Bell, Rob. Rob Bell is the founder and former teaching pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church in the United States, is a leading teacher in the Emerging Church movement, and has made a series of videos titled Nooma. He is presently working on a television series. His book Velvet Elvis is included in Dr Norman Geisler's list of Emerging Church literature. Rob Bell is a false teacher and his theology, while giving lip service to Christian doctrine, is sufficiently flawed for it to actually be regarded as non-Christian. For example, he rejects the necessity of the Trinity or the need for Jesus to be born of a virgin (although he claims to affirm that it happened). While he has claimed to affirm the Nicene Creed, one of his basic ideas is that Christianity should not depend on any fundamentals – anything that would cause Christianity to fall if they were proven to be wrong, such as the Trinity and the virgin birth of Christ. On that subject he writes:

[Without the virgin birth] is the way of Jesus still the best possible way to live? Or does the whole thing fall apart?

He answers his own questions; referring to a trampoline analogy:

Yes, of course you can keep jumping, even if you stop believing in the Trinity or the Virgin Birth.

It's important to recognise that Rob Bell's "the way of Jesus" is not the biblical gospel message that we are all sinners with a need for repentance, and salvation from our sin made possible only by a saviour born without sin (necessarily of a virgin birth) who died in our place and was physically raised from the dead. Not for Rob Bell orthodox theology; he acknowledges the empty tomb, but doesn't believe in a physical resurrection, as Ken Silva writes:

And as you’ll hear Bell himself say, for him it was a Jesus resurrected with an incorporeal spiritual body; and that’s really not too much unlike that taught by the Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Instead of the biblical gospel message, Rob Bell teaches a worldview in which sin is replaced by social and political (not religious) oppression, and we aspire to liberty from that oppression. With that worldview, it is not surprising that he may also reject the essential Christian doctrine that Jesus is the only way to God the Father, apparently believing in pluralism – that all religions are valid (although he possibly believes they are not necessarily of equal effectiveness, since he has called Christ's way "the best possible way to live" – but note again that he believes "Christ's way" is something other than the biblical gospel message).

I am far more interested in jumping than I am in arguing about whose trampoline is better.

And also:

One of the lies is that truth only resides in this particular community or that particular thought system. I affirm the truth anywhere in any religious system, in any worldview. If it’s true, it belongs to God.

Now, living our faith and social action are good and the Bible instructs us to engage in them. However, they are not enough for salvation. Works are just as insufficient for salvation as feelings are. Read Feelings – Why subjective experiences are not enough to base one's salvation on in the Cult FAQ for an explanation. In promoting what we do over what we believe, Rob Bell teaches a works-based theology. Also, he teaches (also pointed out by Dr Norman Geisler) an opt-out form of universalism, where everyone is automatically saved unless they decide they don't want to be.

So this is reality, this forgiveness, this reconciliation, is true for everybody. Paul insisted that when Jesus died on the cross, he was reconciling “all things, in heaven and on earth, to God.” All things, everywhere.

This reality then isn’t something we make come true about ourselves by doing something. It is already true. Our choice is to live in this new reality or cling to a reality of our own making.

Correct Christian doctrine is that forgiveness is available for all, not true for all. Rob Bell has expressed skepticism of people who believe in a literal hell and teaches that Jesus believed hell was only a present reality – hell on earth. Other comments he has made about hell only make sense in the light of this view.

Heaven is full of forgiven people. Hell is full of forgiven people.

As with Brian McLaren, Rob Bell supports the teachings of radical theological liberal ("Progressive" Christian) Marcus Borg, John Dominic Crossan (the former co-director of the Jesus Seminar) and Ken Wilbur (who teaches cosmic consciousness). Patrick Abendroth of Omaha Bible Church has this to say of Rob Bell:

Simply put, Rob Bell is a theological liberal resembling the mainline denominations of the early 1900s. The difference is that Bell is sporting a fashionable new dress or in his case, a new pair of geek-chic glasses.

If J. Gresham Machen were alive today, I suspect he would do what he did with Bell’s theological predecessors. Machen would remind him that while he has the freedom to start a new religion, he really should call it something other than Christian given that his religion does not resemble what Christ actually established as recorded in the Christian book, the Bible.

But perhaps we shouldn't be surprised that Rob Bell's gospel doesn't resemble Christ's teachings, as Rob Bell doesn't even believe the Bible is the divinely inspired Word of God.

[The Bible is a] human product... rather than the product of divine fiat.

This review of Rob Bell's book Velvet Elvis looks at some of his incorrect theology and its consequences. If a person relied only on Rob Bell's teachings he or she would never hear a full gospel message and would probably never come to a saving knowledge of what Christ did for them on the Cross. Out of the six essentials of Christianity, Rob Bell either denies or rejects as being essential all of them (except possibly that Jesus was God in human form). Reviewing Rob Bell's Nooma video Love Wins, Todd Friel says:

This [Rob Bell] is another fellow who doesn't understand the gospel. I'm not kidding. He doesn't understand the gospel. He doesn't understand propitiation, he doesn't understand justification. Or if he does, he's clearly rejecting it.

The false and confusing teachings of Rob Bell and of those he supports (including emerging church proponent Brian McLaren, who has criticised Christians who believe in a literal return of Christ) firmly earn Rob Bell a Danger rating.

	Danger: The group/person or belief/practice is considered dangerous due to mind control or particularly bad doctrine. These groups (or people) have a strong tendency to damage their members/followers.
	Hot Topic: The group/person or belief/practice has recently featured in the secular news media, has generated notable correspondence, is a popular conversation topic, etc. Note that this rating has nothing to do with the "cultishness" of a group.

Printed on 20 January 2021 at www.cults.co.nz.
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