Quotes from Rob Bell

First, I'm a Christian, and so Jesus is how I understand God. I realize that for some people, hearing talk about Jesus shrinks and narrows the discussion about God, but my experience has been the exact opposite. My experiences of Jesus have opened my mind and my heart to a bigger, wider, more expansive and mysterious and loving God who I believe is actually up to something in the world.

How we respond to what happens to us—especially the painful, excruciating things that we never wanted and we have no control over—is a creative

What new and good thing is going to come out of even this? When you ask this question, you have taken something that was out of your control and reframed it as another opportunity to take part in the ongoing creation of the world.

because having too many options can easily lead to being stuck, disconnected from your life because there's no pressing need to do anything.

Heaven comforts, but it also confronts.

Suffering and loss have this extraordinary capacity to alert and awaken us to the gift that life is.

Failure, we see again and again, isn't final, judgment has a point, and consequences are for correction.

You go to a funeral and you sit there grieving the death of this person you loved but when you leave you realize that mixed in with your sadness is a strange sort of energy that comes from a renewed awareness that you're here and this is your life and it's good and it's a sacred gift.

And in trying to protect the image of God in them, we just might be protecting the image of God in ourselves in the process. Because with every decision, conversation, gesture, comment, action, and attitude, we're inviting heaven or hell to earth.

Begin whatever you're doing by remembering that you are here and you have been given a gift.

It's at the end of ourselves that new futures open up.

The ancient sages said the words of the sacred text were black letters on a white page—there's all that white space, waiting to be filled with our responses and discussions and debates and opinions and longings and desires and wisdom and insights. We read the words, and then enter into the discussion that has been going on for thousands of years across cultures and continents.