every knee

I haven't read Richard Mouw a lot but what I've read I've agreed with. And what I've read also left me thinking he's a smarter man than I am. At the same time I'm troubled by his post The Orthodoxy of Rob Bell.

Mouw summarizes Rob Bell:

So, here is Rob Bell: people who refuse a “vital connection with the living God” are given over to a “kind of life [that] is less and less connected with God” (Love Wins, 66). And this is no mere theoretical state of affairs, “because it is absolutely vital that we acknowledge that love, grace and humanity can be rejected” (my italics)—and if so, “God gives us what we want, and if that’s hell, we can have it” (72).

To this Mouw adds his perspective.

And I certainly do believe that some folks choose that hell. The Hitler types. The man who kidnaps young girls and sells them into sexual slavery. They are well on their way to hell, to becoming inhuman monsters. To be sure, as the hymn rightly reminds us: “The vilest offender who truly believes/ that moment from Jesus a pardon receives.” But for those who persist in their wicked ways, eternal separation is the natural outcome of all the choices they have made along the way.

In a book I wrote several years ago defending the basics of a Calvinist perspective, I told about an elderly rabbi friend who struck me as a very godly person. He would often write to tell me that he was praying for me and my family. When he died, I said, I held out the hope that when he saw Jesus he would acknowledge that it was Him all along, and that Jesus would welcome him into the heavenly realm.

... A prominent evangelical had criticized those of us who have been in a sustained dialogue with Catholics for giving the impression that a person can be saved without having the right theology about justification by faith. My response to that: of course a person can be saved without having the right theology of justification by faith. A straightforward question: Did Mother Teresa go to hell? My guess is that she was a little confused about justification by faith alone. If you think that means she went to hell, I have only one response: shame on you.

I think this satirical piece speaks to the Hiltler question. Fundamentally, I think what Bell and Mouw have not addressed is the sinful nature of man. I think that even our righteousness is as filthy rags (Isa 64.6) and so yes, even Mother Teresa short of Christ would spend eternity in hell. I do not judge her. I did not know her nor her relationship with Jesus. And I reject that we can look at her works and know with certainty (Matt 7.21-23).

And so I take offense when someone argues "look at Mother Theresa" or "look at Gandhi". Eventually all will bow before the name of Jesus (Phil 2.9-11). This does not mean that when they bow they will escape the penalty of hell. These arguments can only go one way - Universalism. I and those making these arguments reject Universalism and so I'm confused.