Heaven and Hell, Children and Rob Bell

May 21 has come and gone, we’re all still here. But “the end times” and what will happen to us when either the or our end comes is still on the minds of many. Two recent books have been runaway bestsellers, one on heaven, one (ostensibly) on hell. The latter has received blogospheric amounts of commentary, most of it sadly uninformed — it should be basic rule that you cannot post on a topic without having read the book yourself, simply because you read about it on some blog somewhere. But reading books takes time, sound reflection and writing requires sustained attention. Call Day and graduation are now wrapped up on the 172nd year of Concordia Seminary, and so we’ve had some time to read and write.

Over the next several days we’ll be trickling out commentary from faculty and pastors on two hot books:

Todd Burpo and Lynn Vincent, Heaven Is For Real: A Little Boy’s Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2010).

Rob Bell, Love Wins (HarperOne, 2011).

We’ll post the first review essay this afternoon, and trickle the other four or five out over the next week. Each will come at these books (as you’ll see, that may not be what these actually are) from a different angle, but I hope you’ll notice the solid Lutheran pastoral care and theology reflected in their work. Your comments, as always, are welcome. Stay tuned.