Last night I went to see Rob Bell at the Vic Theatre in Chicago. The line was around the block to the sold out show.
The stage was set up with a rather large alter in the middle. Rob Bell hopped out a few minutes after 8 looking a bit waffy with a shaved head. He started by telling a story of primitive people and how they might have related their internal feelings and external enviroment to a sense of god and then ritual. It was interesting. ]
The things I got out of the night that stuck with me where:
- Maybe Abraham sacrificing his son was about his faith but about God providing (in this case a ram to sacrifice).
- Abraham brought an incredible new religion because it was a god who cared and wasn't always pissed off.
- Jesus was even crazier because he said we don't need this alter. I am the alter and the sacrifice. The sacrifice is complete in me.
- God doesn't want inhuman sacrifice for the sake of just giving more but he wants life to be a celebration of God in everything we do (still working through some of this).
It was great stuff. Hopefully I can get some of his old tours on dvd and It seems that by searching the google I can.
If you haven't read them I would highly recommend:
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Rob Bell: The God's Aren't Angry Tour
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6 comments:
www.everythingisspiritual.com
I think about Abraham often. God is preaching Jesus Christ to us far before we knew anything. Abraham is like the Father sacrificing Isaac like God does with Jesus. The ram is the propitiation of Jesus Christ. Jesus confirms this in Luke 24 that it was all about him.
Abraham had no idea what he was doing, he just walked in the steps God had for him, starting in the land of UR for hundreds of miles into Canaan. A mysterious character.
Rob Bell has doubts about the reliability of scripture and puts more emphasis on experience. He has some serious doubts about whether things happened the way they were recorded in scripture. Jesus is quoted in all three synoptics of saying: For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.
So I have mixed feelings about Rob Bell, and although he may say valuable things to some people, ultimately I take him with a grain of salt. :)
havenofbliss.com
Rob Bell never says that he doubts the validity or reliability of scripture!?!?!?!?!! He did a study on the canonicity (or the law that was used to chose the books that went in to the Bible) of the Bible and is totally convinced that the Bible is the true word of God. I don't know where you got that but it's wrong. I know he puts forth a lot of things that are different from what we usually are used to saying, but that just means he is understanding the Bible in his own walk with God and teaching it to anyone who wants to hear. He fully believes in everything the Bible teaches and I press on you to try and find anything recorded that (in context) says he doesn't.
Bell uses many scriptures and is great at giving background information and history on it but, he does stray from scripture sometimes and he speaks more off of his own thoughts and what he has learned from outside sources. This is not necessarily wrong but its not all that right either. In his new dvd he speaks about cavemen and cavewomen as if they were real but in no scripture do you ever see evidence of this, many of the people in the bible were in some senses nomads but they weren't cavemen. I wish he would've spoke about adam and eve instead of cavemen, because if you look at adam and eve you can see that God wasn't angry with humans but he was dissappointed Genesis ch. 6 God regrets even created humans...so there is alot of controversy in all of his new dvd.
So... I just watched the Rob Bell DVD of "The God's Aren't Angry". I have a few questions:
1. So God is not angry with my sin?
2. Sacrifice is a man made institution?
3. Jesus died so that I can feel good about myself, just to appease my conscience?
4. Repentance is just a “celebration” of life, and not a turning away from sin?
5. What is so revolutionary about Judaism if all you’re doing is sacrificing the same way that the pagans do? Even down to human sacrifice (Jesus). Is the only difference that you get to feel good about yourself? So, God tells Abraham not to sacrifice his son because that’s what the pagans do. Instead he provides a ram and has him sacrifice that… just like the pagans do. Only to, thousands of years later, offer a human sacrifice… just like the pagans do. I’m not seeing the revolution.
6. What is the point of the Resurrection? And why does he never mention it?
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