Controversial evangelical pastor Brian McLaren has come to the defense of Rob Bell, taking on R. Albert Mohler, Jr.'s critical review of Bell's new book, Love Wins, in a recent blog post. For weeks, evangelical leaders have hammered Bell for his views on heaven and hell as expressed in his new book Love Wins. Bell is accused of being a universalist, dismissing the sacrifice of Jesus' death on the cross, and not believing in hell, among other things.

In his blog post defending Bell, McLaren uses a baseball metaphor to point out four errors in Mohler's critical arguments against the book.

First, McLaren takes issue with Mohler's line of argument that his interpretation of the gospel is the gospel itself and that Bell is attempting to promote a different version of the gospel to make it more popular. McLaren responded, "[H]e (Mohler) is wrong to assume that Rob is saying his story is better than Jesus' story. Rather, Rob is suggesting that Jesus' original story (as he interprets it) is better than the version many hold and proclaim today."

No articulation of the gospel today can presume to be exactly identical to the original meaning proclaimed by Christ and the apostles, McLaren argued. He said Christians therefore should proclaim their interpretation with "humble confidence" rather than "a naive and excessive confidence."

According to Mohler, God's holiness and justice requires the traditional doctrine of hell.

McLaren wrote that concerns raised over the traditional doctrine of hell are based on justice and holiness, not because of sentimentality. However, he pointed out that "it's very hard to square the idea of eternal conscious torment with a just or holy God." Even from a human stand point, a human father punishing his children's disobedience with 10 seconds in the fireplace would be unjust and unholy, said McLaren. If a definition of justice and holiness characterized by "the imperfect...suffering eternal agony" would be unworthy of a human being, "how much more unworthy of God whose justice must be better than our own," he asked.

In his third point, McLaren rejected Mohler's argument that those who reject the traditional doctrine on hell is embracing a liberal theology that killed and emptied out many mainline Protestant churches at the end of the 20th century. McLaren also suggested that mainline Protestantism might not be dying at all but preparing for the birth of a new generation of Christianity. Also, evangelicals might be headed toward a similar downfall as the church has a higher college attendance rate or grapples with hypocrisy or disconnection from real-life issues.

McLaren concluded his post by asking for those who ascribe to a traditional view of hell to give a "fair hearing" to those who "can't in good conscience defend that view any longer."