Review of Rob Bell's Love Wins: Chapter 4

Review of Rob Bell's Love Wins: Chapter 4
By: Justin Ahlgrim

CHAPTER 4 - DOES GOD GET WHAT HE WANTS


*Essentially, the question Bell asks in chapter 4 is, if God wants people all to be saved and come to a relationship with Him, won't He get it? Does the fact that some people don't get saved lessen the sovereignty of God? The answer Rob Bell doesn't give is No, no it doesn't. Because There are different types of wills of God.
-There's God's Decretive Will - what God declares will happen no matter what (sometimes we may not know what it is though)
-God's Preceptive Will - His precepts, commands that He tells us to follow
-God's Dispositional Will - what is pleasing to God, but He does not command it
There are different types of wills for every person, including God. And this is an important thing to note that Bell completely ignores. Because for instance, God commanded in Exodus 20:13, "You shall not murder!" Well, Mr. Bell, God's people still murdered each other. Does that mean then that God's not sovereign because He didn't get what He wanted? Bell ignores the notion of the different wills of God altogether, which is odd, since it would be logically crucial to his argument. God wills that all people would not perish but find everlasting life. True. But the question is, what will is that? It is this crucial question, that Bell fails to ask. For more on the idea and application of the different wills of God, I'd suggest RC Sproul's $7 mini-booklet called How Can I Know God's Will


*To help show His point that what God wills is for all people to be saved, for love to "win," Bell points out that there is a biblical theme of God making all things right again for all peoples (Ps 65, Exekiel 36, Phil 2, Ps 22, etc ...) but as Kevin DeYoung points out, some of these promises are to God's people solely, some are general promises about the nations coming to God, and others are about the universal acknowledgement (not salvation) of people knowing God when Christ comes back. Bell, instead of diving into a single one of these texts, simply lists them off like each one says exactly the same thing and exactly what he wants it to say. Seems pretty assuming, naiive, and misleading for the reader to me.

*At one point, Bell is talking about people not being saved (a toxic proposition in his view) and he condescendingly says something close to "Can you picture a God who is looking through the peephole of a door while a person is pounding on the entranceway and God says 'Sorry, too late'?" And I cried out loud, YES, YES I CAN!" For Matthew 25:10-12 says, "And while [the foolish bridesmaids] were going to buy [oil for their lamps because they were not ready], the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut.  Afterward the other bridesmaids came also, saying, 'Lord, lord, open to us.'  But He answered, 'Truly, I say to you, I do not know you." Yes Mr. Bell, God is waiting at the door, and He says you need to be ready in this life, before its too late. This life matters for everything. Because eventually the door will shut. Christ will come back. And the only thing that will save any of us is believing in Jesus now. I was astounded that Bell spouted out a metaphor of God that Bell thought would show how ridiculous the notion of exclusive salvation was, when in fact, that happened to be a near replica of a parable of Jesus in the Bible. Whoops!