An image Bell returns to often in Love Wins is that of Jesus being the rock that gives water, an image from Hebrew scripture where Moses, leading the Israelites through the desert, called on God to give them water. God told Moses to take his staff and smack a rock with it. The rock cracked open and water spilled out. A cranky bunch of people wandering in the desert slaked their thirst.

Jesus, Bell says in Love Wins, was (and is) that rock. Even when he wasn’t called by that name, even when people don’t recognize him, Jesus is always the one who brings grace and salvation.

“Not everybody sees it, not everybody recognizes it, but everybody is sustained by it,” Bell writes. “He is the answer, but he is also the question, the hunt, the search, the exploration, the discovery.”

–Excerpt from this great article by Cathleen Falsani, a friend of Rob Bell

Painting by Douglas Rush

Tags:HeresyJesusliving waterMosesRob Belluniversalism