"knowledge makes arrogant, but love edifies" [1 Cor 8.1 and books i got for xmas]

That is the balance we must and get to hold. With that in view, here are some lovely books I was blessed with for Xmas.

"THE ART OF READING SCRIPTURE" [Davis and Hays] includes several articles I am looking forward to. Some of these ideas are the Scripture's authority in the church, reading Scripture as a coherent story, reading difficult texts, and reading in light of the resurrection. Why can't everybody else see that hermeneutics is so fun!

"KNOWING THE HOLY SPIRIT THROUGH THE OLD TESTAMENT" [Christopher J. H. Wright] is going to be good as well. I really I appreciate his Christocentric approach to the Scriptures.

"ANOINTED WITH THE SPIRIT AND WITH POWER: THE HOLY SPIRIT'S EMPOWERING PRESENCE" [Harvey] is by one of my Greek profs from seminary. For a super-Presbyterian to write a book on the Holy Spirit and His anointing, you know it has to be incredible. This is especially so because the academy is not in view, but the church is.

"ORTHODOXY" [Chesterton] is because I lost my old copy and never finished it. It is a poet's unfurling of his attestation to the Apostle's Creed.

"JESUS WANTS TO SAVE CHRISTIANS" [Bell and Golden] is to keep up with cutesy and pop evangelicalism. I've already finished half of this. Bell is just trying to articulate that the Bible should be read with a "new exodus" lens. It smells like evangelical liberation theology [which is a massive paradox] on some pages and smells like the gospel on others.

NARRATiVE THEOLOGY

I like how Rob Bell and his little posse believe in what they call "Narrative Theology." Go here and read their schpeel on it. Of course, the chunks of this that are beautiful and good must be held to in light of the NT's exhortation to pursue doctrinal purity.

Needless to say, the marriage of Systematic Theology and Narrative Theology is an arranged one. The families on both sides often seem near-sighted and ready to hate their in-laws. That's why I'm a member of the First Emerging Reformed Bapti-costal Holiness Church of Prophecy of the Second Coming.

the next Billy Graham?

At least that's a possible question from the media. Rob Bell is cute enough, smart enough, and prominent enough to have CNN and Time Magazine give him significant attention [if you’re too lazy to read, the CNN one is a video]. We have to give a snot about this because it is molding what is called “Christianity” in America. Have fun.

rob bell is a false teacher?

So I went and saw Rob Bell Monday night in Atlanta. The ticket was free, but it was worth the few hour journey down there just for what happened before it even started. It was at this venue/bar, so there are definitely going to be some perturbed conservatives about that. However, I wasn't ready for what happened.



These guys on the street were yelling that Rob Bell was a false teacher and he was preparing souls for damnation. This dude was hollering about womens' breasts hanging out of their shirts and people being biblically illiterate and that it was all Rob Bell's fault. Kinda harsh. They were saying that Rob Bell was described in Ezekiel 13. I was shocked to open my Bible and find the perfect description of a skinny, trendy, geeky, intuitive pastor. Anyway....

So naturally, I approached this one guy and wanted to talk to him. He was mingling his false-teacher screaming with bits about repentance, which I obviously agreed with. Before I knew it, one of his friends [who wasn't screaming so much] was interviewing me about how Bell doesn't believe in the inspiration of the Bible. I told him that I doubted Rob Bell had said that. I then found myself being video-recorded. Oh boy. The moral of this story, I suppose, is that I might end up on YouTube saying that I don't believe the Bible and that Rob Bell and Joel Osteen are dating.

In the end, Bell's 2-hour schpeel was ok, but it almost put me to sleep. But the Lord taught me something cool in hindsight of all this. Just as much as I yap about Bell, McLaren, Piper, NT Wright, Catholicism, Calvinism, yada, yada, blah, blah - I need to be in prayer for those guys and those people that Jesus would be their all, that the word would be their life, that they would be wholly yielded to the Spirit of God, and that they would cherish the Gospel far above all else. I prayed for Rob.

So.... if you see me YouTube and I say something dumb, it's not my fault.