There have been quite a few well-known Christian leaders taking a swing at Rob Bell’s latest book, Love Wins. Probably the article I see getting the most circulation is Al Mohler’s article, “We Have Seen All This Before: Rob Bell and the (Re)Emergence of Liberal Theology.”
While most of what Mohler said came as no surprise, one paragraph in particular actually shocked me initially:
“Like so many others, Bell wants to separate the message of Jesus from other voices even in the New Testament, particularly the voice of the Apostle Paul. Here we face the inescapable question of biblical authority. We will either affirm that every word of the Bible is true, trustworthy, and authoritative, or we will create our own Bible according to our own preferences. Put bluntly, if Jesus and Paul are not telling the same story, we have no idea what the true story is.” (emphasis mine)
My initial thought was, Wait a minute, Mohler can’t really be saying that if he was forced to choose between Paul and Jesus, he wouldn’t know who he’d choose, would he? If I was forced to make that choice, then it is obvious and easy. I’d choose Jesus. You know, the guy who is God, and came to save the world from their sin? Yeah, that guy. Paul’s great and all, but he would be the first to say (and did say) that he doesn’t hold a match to Jesus. It seems like an obvious answer to an easy question, so Mohler couldn’t really be saying that he wouldn’t be able to choose which of their stories to accept if he had to, could he?
But then I realized that this is exactly what Al Mohler is saying. He is quite clearly saying here, and makes no apologies about it, that if someone were to genuinely convince him that there were unresolvable conflicts in the Bible, he would be completely lost. Al Mohler puts the authority of scripture as the foundation of his faith as a Christian, and is quite eager to let people know.
And putting the authority of scripture as our foundation would make sense, I suppose, if we were “Biblians”. But we’re Christians, and that means that Christ must be the foundation of our faith. We don’t follow the Bible – we use the Bible as a means to following Jesus. We as Christians should not believe Jesus is Lord because the Bible is authoritative, we believe the Bible is authoritative because Jesus is Lord and he believes the Bible is authoritative.
By placing scripture (or perhaps, more aptly, our interpretation of scripture) as our foundation, we end up building a theological house of cards, where our faith in Jesus is built on top of many various doctrines, and if any one of them falls over, our faith in Jesus does as well.
Rob Bell address this idea as well, in his book Velvet Elvis. He gives the example of the virgin birth, and how, although it is an important doctrine that he affirms, if we were to discover incontrovertible proof that the virgin birth wasn’t true, that our faith should start with Jesus, and that this news should not crush our faith. Mark Driscoll took particular exception to this idea. He responds to it in his book, Vintage Jesus, but you can read the specific response online here. His response is quite clear. He states that the virgin birth is foundational to his faith, and then lists 4 reasons why. He essentially says, You don’t think it would crush my faith to find out the virgin birth is false? Of course it would! It is one of my foundational cards, and here are 4 other cards that rest on top of it. Driscoll shows here that he doesn’t understand Bell’s point and then simultaneously proves it, by showing how his own faith is a house of cards where if you take out one piece, it all falls apart.
By not putting Jesus as our foundation, we set ourselves up for failure. By making our faith in him conditional on other doctrines or ideas, we are setting those ideas before him, and scripture itself states that we should not put anything before God.
The point here isn’t to point fingers at Al Mohler or Mark Driscoll. We all, including myself, are often putting things before God. The Bible has a word for it – idolatry. Some would say that any sin ultimately comes to idolatry – putting something in front of God, even if it’s simply our own desires. Also, this theological house of cards isn’t an issue exclusive to conservatives. Liberals have their own version, where they see Jesus’ precarious position in their theology, and so to compensate, they take away things from Jesus, such as his divinity, or the resurrection, so as to hedge their bets in case their card house tumbles.
There are other things at stake though than just the balance of our faith. Our interpretation of scripture begins to change once we put Jesus right in the centre of our faith where he belongs. When we put the authority of scripture at the centre, then when we see Paul and Jesus talking about the same topic from slightly different perspectives, we just mash their ideas together, as if we’re making a cake and it calls for “equal parts Paul and Jesus.” But when we put Jesus at the centre, we view what Paul says through the eyes of Jesus – we read Paul’s words in the context of Jesus’ teachings. We should do this for all of scripture. We do not read about Jesus and see how we can fit him in and amongst the rest of scripture; we read all of scripture and view it in light of Jesus, with an understanding that Jesus is the truest revelation of who God is.
We can see that the authors of the New Testament take this approach. The writer of Hebrews starts off their letter by taking the creation story, and affirming that Jesus was there in it, that the universe was created through Jesus. The letter continues by stating that Jesus is, “the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being.” God is perfectly represented in Jesus, so we must view all of what scripture says about God through the lens of Jesus. We see this same trend in 1 Corinthians 10, where Paul states that when Moses struck the rock and it produced water, “the rock was Christ.” Here we see again, that Jesus is the foundation for Paul’s faith, and he reads his scripture in light of that, rather than the other way around.
Should we affirm the authority of scripture? Yes, we most certainly should. But it is because we have put our faith in Jesus, and Jesus takes scripture seriously, so we take it seriously too. Scripture is wonderful, and I affirm that it is “God-breathed”, but we should never put the creation ahead of its creator. We must affirm that, above all else, Jesus is Lord.
Hidden Irony 
Mar 24, 2011 @ 08:27:46
agree.
My view is that the bible is not God. The Word is not the Bible [Jesus is]
The Bible may be inspired by Holy Spirit [and so was Mozart] but still tainted by the non-god side [human]
Mar 24, 2011 @ 09:20:22
Thanks for your thoughts Gary, and a good clarification on what the “Word” means.
While what “inspired” means is an interesting question, I do want to clarify that I’m not making any particular claims about the Bible being tainted, or what the definition of “God-breathed” is. I think even if we agree with Al Mohler’s view of the Bible being inspired and inerrant (and agree on his definitions for those terms), we still must recognize that it is a creation that comes behind the creator, and we must put our faith first and foremost on Jesus, and on scripture second.
Mar 30, 2011 @ 10:01:25
James,
The SBC, particularly since the “Mohler era” begun (luckily AFTER I was gone from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary …MDiv 1981), has long had a problem with “Bibiolatry”. Equating Scripture with the God to whom it bears witness. The further problem is that the “Scripture” is not only what “God has set forth”, but inevitably confused with what Mohler would set forth. Duke McCall, at the height of the “Bible controversy” in 1981, said in a chapel address with WA Criswell, JamesRoberson, and Adrien Rogers present: “God forbid that we confuse that ‘Word of God’ with our appropriation of it”
Dale
Mar 30, 2011 @ 12:03:05
I agree with the caution against setting up the Bible as an idol, but even if you knock out that leg, Mohler’s point still is worth discussing. Are there significant differences between Paul and Jesus or not? Is it possible to believe Paul (or Peter or the other early apostles) are significantly in error about what Jesus taught them and meant?
Mohler says, “No.” He thinks Bell is trying to say we can discount Paul when our reading of Jesus is different from what we hear Paul saying. I don’t know if that is what Bell says, but that seems like an important issue and discussion.
Mar 30, 2011 @ 14:12:42
Hi John,
Bell never explicitly says that he is taking Jesus’ word over Paul in any way. He does use a few Pauline quotes, but Bell quotes Jesus significantly more than Paul. I am unsure whether Mohler has specific ideas of verses from Pauline scripture that speak against Bell’s interpretation of Jesus’ teachings, or if he is just bothered that Bell works almost exclusively from Jesus and excluding Paul to a great extent from the conversation.
“Are there significant differences between Paul and Jesus or not?”
I don’t believe so, and I don’t think Bell believes so either. But I do think the various Bible writers come at things with their own perspectives, and that can make what they say appear at tension with each other. The question is, what do we do with that tension? I think if we put the Bible as our ultimate foundation of faith, then we end up weighting Paul’s words and Jesus words equally, and we try to mix them together, and let each person inform the other’s teachings on an equal level. I think if we put Jesus first and foremost as our foundation, then we’re going to see his teachings as weightier, and view Paul’s teachings in light of what Jesus said.
I see this when people write off what Jesus says about enemy love. People will say he clearly doesn’t mean *all* our enemies, and we shouldn’t really love them the same we we love our neighbour, not if we view what Jesus says in light of the rest of the Bible, especially the old testament. But I think if we take Hebrews 1 seriously, that Jesus is the ultimate and perfect revelation of God, then we must take this teaching (and in this case, his ultimate sacrifice in love for His enemies) seriously too, and read the rest of the Bible in light of it, rather than the other way around.
Mar 30, 2011 @ 14:27:28
“Is it possible to believe Paul (or Peter or the other early apostles) are significantly in error about what Jesus taught them and meant?”
While I don’t believe this, if I ask myself, “What would happen if it were proven to me that they disagreed with a major teaching of Jesus?”, my answer would certainly not be, “I would lose my faith as I wouldn’t know who to trust anymore.”
Mohler seems to clearly state that that would be his answer though, and that to me says that his faith rests on his view of scripture, rather than on the person of Jesus, and that is where I find myself in strong disagreement with Mohler’s approach.
Mar 30, 2011 @ 12:08:14
Good post. I think you are right – Mohler is basing his belief not first in Christ, but in a particular approach and interpretation of scripture. It is a subtle but important difference.
Mar 30, 2011 @ 16:40:40
What is the stat? 80% of Americans are eclectic in their understanding of God and Jesus. Where do we find a clear picture of who Jesus is? In our prayer closest? In the creation? In purely subjective and emotional experiences with Him? Through the Koran? I mean who are you going to allow to speak about Him…how do you hear Him speak to you? Certainly from our relationship with Him, but He has also clearly spoken through His Word. If we can’t trust Paul, how can we trust those who wrote down Jesus’ own words. If we can’t trust them, then who can we trust? The amazing thing about Jesus is that he is a historical person, and books have been written by His followers about Him…verifiable, reliable, historically accurate. And Paul clearly spoke about Christ, taught about him, even wrote letters to the churches describing what it meant to function as a follower of Jesus and together with others as His body in the world. Luke was a companion of Paul and recorded the gospel of Jesus and then the book of Acts. Do we trust one or both but not the one who he traveled with in sharing the gospels? While I will completely affirm that the Bible can become an idol, and that it is not an end in itself, I need the Word, all of it, to see the Living Word, Jesus, clearly. While I never picked up on the Jesus/Paul contrast in Bell’s usage of them, I did pick up that Bell was often not allowing the context of the verses he used to support His position to help in his interpretation of them. Let’s face it, we can make the bible say whatever we want if we do that, can’t we?
Mar 30, 2011 @ 16:57:06
Thanks, Jonathan.
“Let’s face it, we can make the bible say whatever we want if we do that, can’t we?”
It’s true – our interpretation of scriptures is going to necessarily be faulty on some level, and we’re going to come away with some incorrect conclusions from it. And that’s part of the problem – reading and interpreting scripture is one of those “subjective and emotional experiences with Him.”
We can meet Jesus and know him enough to put our faith in him in many ways – through scripture, yes, but also through the faith and love and hope of Christians, through His Creation, even through supernatural experiences like Paul’s. Whatever that is, it causes us to put our faith in Jesus. And through our faith in Jesus, we learn that he loved scripture and took it very seriously. So we love it and take it very seriously too. Certainly a lot of historical studies demonstrate the accuracy of much of scripture, but that in itself doesn’t prove that it’s “God-breathed”, or that every piece of scripture is authoritative, inerrant, etc. Those viewpoints can only logically come after we come into faith with God.
Once we have that faith in Christ, though, we need to remember not to put the cart before the horse and say we now believe in Christ because we believe in scripture. Our faith needs to always stand primarily on the person of Christ, rather than any of the various methods that He is revealed to us.
Mar 30, 2011 @ 23:58:08
James,
I would agree that reading the scriptures can be as subjective as you want it to be, but one verse of scripture has to be held against the rest of it…that helps with reading verses out of context. As well, gathering around the scriptures in community helps to clarify and correct schewed conclusions about a particular text.
Through our faith in him we learn that He loved scripture and took it very seriously. How do you know that? Because scripture says so. My point…the scriptures are the clearest window we have to get back to the historical person of Jesus. They clarify for us what Jesus says and thinks about certain issues, and therefore allows us to clearly see who he is, what he stands for, what his kingdom principles are, etc.
Let me give you an example of what I mean. I hear voices in my head that tell me that I am an absolute S.O.B., that I am stupid, a failure beyond repair, worthless. If i am basing my faith in Christ upon experience, while this may be unlike any experience I have had with Him, who am I to saw that it is not him? How can I determine if it is Christ or someone wanting me to think it is? There are a couple of ways that I know how to. The first is by asking someone or some people who I know walk with Jesus to tell me if what I am hearing sounds like Jesus. That’s good, but something better is to find out what God himself says clearly about it, in the Word. Hmmm, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ. How do i know that…because I sometimes feel that when I am with Jesus, perhaps, but more clearly i sense the Spirit bringing this scripture to my mind, to remind me of the absolute freedom that i have in Jesus. I guess that’s what I mean when I say that we need the Word, in our lives, all the time…I beleive that it’s the clearest way we hear God speaking today. All other experiences are evaluated based on what God has already says in through the WORD in the Word. Are you with me?
Kevin, on your point i guess we could also say that if anyone uses the scriptures to say that God is not just they are also off with the interpretation.
Mar 31, 2011 @ 08:11:53
Jonathan,
I don’t really disagree with anything you have said. My point though is that our faith still needs to be in Jesus, rather than a long list of doctrines.
For example, I see many times people leaving the faith as they investigate evolution and decide that it is convincing. They rested their faith on a literal interpretation of the Bible, and when their literal interpretation of Genesis card got pulled away, their whole faith fell apart.
Regardless of your beliefs around evolution, one’s faith should be stronger than that, and resting your faith on the doctrines rather than the person of Jesus puts you on shaky ground. Also, it gets people defensive and combative about ideas and doctrines that don’t particularly matter. One can just look at this evolution vs creation debate and can see that there’s little love of Jesus in it – the whole thing hurts the cause of Christ, but it’s there because people have put that doctrine as the cornerstone of their faith, and so they feel they must defend it at all costs.
Mar 30, 2011 @ 17:40:46
I find the Wesleyan Quadrilateral is helpful here. Scripture, tradition, reason, experience. Scripture is most important in showing us the Living Word (as you put it), but it does not exist in a vacuum.
Dealing specifically with Mohler, Piper, and Driscoll. They are big on the doctrine of determinism/predestination, and that colors their interpretation of scripture. Wesley said in this regard, that scripture cannot mean that the God of truth is a liar. If someone uses scripture to prove that God is not love, they are off with their interpretation.
Apr 10, 2011 @ 01:32:01
So if the virgin birth is proven to be false, which would in turn determine that Jesus was born of a sinful man thus having been born in sin and thus not being sinless and thus being an imperfect sacrifice and thus being insufficient as atonement for our sins not to mention someone who lied about who he was with such claims as his being the son of God and all, wouldn’t you say that our house of cards is f’d?
See our faith does fall apart if it is systematically bull poop.
example:
God created the world and it was good
Man sinned and brought death into the world
Man has been born in sin since the fall
Sin continues and God’s people are in exile
Prophesy of a virgin birth to come
Virgin birth occurs
Jesus, fully man and fully God is born without the blood line of a man through which sin is borne
Jesus lives a sinless life as a carpenter before beginning public ministry where he remains sinless
Jesus is falsely accused, arrested, tried, tortured, and murdered
Jesus’ sacrifice as the spotless lamb of God for the sins of the world is made
Jesus rises from the dead 3 days later thus “sealing the deal” and proving that Jesus’ was true to his word that he would be murdered and raise 3 days later.
Let’s try Rob Bell’s approach
We don’t really know how the world was created because Genesis is a poem (everything is Spiritual tour)
Man sinned and brought death into the world
Man has been born in sin since the fall
Sin continues and God’s people are in exile
Prophesy of a virgin birth to come (but virgin could possibly mean something else)
Virgin birth never happens
Jesus, born of Joseph and Mary’s adultery is just like his neighbour Brian.
Jesus lives a sinful life as a carpenter before beginning public ministry where he tricks people into believing that he is someone he is not in order to gain followers
Jesus is accused, arrested, tried, tortured, and executed because of his blasphemous statements claiming he was gods son and operating under false authority to forgive sins
Jesus is crucified beside two thieves and two thieves are crucified on either side of a lying blasphemer
If this is the way it went down, then we have been taken for a ride. Maybe the Mormons have it right…but it’s probably the Muslims they wouldn’t fall for tricks like this.
I mean it’s taken him a few years to get here but it’s quite clear at this point that Rob does not take the authority of scripture seriously which would lead someone to conclude that he doesn’t take God seriously. If God’s word can’t be trusted, then how can God himself be trusted?
Apr 10, 2011 @ 09:13:48
Hi Charba,
Your examples illustrate my point perfectly. In your example, you list 6 doctrines before you even get to mentioning Jesus – you build your faith in Jesus on those doctrines – and then you demonstrate how if you alter or pull away one of those doctrines, your faith in Jesus falls apart.
This was my point. This is the problem with building your faith in Jesus on top of a bunch of other doctrines – it is like a house of cards, which as you have demonstrated, falls apart at the slightest breeze.
What I have learned is that for our faith to be solid, we need to have our first line be something like this:
Jesus Christ, son of God, being both Man and God, gave himself up for humanity, dying on the cross and being bodily resurrected, so that we may have eternal life by putting our faith in Him.
That’s the starting point of my faith as a Christian – not Genesis (or any particular interpretation of it), not the virgin birth, not any particular prophecies. If I start with Jesus, and grow out my faith from there, I know my faith is solid – the rest is just details… if something comes along that makes me rethink or feel I need to adjust my doctrinal beliefs (which is going to happen to *some* extent to anybody who puts time and energy into learning more about Jesus), then I can feel secure in my faith, because my faith is founded on Jesus first before all else.
You ask, “If God’s word can’t be trusted, then how can God himself be trusted?” I think this is getting things backwards again. I don’t trust God because I trust God’s word, I trust God’s word because I trust God.
Apr 10, 2011 @ 10:17:06
James,
Very well said
I agree totally with the “doctrinal house of cards”. This is Mohler’s problem, and is also the problem with fundamentalism in general. The “ism” is an idol, unless it be Jesus. Then we have to careful that we don’t confuse Jesus with doctrines ABOUT Jesus, so that we don’t just line up a bunch of propositions about Jesus and make those sacrosanct. We moderns have a funny way of talking about “beliefs” in those propositional terms instead of how we align our allegiances to “follow” Christ.
Apr 10, 2011 @ 10:42:44
Thanks Dale,
I agree about following Christ – Jesus told people to follow him, not believe propositions about him. I think that is part of what having a child-like faith is about – we can follow Jesus without having a full understanding of all that’s going on.
I can agree with not confusing Jesus and doctrines about him to a certain extent, although I think there’s a point where they are inseparable. For instance, we can’t just discard the idea that Jesus is divine – if we do, we are back worshipping the created instead of the creator, and we’re back to idolatry all over again.
Jun 18, 2011 @ 02:18:58
Thank you James for writing so eloquently and rather civilly about this topic.
I wanted to ask, if the “Bible is inerrant” card were pulled, what then would your sources be for understanding the person of Jesus. I see that you’ve kind of addressed that in your March 30 @16:57 reply, but I can see peoples from other “denominations” (yes those quotes might be seen by some as loaded) or even other religions to be in relatively complete agreement to what you said and yet have a completely different view about Jesus (he’s a spirit-man, he’s just our older brother, he’s one of many gods who happens to have a book, we’re gonna rule other worlds just like him when we go to Heaven). Our faith does, indeed, needs to always stand primarily on the person of Christ, but without the Bible being accurate, what accurate thing, method or way are we left with to ensure that we do know who the person of Christ is (and who He is not for that matter). Without an accurate map created by trustworthy cartographers, are we to base our navigation on random people on the way (perhaps Yahoo answers is the way to go…)? How can we know they know where our destination is? (I know there are so many holes in that analogy – just roll with it). The point is about objectivity. How do you know that what you believe about Christ is correct versus what I believe about Christ if we can’t really use the Bible to base our beliefs because the Bible really isn’t that accurate anyway?
What was the original purpose of these pesky doctrines anyway? Weren’t doctrines created in the “olden days” of the early Christians to protect the authentic story and understanding of Christ (against things like stoicism, docetism, everyone-goes-to-heaven-after-all-ism etc)?
yes, yes, the tongue is deeply in the cheek in this post 🙂
Jun 18, 2011 @ 08:22:55
“How do you know that what you believe about Christ is correct versus what I believe about Christ if we can’t really use the Bible to base our beliefs because the Bible really isn’t that accurate anyway?”
I make no claim that “the Bible isn’t that accurate anyway.” I think it’s quite accurate, and we can use standard historical evaluations on it as we would with any other historical documents to determine that it is fairly accurate. There are many historical figures whom we have fewer writings of which appear much longer after the fact than we do with the New Testament, and we are happy to think of those other writings as accurate, so I don’t see any reason not to see the New Testament as similarly accurate (in fact, I think there are many pointers in it that it is more accurate.) My point is that while I do believe scripture is inspired, I don’t think one needs to believe that at all to believe it depicts Jesus accurately.
My point in this blog isn’t to denegrate the Bible, call it inaccurate, etc, but to recognize what it is and put it in its rightful place. Yes, it is God-breathed and inspired (and perhaps inerrant – I’d need a definition to work with before I’d say it is or it isn’t), but it is not God himself. It is a creation from God, and a signpost to God, and as such it needs to be treated that way. Imagine if your best friend was travelling for 3 months to Antaractica, and he gave you a special phone, and this phone was the only way to reach him. What a fantastic gift! You marvel at this phone, invite others to come over and study the phone with you. You open it up and dissect it and tell everyone you can find just how fantastic this phone is. And then your friend returns and asks why you never called him… we need to remember the Bible’s place, and that it’s there so we can connect to our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.
Jun 18, 2011 @ 19:56:37
I appreciate your concern about Bible-olatry and how there can be an undue elevation of the Bible, and at the same time, we don’t want to undervalue it’s significance. Perhaps there’s a place in this gradient where people can be in between and yet not at the exact same point.
I feel that in many ways, I have the same feelings about Christian traditions (creeds, prayers, saints) as you do about the Bible. I feel that they are important and can be very useful in a person’s walk in faith, but do not replace a personal relationship with Jesus or be held in equal value of importance. I have dear friends, on the other hand, who would like Christian traditions to be held at a higher level , quite similarly to the way other people may argue that the Bible is essential. For them, Christian traditions is their cellphone? In conclusion, you and I aren’t so unlike…
Jun 18, 2011 @ 22:02:24
I completely agree about the creeds. While I affirm what’s in them, they are quite incomplete.
For instance, if you look at this section of it:
…..
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
….
It skips from his birth, right to his death. I’m pretty sure something in the middle there was important – all the things Jesus did and taught, perhaps? It’s interesting that Jesus’ actual teachings are pretty much completely absent from the creeds. While the creeds are useful, they lack a lot of the most important stuff.
And you are totally right – the personal relationship with Jesus is what is always of the highest importance. We must always keep that at the forefront. I think people often devalue that, because it’s so much harder to tell what someone’s personal relationship to Jesus is like. It’s much easier to find some other belief or creed and declare people in or out based on that, like many fundamentalists are trying to do with Rob Bell.
Jun 20, 2011 @ 13:17:43
Just remember that creeds were written in a context for a reason…they were vital documents in their day to protect against heresy…against teachers that gave people what they’re itching ears wanted to hear rather than Christ himself.
Jun 20, 2011 @ 13:24:55
Very true, Jonathan. They often get used as a complete encapsulation of what Christianity is when they weren’t really intended to be used that way.
Jun 19, 2011 @ 13:24:42
I tend to have perhaps the same feelings about “personal relationship with Jesus”. That becomes idolatry when it is taken to its all-too-often “individualistic” sense. That goes to the root of idolatry (which is worship of “other gods” , in this case, the self and a narcissistic focus on one’s “personal relationship with Jesus”, thus escewing all the “social” and “communal” dimensions of the faith.