Why Do Fundamentalists Hate Rob Bell?

From the title of this post, I probably have alienated all of my Fundamentalist reader(s), but that wasn’t my intension.  If you’re a Fundamentalist and still read my stuff, you must really hate me.  I imagine you are taking notes on everything that I’m wrong about, and you are waiting for the perfect time to spew many comments of disapproval all over my blog.  Or perhaps you are a Fundamentalist with an open mind and, therefore, a walking contradiction.  And so, if you are still reading this post, let’s get onto the meat of the subject: Rob Bell…the heretic?

What you shouldn’t expect from this post: the equivalent to a Rob Bell TeenMag article stating, “Rob Bell is SOOO dreamy… and available! XOXOXO”; statements why he is theologically superior to everyone else; or any claims of “Modern Day Prophet” or the equivalent. 

I like Rob Bell, I like Nooma, I like Rob Bell’s books, and, Lord willing, I hope to someday attend a service at Mars Hill Church in Michigan.  Now I’ve liked Bell for a while.  I was first exposed to the Nooma videos at the National Youth Workers Convention in Anaheim in 2006.  What was presented was Nooma Video 14, “Breathe”.  What struck me were the compelling implications of such a simple idea.  It’s like the message was there the entire time and was just waiting to jump out and grab me.

Since I’ve been working in the church, I have used a few Nooma videos on occasion.  What follows are deep conversations about aspects of faith, what it means to love, what it means to serve, and other topics that sometimes get swept under the carpet or not fully explored.  I’ve had youth ask when we’re going to do more Nooma videos.  So not only do I enjoy the videos, but the youth enjoy them AND the deep conversations that follow.

Enter Nooma video #9, “Bullhorn”.  I was screening the video before youth group sometime last year.  I liked it; Bell made some good points.  Just for fun, I decided to do a YouTube search for Rob Bell videos.  What I found was a bunch of copycat videos done to look like Nooma videos, but they were avidly against Bell’s videos.  No problem—everyone that “creates” is due some critics.  But then I got reading the comments—some funny, others disturbing, and yet others made you wonder how they figured out how to use a computer...  Upon further research, I noticed more and more people exclaiming their dislike of Bell’s teachings, even going as far as to say he’s a heretic.  One particularly funny comment I noticed on an iTunes audio book review for Bell’s book, Sex God, went on to say, “Rob Bell is a heretic.  He takes away and adds to the truth of scripture to make his point…” But yet the reviewer still must have liked the book enough to give it three out of five stars.  So he absolutely hated the message; but it was still an above average book?

My question is this: Is it really that easy to throw around the H-word in Christianity?  Just because someone disagrees with your theology (but probably not so much your theology as your implementation of your faith), you feel obligated to drop the H-bomb on someone?  Really?  My question is what gives you the right?  Where in anyone’s understanding of Christianity is arrogance and pride-filled name-calling acceptable?  Is calling someone a heretic really focusing on the things above?  Is getting the courage to write a poor review of his work really working towards the Kingdom of God?  Have you ever wondered how even the Evangelical Champions haven’t called Bell a heretic?  Do you ever think that maybe, just maybe, calling someone a heretic isn’t the best first step?  Moreover, perhaps there’s a small possibility that you misunderstood their words?  Do you think that possibly the reason that you have no credibility is because you’ve allowed yourself to fall into the 3^rd grader-mentality of name-calling?

Doing a short Google search, I found a small quotation that will sum up probably 90% of the arguments against Bell.  I found it here.  And I quote:

Here’s a sample of Rob Bell’s heretical theology taken from his book, Velvet Elvis:

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

Heaven is full of people God loves, whom Jesus died for.
Hell is full of forgiven people God loves, whom Jesus died for.

The difference is how we choose to live, which story we choose to live in, which version of reality we trust. Ours or God’s.

So there you have it, everyone is forgiven! All you have to do to go to heaven is live in God’s story (whatever that means).

See?  Do you see it?  You have decided to take an active stand against something when you don’t fully understand it.  You have decided to pick a side without fully knowing what the opposing side stands for.  But I would argue that there IS NO opposing side.  I ask you to do this: Desperately seek out the meaning of the message before you make your judgment.

So there it is—the answer…whatever that means…

My 2¢.                                                                                                                                                      

-Kyle