter, where we are to identify ourselves first and foremost as sinners. Now this doesn't mean we don't sin; that's obvious. In the book of James it's written like this: 'We all stumble in many ways.' Once again, the greatest truth of the story of Adam and Eve isn't that it happened, but that it happens."
- Velvet Elvis, p. 139

quote:

"What if tomorrow someone digs up definitive proof that Jesus had a real, earthly, biological father named Larry, and archeologists find Larry’s tomb and do DNA samples and prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the virgin birth was really just a bit of mythologizing the Gospel writers threw in to appeal to the followers of the Mithra and Dionysian religious cults that were hugely popular at the time of Jesus, whose gods had virgin births?

But what if, as you study the origin of the word “virgin” you discover that the word “virgin” in the gospel of Matthew actually comes from the book of Isaiah, and then you find out that in the Hebrew language at that time, the word “virgin” could mean several things. And what if you discover that in the first century being “born of a virgin” also referred to a child whose mother became pregnant the first time she had intercourse?"
-Velvet Elvis, p. 26

quote:

I’ve been told I need to believe in Jesus. Which is a good thing. But what I’m learning is that Jesus believes in me....God has faith in me.”
-Velvet Elvis, pp. 133-134

quote:

ORIGINAL: GroupW

No offense meant by this, but I think that last quote is taking McLaren way, way out of context. Haven't read that section yet but in what I'm currently reading, he makes use of similar "weakness" imagery in dealing with salvation and the cross. The cross, he says, was a Roman symbol of strength. (As in, "look what I can do to you if you cross me." )

In showing their strength, and by crucifying Christ in his supposed weakness, the powers that be lose and are proven themselves to be weak - weaker than God's kingdom by many orders of magnitude.

This turning of weakness into strength, again, is an extremely orthodox stream of thought. I haven't read the book you quote, but I'm having a hard time thinking that it's as incriminating as you indicate based on what I'm seeing in "A Generous Orthodoxy". Again, I think you have to get past the inflammatory language and understand the point he's trying to make there.

quote:

Bell and Bultmann

Rob Bell repaints the attacks on the Christian faith by German liberal theologians and their subsequent followers. He embraces a liberal world-view that denied the virgin birth because of a faulty view of the relationship between science and scripture. Rudolph Bultmann was the one of the most famous of these men. Bultmann claimed the job of modern (late 19th, early 20th century) theologians was to demythologize the gospels so the Christian faith could be relevant to our culture and learn how to live like Jesus. Living like Christ was important but doctrine was not.

Rob Bell repaints these false teachings of historic liberal theology. He consciously uses liberal theologians' own words.10 He declares historic liberal theology to be a part of the Christian tradition he embraces. He is certainly aware of this historic attack on the Christian faith. His response is to accept liberalism as a part of the historic Christian faith rather than expose and condemn its errors. Rob Bell is a part of the historic liberal tradition rather than the historic tradition of the Christian faith.

quote:

I've only recently seen a portion of one of his videos.

I wondered if anyone knew anything about him and the rest of his theology.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lapidoth

quote:

Bell and Bultmann

Rob Bell repaints the attacks on the Christian faith by German liberal theologians and their subsequent followers. He embraces a liberal world-view that denied the virgin birth because of a faulty view of the relationship between science and scripture. Rudolph Bultmann was the one of the most famous of these men. Bultmann claimed the job of modern (late 19th, early 20th century) theologians was to demythologize the gospels so the Christian faith could be relevant to our culture and learn how to live like Jesus. Living like Christ was important but doctrine was not.

Rob Bell repaints these false teachings of historic liberal theology. He consciously uses liberal theologians' own words.10 He declares historic liberal theology to be a part of the Christian tradition he embraces. He is certainly aware of this historic attack on the Christian faith. His response is to accept liberalism as a part of the historic Christian faith rather than expose and condemn its errors. Rob Bell is a part of the historic liberal tradition rather than the historic tradition of the Christian faith.

LINK

quote:

ORIGINAL: mushhead

quote:

"This is the scandal of the message of Jesus. The kingdom of God does fail. It is weak. Is is crushed...Looking back on Jesus and his message, Paul spoke of the Cross as the weakness and foolishness of God (1Cor. 1:18-25)...Somehow for him, the defeat of Christ on that Roman cross..." (McLaren; The Secret Message of Jesus; pg. 69-71)

quote:

ORIGINAL: doinkdom

I'm fighting a computer virus so not sure how long I'll be here...only to say I have not read this thread other than the OP.

I have always been a Rob Bell Nooma video fan. They're wonderful for discussion and ice breakers, etc.

However the latest one titled "She" could be a deal breaker for me. I'm still thinking about it.

We will continue to use all the previous ones in group studies, etc. but Rob recently advocated women elders and now this new video is out that actually does a fairly poor job on the subject.

So...love the other Noomas, but this one might the exception.

quote:

ORIGINAL: mushhead
(Rob Bell; Christianity Today interview; Bell interview)

quote:

ORIGINAL: crankius
I bought Velvet Elvis today. I'll give my opinion as I am reading for everyone's entertainment.

quote:

ORIGINAL: GroupW
The good news - I can count on you for some great ideas & commentary.