Tommy Mann

Let’s be honest: the idea of a devil can seem childish, like believing in the tooth fairy. Is there actually a devil, or is that just an invention of religious people to explain away things they don’t like? In Rob Bell’s book   What is the Bible?  He makes the case that the Jews developed the concept of a devil while they were exiled in Babylon—quite late in their history—as a way of coping with a God that would allow bad things to happen.     They blamed the devil to let God off the hook.    Pointing out that the first mention of Satan is in 1 Chronicles 21, written after the exile, Bell states: “The idea of Satan didn't emerge until the exile, until the Hebrews had experienced extraordinary evil and oppression and had found themselves in a foreign land miles from home in the midst of great alienation and suffering…You can see how the idea of an opposing, evil, destructive, force/spirit/god/goddess emerged as people became more sophisticated in their think...

           I’ve been very critical of the emerging church in some of these blogs, and some have accused me of not actually knowing what that movement is all about. For that reason I decided to write a review of the writings of some of these emergent leaders.      I have previously written about men like  Tony Campolo ,  Rob Bell , and  Mark Driscoll  so they won't be focused on in this post.       I have read, among other texts, Dan Merchant’s Lord Save Us From Your Followers, Dan Kimball’s The Emerging Church, Brad J. Kallenberg’s Live to Tell—Evangelism for a Postmodern Age, Erwin McManus’ The Barbarian Way and Wide Awake, and Donald Miller’s books Blue Like Jazz, To Own a Dragon, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, and The Open Table.         My two favorites were books written by multiple authors (a community of them, perhaps). These books are An E...

I’ve never wanted an author to be so right. I’ve never seen an author be so wrong. First, before we get into Bell’s teachings on hell that are at the center of this controversial new book, I want to point out some flaws in his thinking. On page 10 Bell is busy criticizing the evangelism methods that some Christians employ, and he says that the Bible never tells people to have a personal relationship with Jesus; Jesus didn’t say that, he points out, nor did Paul, Peter, John, James, or the woman who wrote Hebrews. We do not know who wrote Hebrews. Many believe it was Paul, others, Barnabas. I have heard theories and opinions, but to matter-of-factly attribute the book to a woman like we know who wrote it is wrong. This might not seem like a big deal, but it flies in the face of the premise of his book, that we don’t know anything. On the opening page he blasts someone for asserting that Gandhi is in hell. His response: “He is? We have confirmation of this? Somebody knows this? W...