Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith

by Rob Bell and Bell

Book Overview

We have to test everything.I thank God for anybody anywhere who is pointing people to the mysteries of God. But those people would all tell you to think long and hard about what they are saying and doing and creating.Test it. Probe it.Do that to this book.Don't swallow it uncritically. Think about it. Wrestle with it.Just because I'm a Christian and I'm trying to articulate a Christian worldview doesn't mean I've got it nailed. I'm contributing to...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 031026345X
• ISBN13: 9780310263456
• Release Date: July 2005
• Publisher: Zondervan Publishing Company
• Length: 194 Pages
• Weight: 0.96 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.5" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

Life changing book

There are no words to describe this book. It is written beautifully and powerfully. I had so many questions about the Bible and this book no only helped me understand them but it also allows me to understand that it's ok to question some things

A "Must Read" for all Christians.

I found this to be an engaging, enlightening, and thought provoking book. There were many historical aspects that I had never heard before. "Real world" explanations of phrases like "...the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." The historical aspects, though fascinating, were not the main attraction. This book is about making following Christ alive and real in this world, and in this time. It's about engaging our culture, our neighbors, and even our planet in a living and vital way...the way Jesus did. Velvet Elvis will challenge your preconceived notions. It will expand your understanding. It is not the final word on Christianity, as the author makes clear. We know Jesus has all the answers, but beware of anyone else who thinks that they do. I've read a number of other reviews of this book. It seems to have very extreme reactions. People really like it, or they label Mr. Bell as a heretic. Of course, the institutionalized church has pretty much always killed the prophets. Anyway, like it or hate it, it's a very interesting read. One which I highly recommend.

For church cynics

I have so many friends that have thrown the baby out with the bathwater and abandoned Jesus all together after hurtful and damaging experiences with church. It's hard to watch their bitterness and resentment and closemindedness. Following Jesus really is the best way to live. It's about Jesus, it's not about Christians or church. Anyway, writers like Rob Bell and Donald Miller are getting back, I think, to the heart of Christianity--following Jesus, and his love, and his best possible life. Theirs are books that I hope and pray that my friends will read someday. I think that if Ghandi met Rob and Donald he might not have said, "I like your Christ, but not your Christians", and he wouldn't be able to say that he had "never met" a Christian.

Please stop throwing crackers at Rob Bell. It's not nice.

I don't see the modern theologian as one courageous enough to throw stones (because we all know who rebuked that), but I see many of them feeble enough in the realm of a broad mind as to wage war with crackers, and that's what many have chosen to do with Rob Bell's 'Velvet Elvis'. Coming from a pastor's kid who's heard a great deal from the likes of Johnny-Boy MacArthur (Big Mac), Tony-Tony-Tony Evans, Billy the Kid Hybels, John Pied Piper, and others, I can tell you that Bell is onto something, something with substance (much like those great men I just mentioned). In 'Velvet Elvis', Bell asks us to rethink our logic and understand that God is bigger than our feeble conception of His totality. He asks us to understand that holiness can be found in having pure, sinless fun, that holiness can be found in an HIV-ridden slum of Africa, and that holiness is found wherever you step foot today. Why? Because you are a child of God and YOU are holy in HIS site. I'm sure the "I'm a (bold letters:)SINNER saved by (small letters:) grace" crowd is already slicing my review with a negative mark. Alas, I shall trudge on undaunted! Bell also asks us to rethink our box of truth, that Christ's truth extends beyond the Bible (but DOES NOT give credence to any other "holy" books" as being a place of Spiritual answers and authority) because Christ is truth and because Christ is limitless, and that Christ is longer than the pages of the Bible. He does this in a way that does not diminish the Word of God, but in a way that points out that the Bible is a source of much of God's truth, but that God ultimately cannot be limited to anything that is written. To diagram God completely, as Bell says, is for God to cease to be God, for God cannot be blue-printed. I know, without context, this doesn't initially sit well, but trust me, Bell is hardly a syncretistic psychopath. He calls the Word of God open-ended, that Christ is showing us His healing, mercy, and truth today just like he did back then, and in similar ways as in what we read within the pages of the Bible. I think the most potent part of Bell's book is the truth of God-living, not God-defending. Bell says we shouldn't spend so much time trying to defend and explain our faith as we should simply just live it. He uses a trampoline as an example. You don't spend time explaining to someone how good your trampoline is or how safe it is. You simply jump and from the expression of joy that comes from your being, they see that you are having a blast and they want to be a part of that experience. Bell also gets into the depths of what being a disciple meant in Christ's day and what Christ's sayings actually meant to the Jewish culture of His day. Bell does not westernize Christ here, but shows us the context from which many of the Gospels were written. It's quite eye-opening to say the least. I'm sure the quickly-to-label-someone-a-heretic crowd has just about read enough from my review, but please, give Velvet El

Thought-provoking start of a needed conversation

First off, I am somewhere between a 4 and a 5 (call it 9 of 10) on Velvet Elvis, though my tilt moved it up to a 5. From reading this book, I see that Rob is really trying to "jump-start" the conversation about what faith is and is not, and to help those of us in Gens Y & X - inheritors of the post-modern worldview which incubated in the 60's - see how the Jesus is just as relevant today as he was in His own time. My favorite quote: Christian is a great noun but a poor adjective.Too often, the church of the previous generation has been too accepting of mediocrity in a plethora of areas because the label "Christian" has been slapped on the package (whether it's music, media, or day-to-day programs/initiatives). While I do not agree with him on everything (I think he could have expanded on many of his ideas to give them clarity and to cut down on misunderstanding. Granted, from reading many of the other reviews, it seems some people deliberately misunderstand and take Mr. Bell's positions to illogical extremes), I believe that he is on the mark with what is required for the church to remain relevant and resonant with today's Western culture. From reading VE, I don't think he was saying that the Bible isn't 100% true - I think he was suggesting that it is pretty arrogant of any one person to assume that they know what "100% true" is. Western thinkers, who see things in literal definitions and bullet points, have a difficult time reconciling this concept - particularly when it deals with a book (actually a collection of books) written primarily to an Eastern audience, whose world-view is shaped by experiential learning, based on what can be seen, heard and touched. For example, Westerners look at Genesis and many will insist that the story of creation HAD TO BE a literal 7-day process. The contextual view stresses the importance of "God created..." with the rest being a story of how it came about - in an experiential manner. Do I think the world was created in 7 days or that it came about via a gradual process over billions of years? I don't know, but all that matters is that God created it, and the story we have about that creation can be interpreted many ways. So, if I am inclined to believe that God may have created the world in something other than 7 literal days, and you are inclined to believe it happened in 7 literal days, does that mean that one of us doesn't believe that the Bible is 100% true? From my reading of Rob's thesis, the answer is no. Now, if taken to extremes, I agree that his thesis can be misused (and should have been more clear) if you were to say that God created it in 7 days whereas I said that Allah created it per the story in the Koran and that neither of us could know what is true - because Allah and YHWH are not one in the same and my view would say that the Bible is not true, since I would be denying the point of the Genesis story (i.e. "God created"). One of the earlier posters seemed to sum up most of the

A breath of fresh air...

Have you ever had one of those moments where you have been swimming and you finally surface and take a breath...it is the greatest breath ever, or one of those moments where you have been outside in the 115 degree Arizona heat for 10 hours and you take a sip of cold water... it is the greatest taste ever. Well that is how I would have to say this book has been to my soul. It truly has been a breath of fresh air to me. I begun to listen to Pastor Bell a good while back, it started for two reasons. (1) I read a Q & A he did in the Leadership Journal that was an excellent article, and (2) me & my wife began studying the Jewish roots of our great faith. I would recommend this book to anyone who is in need of a breath of fresh air and is sick of the "ho-hum" Christian life. As an Assemblies of God minister I will have to say this book has challenged me, it has caused me to stretch. And I walk away from this book better off. Truth is I will be reading this book over and over again in the days ahead. Pastor Bell is a superb teacher, perhaps one of the greatest teachers of the Word of God in modern times. On a side note the NOOMA video he produced only further bring into the light the anointing that the Lord has placed on this man's life as he is continually covered in the dust of our Rabbi... Messiah Yeshua... Christ Jesus. As one member of the body of Christ to another I highly RECOMMEND this book, as to the people who post negative reviews...look at his fruit, not his methods. The message never changes just the methods. So cheer up the kingdom of God is big enough for all who represent Christ and His eternal message.