The Epic Gospel Story

Gustaf Aulén says of the subjective/moral influence view of the atonement that it sets "forth a 'purified,' 'simple' conception of God, whose characteristic is an unchanging Love. But the simplicity is won at the cost of the obscuring of the hostility of the Divine Love to evil; the conception of the Divine Love has become humanised, and at the same time rather obvious and stereotyped" (p. 154, Christus Victor).

I haven't read Love Wins, so don't know if this is fair, but I did recently come across one persons view of it. He felt it was

an exceptionally bland story. There is no drama. No deep conflict requiring resolution. No compelling need for a satisfying denouement. Where is the insurmountable problem that must be overcome? Where’s the cliff we might fall off? Where’s the foreshadowed death that can be avoided only by intervention from the outside? Nothing is ever really at stake in Bell’s tale of limitless happy endings. It has even less suspense than a child’s bedtime story.

(pp. 145-206, Mike Wittmer, Christ Alone)

The real story of the Bible is never bland or obvious, but full of colour and surprises.

Last night in our home group we read the whole of Ephesians. It struck me afresh that the Gospel story is an epic. It is cosmic in scope, evil really is dark, the battle is violent, and there is a great hero.

Post-mortum response to the unveiled word

the Word of God is so weak that it suffers to be despised and rejected by people...This weak Word, which suffers contradiction by sinners, is the only strong, merciful Word, that can make sinners repent from the bottom of their hearts. The Word's power is veiled in weakness. If the Word came in full unveiled power, that would be the final judgment day.

(p.173, Deitrich Bonhoeffer, Discipleship)

It would be an interesting question to ask Rob Bell, whether it makes any difference that post-mortum repentance would be in response to the glorified and strong Word of Christ.

I think that when Paul says that he preached "the word of the cross" (1 Cor 1:18), he wasn't just referring to the content, but the form of Gospel he preached. It was weak and foolish, carried by jars of clay, just as Jesus seemed to so many in first century Judea.

At his second coming the Word will be much more a "word of the resurrection", and will be carried by angels blasting trumpets. Glory will be unveiled and strength exerted.

If Rob Bell sees people repenting, and trusting, in response to that Word then is there something quantitatively different to our repentance and faith?