Rob Bell Answers a Few Questions

The OOZE interviews Rob Bell and here are a couple of question/answers that make me like Bell more and more!


So the band never toured but now you have. Your ministry has created some controversy particularly among some more traditional churches and leaders, why do you think that is?

I think that what a lot of people call religion is actually fear. I think they say it is historic Christianity but I think it is a lot of terror and fear and shame and all sorts of other darkness, so they are not free. They are bound and terrified and working very hard to preserve and prop up whole systems and ways of thinking, living and believing things that are actually totally destructive. So I assume that sometimes those are the real issues. When people criticize you it says much more about them. For that matter when people praise you it says more about them. I don’t read reviews, I don’t read blogs, I don’t Google my name…it just has no place in my life, I don’t know what good that would do.

As a pastor what would you say to someone who has become disillusioned with organized church or what they have seen of Christianity?

I would wager that the things that most turn them off are the things that most turn Jesus off. There is not one instance in Jesus’ teachings where he gets angry with somebody who isn’t a follower of his or someone who doesn’t love God. His anger is always for religious people who claim to speak for God but live in another way. So if you find hypocrisy absolutely revolting so did Jesus. If you find people who think they are the moral police of culture repulsive, so did Jesus. If you find people who are ready to throw stones at the next sinner very hard to take, so did Jesus. And if you think that people who use Jesus to accumulate political power, to coerce people to live according to their laws, well Jesus had a problem with such things as well. I would say that your anger is shared by Jesus. He’s angered by all the same things.





Shalom!