Tag: salvation

John Piper v. Rob Bell:Battle for the Soul of Evangelical Christianity?

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by Becky Garrison

Rob Bell, a bestselling Christian author and founder of Mars Hill Church in Grand Rapids became a top trend on Twitter last week after Justin Taylor posted a blog article titled “Rob Bell: Universalist?”  Taylor, vice president at Crossways International, a Christian educational non-profit, based his commentary on select chapters of Bell’s forthcoming book Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived that were sent to him and on a promotional video produced to accompany this book’s release on March 29th. Those who picked up on Taylors’ post included bestselling author and Reformed pastor John Piper, who tweeted a succinct “Farewell, Rob Bell.”

The bulk of those generating the ensuing online buzz appear to have reached their conclusions regarding Bell’s book not based on the book itself, which few have actually had the chance to read, but on a position they’ve already taken in the ongoing battles between reformed and progressive (aka emergent) evangelicals. Bell’s detractors claim that he’s abandoned “biblical Christianity” and the belief that only Christians can enter heaven. Instead, he’s charged with adopting universalism, a concept which states that everyone will eventually be saved.  In other words, critics claim, what’s at stake is nothing short of Bell’s soul and those of his followers and readers. Continue Reading →

The Third Baptism

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Sarah Sentilles writes at Religion Dispatches today that Trevor Case’s alleged waterboarding of his girlfriend is unsurprising considering our “torture culture,” rates of domestic violence and historical religious precedent:

In his 2008 article “Torture and Religious Practice,” William Schweiker traces the Christian roots of waterboarding, which was used, for example, during the Spanish Inquisition and in the persecution of Anabaptists during the Protestant Reformation. Schweiker argues that waterboarding is religious violence not only due to its pedigree, but because it carries a particularly religious meaning: that it functioned as a kind of baptism.

Since the Anabapists rejected infant baptism in favor of adult baptism, to take one example, King Ferdinand declared drowning a “Third Baptism,” and an appropriate response to their heretical practices. Schweiker writes that waterboarding-as-baptism was presented as a way to “save” the person being tortured by delivering the accused from his or her sins. Torture became punishment for sins, and punishment became an act of mercy and salvation.

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The Cost of Eternal Life

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“Cryonics is my only hope that I will ever meet my grandmother again.”  A new company in Russia, KrioRus, will freeze the brain ($10,000) and body ($30,000 for both) of the dead in the hopes that advancing technology will bring them resurrection some time in the future.  KrioRus is the first cryonics company outside the US, reports BioEdge.  So much for seeing grandma in heaven.

Cryonics Institute (“Your last best chance for life…”) provides an analysis of operating cryonics companies here.  You can read more about cryonics at the American Cryonics Society (“Is there light at the end of the tunnel?”) website. Continue Reading →