this isn’t the first time i’ve blogged about conversations on real time with bill maher. in spite of having regular (weekly, probably) disagreements with some of maher’s positions, it’s one of my favorite shows because of the blend of maher’s humor and the show’s candid conversations.

i’m not a walmart hater. i have many friends who are, but i’m not. at all. in fact, i think walmart is actually good for communities. there’s certainly some negatives that come with its presence, but ultimately, i think offering products at lower prices is good for lower income families.

i say that simply to establish that i’m not the type who looks for reasons to bash walmart.

but yesterday, as i entered a local walmart, i was greeted with a large sign that hung above the entrance. here’s the sign:

why am i blogging about penn jillette? moreover than that, why am i blogging about penn jillette again?

if, over the last couple days, you were to take a peek at the theological social media circles i run in, you’d be hard-pressed to miss the stunning story that matthew paul turner shared on his blog. delivered in 2 parts (part 1 and part 2), he shared the story of a guy named andrew who, until recently, was a member of mark driscoll’s mars hill church in seattle. you can read turner’s posts to get the full story, but in essence, this guy became subject to church discipline for confessing to sleeping with his fiancée and for having an inappropriate (platonic) relationship with another girl.

over the last couple weeks, as jeff bethke’s video (above), ‘why i hate religion, but love jesus’, was hitting critical mass on the web, i began writing a post about it. that post quickly made its way to my ‘drafts’ folder (which only has 5 posts all-time). it wasn’t that it was particularly controversial or incomplete, it was just that i felt like the support & the criticism across the internet was overstated and largely unhelpful. the web really didn’t need one more blog post.

but.

i can’t decide if it’s a blessing or curse that i tend to see the world through a theological lens. either way, it leads to some unexpected (and often humorous to most people, i’m sure) observations about the nature of both god and people.

so it was on last night’s midseason finale of amc’s the walking dead. in a nutshell, for those who have never watched it, the show is about a group of people trying to save themselves in a world that has been overtaken with zombies (a.k.a. walkers). generally, i dislike the entire zombie genre, but this show is much more about the interpersonal dynamics of the group. which brings me to last night’s deeply theological episode.

whether or not you’ve read rob bell’s love wins, you’ve heard about the book. and you’ve likely heard that in said book, rob bell has done away with hell. and unfortunately, if you’ve heard that, you’ve received false information.

bell’s book is actually an affirmation of the theology of hell. but it’s a very different hell than the fire and brimstone you grew up hearing about.