New here? Please consider subscribing to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
A friend from church wrote a brief review of The Shack that touches on some key points as to why we should be cautious about this book. Or maybe even disregard it all together. He gave me permission to share this review.
SHACK ATTACK – OR A CALL TO DISCERNMENT?
“Discernment is not simply a matter of telling the difference between what is right and wrong; rather it is the difference between right and almost right.” -Charles Spurgeon
At the encouragement of friends, I recently read The Shack by William P. Young. A national bestseller widely embraced by some churches and many professing Christians, The Shack is a work of fiction that embodies lengthy conversations between the main character, a man named Mack, and three persons who represent a version of the Trinity.
Frankly, I was dismayed at many messages conveyed by The Shack and have been surprised that many of my Christian friends have read the book uncritically, finding it a charming and heart-warming story. Some say that it is unfair to have theological expectations since the book is fiction. However, The Shack is marketed as a spiritually transforming book, and it being received that way by many.
It seems to me that a more critical reading is required of The Shack than a secular work of fiction because the author creates characters that purport to speak as God and to guide Mack on his spiritual journey. The fictional story becomes a device to have characters representing the Godhead explain a particular theology. As believers, our spiritual antennas should be fully deployed when we approach such a book.
In The Shack, God the Father appears to Mack as a large, jovial black woman whom Mack calls “Papa.” The Holy Spirit appears as a small Asian woman, and Jesus appears as a Jewish man. Putting aside gender confusion and the attempt to give human form and voice to the Father and Holy Spirit (“no man hath seen God at any time,” John 1:8), it is critical for the Christian reader to carefully consider the message author Young has those voices bring and to weigh their message in the light of the clear teaching of the Bible. That is to exercise discernment, a requirement – not an option – for Christians.
When we read The Shack with discernment, I submit that we find many distortions and untruths. Consider just a few of the words Young puts in the mouths of his created Trinity (my comments are within the parentheses):
Papa to Mack: “We [the Trinity] have limited ourselves out of respect for you.” (Isn’t this Open Theism – God choosing to limit Himself?)
Jesus: “God, who is the ground of all being, dwells in, around, and through all things . . .” (Isn’t this Pantheism – God in all things?)
Sarayu (Young’s Sanscrit name for the Holy Spirit): “We [the Trinity] carefully respect your choices, so we work within your systems even while we seek to free you from them.” (“Neither are your ways my ways . . . my ways are higher than your ways.” Isaiah 55:8-9. Does God respect man’s choices, or does His Word demand that we repent of our ways and that we enter His narrow way?)
Sarayu: “Both evil and darkness can only be understood in relation to Light and Good; they do not have any actual existence . . . Light and Good actually exist.” (Really? Does the Bible teach that evil has no actual existence? Was the biblical Jesus aware of that when He conversed with Satan in the desert temptation?)
Papa: “I don’t need to punish people for sin Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside. It is not my purpose to punish it; it’s my joy to cure it.” (Certainly there are consequences of our sin which we realize in this life and which impact other people. And certainly God has provided the cure for sin. That “cure” is the penal substitutionary atonement of Christ on the cross. Most certainly there is punishment for sin. Christ suffered the punishment for us. However, the implication of Papa’s statement is that the only punishment for sin is sin’s own punishment in a person’s life. The Bible is clear that punishment for the unredeemed, those who refuse Christ’s atonement, is the sting of spiritual death and eternal separation from God. The Shack makes light work of the cross.)
Young’s Jesus character states that he, Papa, and Sarayu are “indeed submitted to one another and have always been so and always will be . . . . In fact, we [the Trinity] are submitted to you [Mack] in the same way.” (Why, then, did the biblical Jesus submit Himself to the will of His father? Does the Bible teach submission to authority in spiritual and family and secular environments? What do you make of the claim that the Trinity is submitted to us? I believe that Young’s anti-authoritarianism is risky in human terms and that it is blasphemous to attribute such egalitarian sentiments to God.)
When requested by Papa to forgive the murderer of his young daughter, Mack balks. Papa says, “Mack, for you to forgive this man is for you to release him to me and allow me to redeem him.” (So God can only redeem those whom humans have forgiven and have released to God for redemption? The effectiveness of redemption for the unrepentant murderer is to be accomplished with Mack’s participation? Find biblical support for that, my friends!)
Christian, what about this assertion by the Jesus of The Shack? “I am the best way any human can relate to Papa or Sarayu.” (This is a false Jesus. The Jesus Christ of the Bible does not say that He is the best way, He says, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me.” John 14:16. He is not the best way – He is the only way.)
The Shack evidences a low regard for Scripture. When Mack mentions biblical events or concepts, Papa brushes them off and glibly explains how it really is, thus suggesting that the Bible is the work of man, not the divinely inspired work of God. Yet, some argue that The Shack has value in that it demonstrates a loving God of grace who invites man to a relationship. But it does so with grievous distortions about the nature of God, the nature of the Trinity, the authority of God’s Word, God’s hatred of sin, the requirement of repentance, and the nature of conversion and salvation.
My brothers and sisters, even in reading and discussing a work of fiction, we must be prepared to “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3), and to do so without apology to the world. The Shack may, from its human author’s viewpoint, be in all sincerity intended as an inviting look at a highly relational God, but would you place even a drop of poison in pure water and invite others to drink? As Dr. Albert Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, said, The Shack “contains undiluted heresy.” Don’t you and I have a responsibility to be equipped to recognize heresy and to shine the light of truth so that we and others are not deceived?
- Wayne Elliott
p.s. I addressed some of the objections to this review: Is the Shack Only Fiction?
{ 8 trackbacks }
{ 377 comments… read them below or add one }
← Previous Comments
Ever since man was on earth, they have tried to make sense of natural disasters by saying The God’s are angry’ and this theme has been continued throughout life to the present day and has been attributed to our God. Why do we have to ‘force’ people into Christianity through scaremongering by saying If you don’t believe, you will go to hell. What sad people you are who try to control others in this way. Do you not know, that many parts of the Bible have been removed over the generations and has been translated so many times. How do we know what is truth – by listening to the Holy Spirit within. Did God stop talking to us when the Bible finished. I don’t think so. At our church – as at others – we have home groups to discuss the Bible and everyone has a different viewpoint. How do we know which one is right. BY the way, I don’t go. I get so fed up with these fundamentalists who want to terrorise people into believing, and some Christian parents could also be accused of child abuse by the the tales they pass on to their children – Our vicar included. Every week we get a sermon on What we must do to be saved, in one form or another. But having read The Shack, this changed my fear of God, and now I have a loving relationship with HIm, so that I can ignore what everyone else says. What normal parent would treat their children in the same way. We surely should be controlled by GOd’s love and wanting to do our best, rather than fear. When we know that God loves us without condition, then in turn we can love others in the same way. Yes the Shack may not always be theologically correct, but how do we know the Bible is actually God’s Word. It was written by human beings. By the way. Have you read any of Neale Donald Walsch’s books. They are amazing. Start spreading God’s love you scaremongers and fundamentalists and then you will change the world. Haven’t you noticed – religion in its present form isn’t working. All the troubles stem from people who demand to be right about their beliefs. How about this for something ridiculous:
“If a man’s testicles are crushed, or his penis cut off, he may not be included in the asembly of the Lord” Deut 23:1-2 There are many others like this. Surely God is not so choosy.
Margaret,
Your post is evidence enough that The Shack is more dangerous than people are warning about.
It seems as if you are denying the only real problem that man has in this life, and that is God’s justice.
Your understanding of who “God’s Children” are is skewed and to complicate matters you have no compass to guide you to the Truth now that the Bible has no authority.
I can’t think of anything else to say but “Thanks” for making the reviewer’s point and ask “Why have you so quickly turned to a different Gospel?”
There remains hope for you Margaret.
abclay
Abclay, How arrogant are you.it is because of people like you in every religion, that the world is in such a mess. people who insist that they are right, and fight others to prove it and make them change their mind. The Crusades being one example. Think of all the hundreds of people who have died horrific deaths for the sake of their cause. William Wallace who was hung, drawn and quartered for his beliefs. British soldiers in the 1st and 2nd World wars – many of whom were tortured without mercy. I think now of the thousands who were drowned in the Tsunami – where are they now – burning in Hell. What torture for their families to have this to contend with. I believe that Jesus died to show us the way to God and to show how God is with us every moment of the day. But like the author of The Shack, he was crucified for being outspoken and for assumed blasphemy. As someone else said: Lighten up. Why do you need for everyone to find God through your way. Why do you need to insis that your way is right. What are you afraid of – that you might actually be wrong and so yo need to force everyone else into yor way of thinking.God has many ways of approaching us because He has created us all with different personalities. I have travelled the world and so have encountered many countries where all religions live peacefully side by side, embracing each other’s differences and with respect.
Sorry Abclay,
God has been speaking to me since I last wrote and suggested thatI must apologise for my arrogant behaviour. Until then I wouldn’t find any peace.I vowed once I had found the God I loved, rather than the God I feared, that I would embrace everyone’s belief knowing that was what was true for them, and that God reaches us all in different ways according to our background. So once again, please accept my apology.
Maybe some folks here would like to enter the book giveaway? Enter here for the drawing for a new book on prayer.
Margaret,
The irony is that you started off by telling ABClay how arrogant he is. Then, you basically went on to tell him just how right you are. All ABClay is seeking to do is what all Christians desire which is to point to Jesus Christ and only Him as the only way to God. Jesus Himself said this.
Got 60 seconds for the Gospel?
Mark
Margaret,
Thank you for your humility.
Mark
Margaret,
Apology accepted. When our emotions dictate our behavior and beliefs, things often can run askew.
A question, if you and I were looking at a clear sky on a clear day and You said the sky was blue and I said it was not blue, but red, would we both be right?
abclay
Mark Twain once said, “God created man in his own image and man, being a gentleman, returned the favor.” While Mr. Twain is hardly a source of godly spiritual insight, his words provide an apt review of works such as “The Shack.”
Great observation, Tracy.
Thanks for posting this review. I’ve read over half the book, but only because I won it in a book give away. I would never have bought it since I had heard so many things about it that I knew were contrary to the WORD.
The first part of the book which was with a human was fine. But when I ran across the page where he MET GOD (no man has seen GOD) and GOD was a WOMAN, I almost dumped the book in the garbage. My first thoughts of the writing about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as it was very sacrilegious.
When it comes to writings such as The Shack, Christians need to use more discernment. We need to be able to recognize the difference in the truth and half truth, or no truth at all! It is easy to get off on the wrong path and lose our way.
Tracy, I think Twain’s quote is certainly spot on. We all have a tendency to make God in our image. Of this we should repent.
Barb, you are touching on exactly where many people have problems with the book. Of course, we understand the book is fiction, but the way God is personified just doesn’t sit well. Not to mention the influence people have said the book has. Combine these two items and this is where the rubber meets the road i.e. people are drawn to the wrong understanding of God.
Thanks for stopping by.
Mark
a couple of questions here:
1. a Hierarchy Trinity, isn’t that Jehovah’s witness theology?
2, we are all threatened by the Shack’s statement against a hierarchy church, but we do see in church history, there were times when church with hierarchy structures maybe spoiled, and we could see colts grow out of the strict hierarchy structure, should we down play personal relationships with God so we could have discernment?
3. I have just listened through the book, I believe I heard that Jesus says that he is the way not he is the best way
Ben,
Should we downplay discernment so we can have a personal relationship?
We need both. Otherwise the relationship may not be with the living God, but with one of our own making (i.e. an idol).
Cults may sometimes follow a hierarchy (or dictatorship), and they may also feel that they have great personal relationships with God and each other. However, in every case they have something in common – they do not worship the God who describes Himself in the Bible. Wrong doctrine is the hallmark of the cult.
Darrin’s last blog post..Response to Driscoll’s Presentation of Un/Limited Atonement: Introduction
Darrin,
Without a personal relationship (i.e. the Holy Spirit) there will be no discernment. You are right that the God from the Bible is the one to worship, and discernment surely comes from references from the Bible. So for example, Isn’t the reviewer’s sharp attack on God limit (humble himself) so he can have relationship with us contradict with what the Bible says about Jesus humble himself and died a death on the cross so we can be saved (have a relationship with God)?
The point of the book is healing. All other things are questionable. If you know the God you serve why do you fret over one book written about him in somone elses vioce/opinion? There are thousands of books written about the Lord and the way he works. Every one is worried about who said what- did you get the message is the point? As long as we are curious beings people will challenge your belief systems. No one is in control but the Lord, so why argue?
Its funny that i consider myself a Roman Catholic, sterotypically the most conservative Christian church, and yet i find objections to this book pretty amusing. What i don’t understand is how people can believe that something as incredible as God can be completely realized through human words found in scripture or even in Jesus’ thirty year life. Nobody understands God completely, only fragments found in scripture and their life experiences and the people who force their understanding on others are only fooling themselves. If people find revelation in The Shack and they become that much of a better person for it, then why the heck is it such a big problem. I know there are people in the world who essentially believe God exists solely for condemning non believers to hell, but unless you’re one of those people i really don’t see any reason why this book is such a big controversy.
I have tried to read The Shack. The first few chapters are ok–normal fiction. I cannot wrap my head around (not do I want to I realize) these ‘figures’ in the book. I kept reading only because I had heard “it is so good”. Halfway through and I cannot read anymore. I am secure in my faith–by grace and through Jesus is the ONLY way to salvation. Yes, I know it’s fiction–poor fiction at that. I have no problem understanding the ‘holy trinity’ without making them into a black woman, and an asian woman. At least Jesus was a carpenter–a bit closer to reality.
Sue,
This is a simple yet great point.
I have no problem understanding the ‘holy trinity’ without making them into a black woman, and an asian woman.
What boggles my mind is just how people better *understand* God based on this book.
Mark
Sue
Are you saying people cannot better understand God through the ministry of another? (ie. a book)
Or that personally you disagree with this books ability to minister to others? Or both?
Rather, Marks response to Sue
Are you saying people cannot better understand God through the ministry of another? (ie. a book)
Or that personally you disagree with this books ability to minister to others? Or both?
Lauren,
Stop asking me hard questions! Let me have my nuance! I’m kidding.
I am mainly referring to this book, yes. I *think* I can see in some ways how someone *might* understand God better. I’m really trying here. It was really tough for me to think in these terms while going through the book.
Darrin has given a very good biblical answer. I’m going to give you an illustration that should help with my position.
Imagine someone telling you about the most comfortable recliner that just came out. You’ve heard stories of just how soft, comfy and cozy it is. A good friend of yours has one and starts to describe it to you. You get excited as you really want one and want to hear first hand experience from a trusted source.
Your friend starts to describe a bicycle seat. It sounds small, hard and uncompromising. The picture you once had in your head is totally changed. You’re not sure how to think about the recliner now. Your friend still tells you of some benefits of how the recliner/bike seat gives you support, holds you up, keeps you in place, etc.
The recliner is no longer a recliner and your desire for it is no longer, too.
That’s sorta how I see The Shack when it describes and personifies God.
Thanks for dropping by and making me think some more.
Mark
Hi Mark,
I am greatly amused by the recliner/bicycle analogy! Now, let me get this straight…is The Shack the comfy, feel good version of God and the bicycle seat the more exacting but edifying view of God held by many Christian conservatives? Or is it the other way around? I think maybe some Christians might say the same about various interpretations of the Bible–they are promised the comfort but are given the rigid bicycle seat instead and then their “desire for it is no longer, too.” Or the inverse: they get so comfortable being supported that they forget to use their spiritual muscles and then feel something is “missing” in the end.
Perhaps the answer might be, recline and luxuriate in the Bible and other sources but never forget to spend more time on that bicycle seat–doing work that may not feel instantly gratifying at the moment? I, for one, hate exercising but I always feel better in the long run (no pun intended, I think).
I’m going to be pondering this post for awhile….thanks Lauren and Mark!
Excellent summary of some of the major issues with this book.
Lauren, I can’t speak for them, but since I’m probably of the same sentiments as they are:
Certainly I believe people can and do benefit, and are helped in understanding God, through the ministries of others. Or perhaps better stated, God reveals Himself to them using the means of other believers. This can definitely include writings as well as the spoken word. I personally have been helped greatly by written sermons and other works by several Puritans, for example.
We read in 1 Peter 4:10, ” As each one has received a gift, minister it to one another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.” Particularly if the gifts, as discussed for example in 1 Cor 12:28 and Eph 4:11, are among the teaching gifts, the Spirit-filled and Word-grounded believer will be used of God to communicate right doctrine (i.e. right = in accord with His written Word), which will include truths about who God is.
But at the beginning of 1 Peter 4:11, we read, “Whoever speaks is to do so as one who is speaking the utterances [or oracles] of God.” So if we are attempting to expound upon the character or mind of God, or hear or read something relating to God, we have here a strong caution to make sure that what is communicated is consistent with the Bible, which is the rule by which we judge all things. Obviously many of us are convicted that “The Shack” is terribly inconsistent with what God has revealed in the scriptures and thus is a serious misrepresentation of Him.
2 Peter 1:16, “For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty.” May we worship Him in spirit and in truth, according to all that is in agreement with the revelation of His majesty, and reject contradictions and counterfeits, no matter how cunningly devised.
Darrin’s last blog post..Response to Driscoll’s Presentation of Un/Limited Atonement: The Chart
Darrin
Thanks for your response. I was hoping that was not a blanket statement. God certainly uses the ministry of other brothers and sisters to edify the body. As to whether this book should be banned from christian homes, I think much interpretation of the writers intent is subjective and slanted by well meaning zealots. who frequent this domain. I personally do not agree with everything the Shack says, but still enjoyed seeing several topics brought up that are rattling our cage as evidenced by the fact that this blog topic won’t die.
I figured I’d let those who were interested in the The Shack one way or another in on the book giveaway I’m having. It’s a novel written by a Christian and I’m giving away a signed copy.
Details here!
Hi Ben, if you’re stiil out there. Sorry I took a long time to see your comment and question. I’m not used to recent comments showing up earlier in the thread as it is with this format, depending on how one replies. (That’s not really a complaint though, Mark.)
I appreciate your reference to the scriptures in discussing the humility of Christ. I believe though that biblically we need to distinguish between a humbling and a limiting. Christ is still described as the fullness of deity, as He who holds all things together. This is an unchangeable characteristic of the Son, as God is immutable. Jesus Christ is the same forever. We know that God is almighty, all-knowing, all-powerful, eternal. Limits are not ascribed to Him. The book at hand seems to take a man-centered view of the universe, where God is molded into whatever we think we need Him to be, which tends to be more like us. He is not really put forth there as sovereign Lord, infinitely distinct from man, and dealing with man as He sees fit. He certainly is abundantly gracious to save some by coming in the form of man, but He in no way loses the infinite deity which the scriptures ascribe to Him.
Sorry I’m not better at articulating this. There have been very good things throughout history written on this. The only thing I can think of right now was recently recommended to me, and that is Athanasius’ “On the Incarnation”, which can be read at ccel.org
← Previous Comments