book review: velvet elvis

[bachanon]

velvet elvis: repainting the christian faith

rob bell

2005/zondervan

Dirty Amazon link (helps support HAIF): Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith

Clean Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0310273080

velvet elvis explores the state of post modern christians. rob bell invites us to look inside ourselves and see if we are being intellectually honest and honest about our faith. he encourages us to challenge accepted "scriptural" ideals and takes us back to the jewish tradition of "binding" and "loosing". he discusses the idea that challenging one's faith is necessary and refines one's belief system. authentic faith requires conflict. thousands of people agreeing with each other in a mega church does nothing to refine personal faith. a movement is afoot and it is outside joel.com or kerryshook.com. rob bell doesn't down ministries such as these. he feels if it works for you, fine and well. however, there are millions of people who do not fit into the "christian" mold that are seekers of truth.

the book is very encouraging if you feel you are outside the traditional christian church yet have a christian background.

[editor]

Interesting. Do you find he uses the word "Christian" a lot, or is he specific? It seems these days a lot of people use the broad brush of "Christian" in a disdainful way when they actually are critical of a particular sect or division of Christianity.

My observation over the last seven years or so is that there are a lot of people returning to church, especially the 20- and 30-something whites who fled en masse during the 70's and 80's. These days, in spite of what you might hear as conventional wisdom from loud internet griefers and naysayers, it seems to me that there is a lot more interest in religion and faith. A book like this might be helpful for people searching for a denomination or maybe who just want to be happy on their own within themselves. It's like a modern-day Counterreformation.