Love Wins

Eternal life doesn't start when we die; it starts now. It's not about a life that begins at death; it's about experiencing the kind of life now that can endure and survive even death.

--Rob Bell

Today, I began Rob Bell's "Love Wins." Fourish hours later, I finished it. Partly, it's because I heard about the controversy surrounding the book, and I love a bit of controversy; I think it's more than healthy to question your beliefs every now and then. Partly, it's because the Christianity I believe in has its soul and basis in Love, and Bell's title kinda drew me in from the get-go.

So, my thoughts: Love Wins is an honest book, and modern Christianity needs a bit of honesty in its stagnate climate. The book has a couple less-than-orthodox claims (as I'd hoped), and, ultimately, contains a huge amount of truth. Is Bell's theology perfect?  I doubt it, though it's certainly within the realm of possibility. The thing I love about it most, though, is that Bell doesn't argue doctrine within Christianity. He argues a Jesus that transcends Christianity; and through that, the Jesus that I've come to regard with comfortable familiarity once again took on a breathless divinity.

So regardless of any truth or fiction in the book's theology, I consider it a success.

Truth #1 - Jesus is bigger than Christianity. 

He didn't come to start a new religion, and he continually disrupted whatever conventions or systems or establishments that existed in his day. He will always transcend whatever cages and labels are created to contain and name him, especially the one called "Christianity."

This is one of those things that Christians all know, of course, but something we rarely take the time to contemplate. One of Bell's strengths is representing a God that doesn't fit inside a religion. Christ, he reminds us, is the Word incarnate: there before the beginning, the mystery that we strive to understand, present forever with us and through us. Bigger than the universe. Really, Christianity's attempt to wrap a neat little bow around our presentation of Jesus is a little presumptuous. Jesus is surprising, mysterious, mystical, intelligent-- but most of all, he's Love. And love always perseveres, and love never fails, and love doesn't consign itself to a single religion. Whaaaaaat? you say. No, it's true. Go look at a Muslim family. Trust me, they love each other every bit as much as you love yours. Jesus, as love, works in them and through them, too.

Truth #2 - Christianity isn't about getting into heaven. 

Life has never been about just "getting in." It's about thriving in God's good world. It's stillness, peace, and that feeling of your soul being at rest, while at the same time it's about asking things, learning things, creating things, and sharing it all with others who are finding the same kind of joy in the same good world.

Bell talks about how Jesus' kingdom of heaven was first and foremost something that should be worked for here on earth. Heaven on Earth. Partnering with God to create something beautiful, something lasting, something peaceful. Following Jesus isn't about obtaining a membership card to the afterlife heaven club. It's about loving right here and right now, striving to create a world more focused on showing people love than on believing the right things.


I love to think; new opinions excite me. When I read a little of Rob Bell's less conventional theology, then, my heart beat a little faster.

My favorite question of the book asks if God's pursuit of humanity stops after we die. Is that it? We get our lifetime, then rest with our decisions? But God, Bell points out, isn't about purposeless punishment. He's about redemption, time and again. He's about making all things new. Sacrifice, then rebirth. Is he relegated to condemning us to hell without the possibility of forgiveness, simply because our earthly time has expired? If we choose hell (which we often do), then so be it. But what if the hellions repent? What then?

Love always perseveres. Love never fails.

In any case, I'm not going into details on his more technical points. I recommend the book, if only to open your mind to a couple new perspectives. Whether you agree with them or not, Bell represents a God unbound by human conventions and a love more radical--and more understandable--than we're used to seeing. And that's something I respect.

Dear Selfless,

Good and Evil have always been created by lovers and creators. The fire of love glows in the names of all the virtues, and the fire of wrath. 

Zarathustra saw many lands and many peoples. No greater power did Zarathustra find on earth than the works of the lovers: "good" and "evil" are their names.

Of course, Nietzsche went on to censure everyone who is duped by the creators of good and evil, who succumbs to the system that those lovers set up; but, like most passages in Nietzsche, the kernel of truth in his storm against morality is golden.

Both good and evil are the works of lovers. People murder in the name of love; they also sacrifice their own lives in the same cause. And there is no act on earth with more impact, more influence, than one done for the cause of love.

I find it frustrating, then, that so many people find good and evil in trite, meaningless actions. Good and Evil are powerful. They affect lives in profound ways: one strips people down to nothing, stealing freedom and laughter and warmth; the other builds people up, giving them confidence, community, and strength. One instills love; one drains it.

Good and Evil have far less to do with specific actions than with specific people. In fact, they cannot be separated from the effects they have on the people around us.

This past week, I learned about a couple Evil happenings in the world, things that break people, destroying their ability to feel or even comprehend love. I also saw firsthand a number of Good things: things that bring a measure of hope and community into lives devoid of both. It reminded me that there are more important things in life than commercial success. Life isn't about success; it's about love.

I think it's easy, sometimes, to forget about radical concepts like Good and Evil while living in middle-class America. We don't see either very often. But when we do, we see the power they have. It's disconcerting and a little uncomfortable, but it's also a reality. And it's not a natural phenomenon; it's a weapon wielded by regular people. We can instill love, or we can drain it. Either way, it has a potent effect on someone's life.

"Love God," Jesus says, "And love others. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." I think this is a passage often overlooked in the Christian community. Everything that matters in this life has to do with love.

There is no greater power on this earth than the works of lovers.

On the Tree on the Mountainside

The free man is a warrior.

How is freedom measured in individuals and peoples? According to the resistance which must be overcome, according to the exertion required, to remain on top.

The highest type of free men should be sought where the highest resistance is constantly overcome: five steps from tyranny, close to the threshold of the danger of servitude.

--Friedrich Nietzsche

I wonder, sometimes, at my decision. I've moved across the country to a city where I know virtually no one, where thousands of starving artists have tried and failed, where the greenery and silence of nature is exchanged for a smoggy concrete labyrinth full of screeching cars and wailing sirens. It's discouraging, it's frustrating, it's difficult, and it's lonely.

But it's also a cyclopean challenge, a chance to overcome, an opportunity to flex my independence. There are days when I just want to give up and go live a life with friends and family--but there are also days in which I can face the challenge with exuberance and confidence, knowing that, should I succeed, every other challenge in life will pale in comparison.

I love challenges. I love pitting myself against a hopeless situation and winning. As an undying optimist and an admittedly naive idealist, I know that, eventually, I'll succeed, and that the troubles and pitfalls along the way will be worth the end result.

But the end result isn't enough motivation to keep going. It's the challenge that drives me. It's having a Gordian Knot placed in front of me and knowing that everyone is watching to see if I can unravel it. I think, more than anything, it's the realization that I can't let a puzzle go unsolved, even if it costs me the warmth and contentedness of being with friends and family. It's the battle, the chess game with capitalist America. It's the fight.* And if I give up, if I admit defeat, I'll lose a part of myself that I don't think I could live without.

I forget this sometimes, looking out over my industrial city, alone on a particularly caliginous evening. Then I realize that giving up will cost me far more than the price I pay to live here.

"But by my love and hope I beseech you: do not throw away the hero in your soul! Hold holy your highest hope!"

*Also, it's the morning coffee, the solitude, and the creative process. But mostly it's the challenge.

Greens and Purples and Silvers

True, we love life; not because we are used to living, but because we are used to loving. There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.

I would only believe in a god who could dance. And when I saw my devil I found him serious, thorough, profound, and solemn: it was the spirit of gravity--through him all things fall.

Not by wrath does one kill but by laughter. Come, let us kill the spirit of gravity!

I have learned to walk: ever since, I have let myself run. I have learned to fly: ever since, I do not want to be pushed before moving along.

Now I am light, now I fly, now I see myself beneath myself, now a god dances through me.

Thus spoke Zarathustra. 

People don't understand why I love Nietzsche so much. They think something along the lines of, "Wait, isn't he that atheist philosopher? Aren't you a Christian? That doesn't make sense." And I grin.

Because life, I've discovered, is far less about the black and white, and far more about greens and purples and silvers. Less about Yes and No and more about Why and How. Less about systems and rules and more about discovery and illumination.

Most people don't ask questions about anything beyond the physical. Anything existential or metaphysical seems pointless and possibly depressing, so they avoid it.

I thrive on it.

I love learning about what makes people act the way they do. Maybe I should have been an anthropologist, but seeing different cultures and learning how they came about is, to me, just about the most interesting thing there is. When it gets more personal, learning people's life stories and adventures, so much the better. I want to be part of it. I want to know it all and experience it all. Every story, every belief, every flavor, every experience, every location. I just want to know, and I think it's this curiosity that keeps me going. If you tell me your favorite city is Florence, I want to go so I can see why you like it. If you're a dedicated Buddhist, I want to learn everything about it so I can understand your commitment. If your favorite ice cream flavor is Ashes & EyeJuice, you'd damn well better give me a taste of it so that I can know what you know.

"Behind your thoughts and feelings," says Nietzsche, "there stands a mighty ruler, an unknown sage." I like to find the "unknown sage" in everyone. Because people aren't worth less because they believe something differently. On the contrary, their unique perspective is very often worth more. It gives them a richness, a texture, that makes them unique.

And anything unique is always beautiful.