I totally get that he’s writing in a provocative way, but I think it’s actually warranted. As one who spends a lot of time in church leadership circles, I see constantly where we speak boldly and in a black and white way about these things that scripture leaves more open.

The Christian doctrine of salvation has been tightened and formulated as a form of protection, I mean we don’t want to mess that up, but we have to be careful to let scripture inform theology not the other way around.

The scripture is plain and spimple more open in its description of how salvation works then modern christian theology describes. We have to be ok with that…

I also think his point about believing ect being verbs is of absolute importance. One of the gravest failures of the modern American church is the cheapening of Gods grace. The “all done with no do” mentality has built multiple generations of believers who disconnect their personal responsibility from their sins and their standing with God, but scripture is pretty clear that lots or our decisions and actions directly effect our standing with God (ie willingness to forgive others). Belief is an action guided by choice of will. So is receiving. So is obeying. So is submitting.

We down play the believers role in the Christian life to the detriment of the church…

You haven’t even gotten to the real controversial stuff yet. You’re still in the good meat section of the book… : )