Velvet Elvis

'Bell fights every impulse in our culture to domesticate Jesus [and] challenges the reader to be open to surprise, mystery and all of the unanswerables... Bell has given theologically suspicious Christians new courage to bet their life on Jesus Christ.' (Christian Century) 'Claiming that some versions of Jesus should be rejected, particularly those used to intimidate and inspire fear or hatred, Bell persuasively interprets the Bible as a message of love and redemption... His style is characteristically concise and oral, his tone passionate and unabashedly positive.' (Publishers Weekly) 'One of the nation's rock-star-popular young pastors, Rob Bell, has stuck a pitchfork in how Christians talk about damnation.' (USA Today) 'It isn't easy to develop a biblical imagination that takes in the comprehensive and eternal work of Christ ... Rob Bell goes a long way in helping us acquire just such an imagination-without a trace of soft sentimentality and without compromising an inch of evangelical conviction.' (Eugene H. Peterson, Professor Emeritus of Spiritual Theology, Regent College, and author of The Message and The Pastor