Rob Bell according to Platt

NEWS BRIEFS: David Platt weighs in on Rob Bell controversy; Colo. civil unions advance

Posted on Mar 24, 2011 | by Staff
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (BP)--Pastor and author David Platt, on a mission trip in India, has weighed in on the controversy over Rob Bell's latest book by saying "intellectual universalism is dangerous" but "functional universalism is worse."

Platt, author of the New York Times best-selling "Radical" and pastor of the Church at Brook Hills in Birmingham, Ala., recorded a four-minute video that was posted at Vimeo.com and at the church's blog (http://bhglobalblog.org).

Bell, in "Love Wins," affirms a form of universalism and denies there is a literal hell.

"If we believe that everyone is going to be OK in the end," Platt said, "[and] if we embrace universalism however it is cloaked, then we're free to live our lives however we want, to sit back as easygoing Christians in comfortable churches, because in the end all these masses are going to be OK."

But if there is a literal hell and people are perishing without the Gospel, "we don't have time to play games with our lives," Platt said.

"I hope that no one who knows me as either pastor or person would question or wonder where I stand on this issue. The crux of the Bible is clear and the story of redemption is sure.... [I]ntellectual universalism is dangerous, thinking that in the end everyone is going to be OK. But functional universalism is worse, living like in the end everyone is going to be OK. So let's fight them both -- in our heads, in our hearts, let's hold fast to the truth of this Gospel.

"And in our lives, let's sacrifice what we have -- our possessions and our plans and our dreams, our safety, our security, if necessary our own lives, to make this Gospel known among all peoples. That is the only possible response for people who really believe this Book."