Liberal Christianity has a problem. I am not a liberal myself, but I do get to hang out with many liberal Christians and I can say with some confidence that I see where the problem is seated. [1]
Liberal Christians ‘get it’. They are more mature or wise than their fundamentalist cousins from the back-country. They see the harm of backward tribalism and hear the hurtful rhetoric of the mean-spirited and judgmental brand of Christianity and don’t want to participate in it.
Don’t get me wrong, they can be very condescending and pretentious … but they are not going to get caught up in the name-calling and mud-slinging … it just goes against their green-meme nature.
The most aggressive thing they are comfortable participating in is a pronounce rolling of the eyes. This gives them the reputation for being spineless, or not standing up for anything, or being unwilling to dignify the argument by responding.
You saw this last week when one of the Duggar daughters (who I admit to having no point of reference for) wrote some stuff on FB that was detailed in a provocative post entitled ‘Liberal Christians are going to hell.
“I don’t even believe in hell” was the most vicious response I saw from my liberal brethren. [2]
See? It is so passé and beneath them that they can’t even be bothered to muster a response. Hell is so medieval and remedial … as we say: Rob Bell wins.
So I thought I would have some fun and do my friends a favor by lobbing a response over the battle-line. This sort of accusation isn’t going anywhere and is bound to come up again – so here is a ready-made response for the next time it comes.
If I were a liberal Christian, here is how I would want someone on our team to respond:
Liberal Christians are not going to hell! To even say something like that shows that you have not understood the very nature of being a Christian.
You are like the man at the bar who approaches a group of women having cocktails and asks if they are alone. You don’t even understand the words that you are using! You think you know what you mean by them … but a group of women can not be alone.
No Christians are going to hell! To be a Christian is to have received the work of Christ on our behalf . It is to be swept up in the gracious act of God for creation’s salvation and thus to participate in God’s covenant faithfulness.
Christ reconciled us to God – something that we could not have done on our own – and so to be a Christian, of any type, means inherently that you are not going to hell. You belong to God in Christ.
What you are saying show that you have yet to understand either the teaching of Paul, as in Romans 5, or the promises of scripture, like the end of Revelation.
In Romans 5 Paul says that the work of Christ – the second Adam – has a far greater effect and further reach (impact) than the sin of the first Adam.
12 Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned—
13 To be sure, sin was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not charged against anyone’s account where there is no law. 14 Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who is a pattern of the one to come.
15 But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God’s grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! 16 Nor can the gift of God be compared with the result of one man’s sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification. 17 For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ!
18 Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people. 19 For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.
20 The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, 21 so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
In your mislead scheme the first Adam affected all but Jesus only gets to some. You have got it completely backwards.
And look at Revelation chapter 20. The only ones who end in the lake of fire (which I assume you think is the same as hell) are those whose names were not written in the book of life. If your name is in the book of life then you are not judged according to your deeds (which can not save you) but are exempted from that fate by virtue of your name being in the book!
11 Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. The earth and the heavens fled from his presence, and there was no place for them. 12 And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. 13 The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. 14 Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. 15 Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.
To be a Christian, is to have ones name written in the book of God’s life! So while you make not like my brand of Christianity or think that I am not a good or the right kind of Christian, the very nature of being a Christian means that I am not going to hell.
Now we can get into all sorts of things about if Jesus’ Gehenna is the same as Revelation’s lake of fire … and I am willing to do that, but for Christ’s sake stop saying that any kind of Christian is going to hell. That is like saying that married people can be single or that fathers can be virgins – the very use of that category precludes your sentence having the ability to be true.
If you want to talk about being a different kind of Christian or believing the right things, we can do that. Just get the initial premise right: to be a Christian of any type is to have received that gracious work of Christ on our behalf. It is a gift of God and not something that we can earn on our own.
Then we can talk.
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[1] I am a progressive hyperTheist. I subscribe to a social constructivist worldview and politically would probably be a communitarian if anything.
[2] It is impossible for a Christian to not believe in hell. As I have argued before: you have to believe something about it.