How can we balance resting our faith on the word of God and yet avoid becoming an "oldsmobile"? When is it "holding onto a relic", and when is it resting on sola scriptura and accepting the fact that we're a "peculiar people"/strangers and aliens, the world will hate us, etc.?

When leaving Mars Hill, Rob announced to be starting a podcast. How about these plans?

I don't know Skye, I have no confidence that asking Mr. Bell anything of biblical substance will yield a straightforward answer from him...my feeling is...why bother.

He wrote another book. Good on him.

I, however, will not be reading it.

I'd love for you to ask Rob the following question: "Do you think Christians in the 2nd, 7th or 11th centuries faced the same kinds of issues you address in your book? Or is what we're facing unique?"

I doubt Rob's new book will be as controversial as Love Wins, though I'm sure he will be asking some good questions (and frustrating many who are looking for better answers than he seems to offer!).

What I'd like to ask him is, given the faith he envisions and the beliefs and/or practices he believes should be discarded, and also given that "Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever," who or what is it that he looks to in order to anchor this faith and practice in the unchanging truth of Jesus Christ?

I would like to ask him what it would take for Jesus to win his heart back from being popular in the world's eyes.

I like Brian Jones' question as well.

I would like to ask Nate what it would take for him to pray seriously for a brother in Christ whom he believes to be misguided instead of making snarky, passive aggressive comments about him on the Internet.

I would ask him his favorite thing from Taco Bell.
If he still has a land line (ma Bell).
His favorite band?
Favorite alcoholic beverage? Favorite drink?
Some food he hates?
Favorite gun?
Favorite Supreme Court justice?
Best city he's ever visited? Why?
Worst city he's ever visited? Why?
Favorite CEO? Why?
His pet peeve?
Book of the Bible he'd ax from the canon. (ok it's a loaded question - I'd ask him a couple of those too)

Oh wait - spiritual.......

Basic things you MUST believe to not be a cult (what's not up for grabs) ????
When should we start waving red flags over doctrinal positions????

...

All I'm really saying is this - when you interview Rob Bell -you probably need to get 'out of the box'

And as with all Rob Bell 'teasers', he says whatever you think he said. Story at 11.

Sounds like Rob is still reacting against a fundamentalist Christian upbringing. Which is sad. Sad because there are vibrant Christians and Christian communities that have avoided the deadly claustrophobia of fundamentalism and the flimsiness of Liberalism (the 20th c. theological stripe, not necessarily political).

So question for Rob: Are you reacting to a fundamentalist Christian upbringing, a subculture and worldview that fewer and fewer people have themselves experienced firsthand? And, if so, how is your response to Christian fundamentalism helping everyday people?

I'd like to ask him if he knows why so many Christians are on the religious/spirituality ascendancy project these days?

I would much want to ask him how to come to an understanding of God with taking into account both the bible and science. His book sounds very exciting.

-Anonymous

Point well taken. Thanks for pointing out my snarkyness. Rob, if you're out there- I owe you an apology for my attitude. I would still ask you that question anyways if I ever met you- but perhaps I need to ask myself that question first. Thanks again brother (or sister!)

blessings
Nate

For folks like Nate, I don't get it, if you had what you thought were great ideas, and you wanted to share them with the world, why wouldn't you write books and promote them? I don't understand why fundamentalist Christians assume that Rob Bell is a self-promoter and only interested in his own fame and fortune. If you actually read his books and heard him speak, you wouldn't get that impression at all, he is probably the most humble and gracious of all the "celebrity" pastors out there. If you want to talk about self-promotion, why wouldn't you bring up Mark Driscoll? He regularly and publicly says all sorts of provocative and very mean-spirited things about all sorts of people (most recently the President of the United States), and so does John MacArthur, and you think that's not for notoriety or self-promotion? Why not, because you agree happen to agree with theologically?

Can I say this in defense of nate? There's a lot of people here who would've responded to the rebuke from "Anonymous" with more snarkyness and defensiveness. But nate didn't. He accepted the rebuke, apologized for the attitude of his initial post, and thanked the anonymous poster for holding him accountable. I think that is worth pointing out. Would that it were the rule, rather than the exception!

i have friends at Union in NYC. They just spent time listening to Rob Bell talking about his new book. They said that, in academic terms, you could describe him as a Process Tillichian. So process theology plus some part of Tillich's theology.

They reported that he didn't like the "Process" moniker, but agreed that Tillich was present in his work.