Jeff Cook on Erasing Hell

You should  check out the very interesting posts by Jeff Cook on Erasing Hell if you haven’t already over at Jesus Creed. The last one is here with currently 128 comments.

In this post, Jeff critiques the hermeneutic which lies behind the main question of the book: Are we willing to submit our reason and understanding to God Word if we don’t like what it says?

Jeff asserts that it is both unnecessary and impossible to do so because the approach to interpreting the Bible that leads to the conclusion of submission of our intellect (Chan and Sprinkle’s) is based on the use of our intellect. This is an interesting take. And I think Jeff has a good point. I certainly think that one’s approach to reading the Bible is key.

The problem with Jeff’s approach, as I see it, however,  is that his syllogism is insufficiently informed by Scripture itself. I think Jason Hood is on to something (comment #34).

One cannot boil the biblical God down to the attributes of generous, compassionate and creative without a severe reductionism to the point of devastating inaccuracy.