The Shack - A New Portrayal Of God (Part 2)

This week I will be addressing the final concern that I have with William P. Young’s bestselling book, The Shack. It surrounds the issue of the nature of sin and the work that Christ has done in order to address that problem in the lives of people. The question of what Jesus accomplished on the cross is vital because it will be intimately attached to how one sees the world’s problems and what one sees as being the solution for those problems. As I pointed out last week, Young defines sin as being a failure or refusal to depend totally upon God in life. Presumably, this refusal to trust God is motivated by a fear that He will somehow hurt us or that we will be betrayed. Young does not present it as a moral defect or an illicit love for that which we should not have. His portrayal has the effect of moving sin out of a moral category where judgment would be appropriate to a relational category of fear and distrust that seems to call for understanding and nurture. It is important to realize that the Bible represents sin as having both moral and relational origins and consequences. Young does not appear to understand this and presents only part of the truth. This would not be a problem if Young were clear that he is only presenting part of the truth, but sadly this is not the case. Instead he portrays a “softer” picture both of sin and of God’s reaction to it as being the whole truth. Consider the following quote from “Papa” [the representation of God the Father]: “I am not who you think I am … I don’t need to punish people for sin. Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside. It’s not my purpose to punish it; it’s my joy to cure it.” (p. 120) This is simply an insufficient view of humanity’s sin problem. Sin is certainly its own punishment, but that is not all that it is. It is also a moral evil that needs to be addressed judicially. The Bible is clear that God is merciful and patient, but that He is also an avenger of evil. Compare the quotation above with the Scripture’s comprehensive presentation of God’s character in Psalm 99: “O LORD our God, You answered them; You were a forgiving God to them, And yet an avenger of their evil deeds.” (Psalm 99.8 [NAS]) The Biblical writers understood that God’s mercy was not inconsistent with His justice.

Young’s treatment of sin simply as a failure to live in complete dependence upon God presents too passive a picture. Our problem is not merely that we fail to trust God, but that we have a nature that actively opposes His work in our lives. Young does not seem to grasp the fact that humans not only struggle to believe that God is good, but even when they believe in His goodness, they still struggle to conform their behavior and affections to that goodness. Papa misdiagnoses when she tells Mack, “The real underlying flaw in your life … is that you don’t think that I am good. If you knew I was good and that everything—the means, the ends, and all the processes of individual lives—is all covered by my goodness, then while you might not always understand what I am doing, you would trust me.” (p. 126)

This incomplete picture of sin and its consequences lead Young to an incomplete picture of the meaning of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. “Papa” describes Jesus’ significance in this way: “He [Jesus] gave up everything, so that by his dependent life he opened a door that would allow you to live free enough to give your rights.” (p. 137) In other words, since man’s problem is that he is not dependent enough upon God, Jesus came to provide an example of what the totally dependent life should look like. This makes His dependence upon God the central mission of His life rather than His sacrificial death and miraculous resurrection. Young sees the significance of Jesus in the fact that He provided a preeminent moral example that teaches His followers how they might come to live in radical dependence upon God. Papa describes this to Mack in the following ways:

“Although he [Jesus] is also fully God, he has never drawn upon his nature as God to do anything.”
“He is just the first to … absolutely trust my life within him, the first to believe in my love and my goodness without regard for appearance or consequence … Jesus, as a human being, had no power within himself to heal anyone.” (pp. 99-100)

While the moral example of Jesus is indispensable to His followers, it is not the central reason that He came. In His own words, He came, “to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." (Mark 10.45 [NIV]) Isaiah describes the nature of this ransom as follows, “For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.” (Isaiah 53.12 [NIV]) Both these verses describe Jesus as coming to redeem people from the power and guilt of sin. His example did not bring about this redemption, but His death and resurrection did. This is because of His unique position as both God and man who could both satisfy the demands of God’s justice as well as reveal the triumph of His mercy. This is the preeminent message of Jesus’ life and of the Scriptures that testify about Him; however, this message receives no attention in The Shack. God is said to have been completely reconciled to the whole world through the death and resurrection of Jesus, but Papa, who has much to say in the book about many other issues, devotes little time to explaining in more detail how the cross and empty tomb brought this reconciliation about.

In Young’s mind, the life of Jesus seems to be saying that God no longer has an axe to grind with anyone, and thus, the ball is in our corner and it is up to us to come to Him. But how we are to come is scarcely delineated in the book because apparently God no longer has any requirements of people. For instance, Papa tells Mack that, “I’ve never placed an expectation on you or anyone else … because I have no expectations, you never disappoint me.” (p. 206) Apparently, among the expectations that God has dispensed with, is His insistence that conscious faith in Jesus is the only way to come to Him. In the novel “Jesus” tells Mack that, “I am the best way any human can relate to Papa or Sarayu (i.e. the Holy Spirit).” (p. 110) This is in sharp distinction to the words of Jesus in John 14.6 wherein He claimed to be “the” way, not simply the best way. In fact, The Shack advances the notion that God is savingly revealed through many different systems of faith. Consider the following quote from “Jesus” in the book:
“Those who love me come from every system that exists. They were Buddhists or Mormons, Baptists or Muslims, Democrats, Republicans … I have followers who were murderers and many who were self-righteous … I have no desire to make them Christian, but I do want to join them in their transformation into sons and daughters of my Papa, in to my brothers and sisters, into my Beloved.” (p. 182)

I will conclude my treatment of this book by acknowledging that there are some useful things to be gained from it. Young employs some compelling metaphors and images that help the reader to approach certain truths from a fresh standpoint. He attempts to grapple intelligently with the perplexing mystery of how such evil could exist in a world created by a perfect and loving God. He seems to sense the ineffectiveness of much of what goes under the name of Christianity to address people on a profound heart level, and he desires that people should relate to God in a more intimate and transformative manner. I commend him for his aims and for his obvious literary talents, but as I have delineated above, I have grave reservations about some of the partial truths that he has presented as whole truths. Consequently, I cannot recommend the book to anyone except those who will read it with a keen and discerning eye. I pray that I have not been uncharitable to William Young or to the points that he intended to make.

The Shack - A New Portrayal Of God (Part 1)

Few people who run in Christian circles have not heard of The Shack, a surprisingly successful book that the author, William P. Young, originally wrote as a personal story for his children. In 2007, Young published the novel himself at the suggestion of friends and has watched as it has sold over 1 million copies. It is the fictional story of a man named “Mack” whose young daughter was abducted and killed by a serial murderer in a shack in the Oregon wilderness. Years later, Mack receives an invitation from God to meet Him at the shack so that He can help Mack work through the pain and anger he feels toward God over the death of his daughter. When Mack arrives at the shack he meets God as a trinity of a large African-American woman, a Jewish man, and a small Asian woman who correspond to God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, respectively. Most of the novel is dialogue between Mack and the members of the trinity as they explain the nature of life more fully and seek to disabuse him of several misperceptions he has about the nature of God. The object of this divine dialogue is to relieve Mack from “the Great Sadness” that has descended upon his life since the murder.

Judging from the sales figures and the buzz that this book has generated, it is clear that people are finding something compelling in The Shack. Everyone I know who has read the book has come away with strong opinions, some positive and some negative. Several people have asked me to read the book and provide them with an assessment of its message. They have asked me to do this because they feel that this is a novel that clearly has some lessons it is trying to teach about how we should relate to and understand God. I have read no other opinions or reviews of the book so that my assessment might be as unbiased as possible. I do, however, view this book, as I must view all lessons, through the lens of God’s Word. I have endeavored to be like the people described in Acts 17: “And the people of Berea were more open-minded … and they listened eagerly to Paul's message. They searched the Scriptures day after day to check up on Paul and Silas, to see if they were really teaching the truth.” (Acts 17.11 [NLT]) As believers, we are called to be an open-minded but discerning people. It is in that spirit that I read The Shack and have come away with serious concerns about many of the assertions that it makes. My concerns fall within three broad categories which I will describe below.

My first concern is that The Shack paints a rather dim view of Biblical revelation and the teaching ministry of the Church. I would be the first to admit that churches are not what they should be and that the Bible is too often taught in a spiritless, impractical manner, but Young seems to be taking issue with more than the fact that there is room for improvement in these areas. In various places in the novel, his main character, Mack, expresses frustration with the very idea that God principally reveals Himself through the Word of the Bible and the work of His Church. Consider passages like the following:

“In seminary [Mack] had been taught that God had completely stopped any overt communication with moderns, preferring to have them only listen to and follow sacred Scripture, properly interpreted, of course. God’s voice had been reduced to paper … it seemed that direct communication with God was something exclusively for the ancients and uncivilized, while educated Westerners’ access to God was mediated and controlled by the intelligentsia. Nobody wanted God in a box, just in a book.” (pp. 65-66)

Apparently, God needs to make Himself more plain to us than is possible through reading and being taught the Scriptures. This comes to Mack in the form of a note from God in the mailbox. In response, Mack comments that “part of me would like to believe that God would care enough about me to send a note.” (p. 71) Mack thinks that a note is a better way for God to express His love for us because otherwise all we have is a dusty book whose study is often a “tedious and boring exercise in coming up with the right answers, or rather, the same old answers to the same old Bible story questions, and then trying to stay awake during … excruciatingly long prayers.” (p. 107) This is the way that interaction with God’s Word is described in the book, and it is not presented as the biased view of one particular man. It is crucial for the reader to understand that the God of Young’s book is constantly challenging Mack’s “religious conditioning” and his “preconceived notions” which is the obvious agenda of the novel. The Shack is not targeted at unbelievers but at those of us who have grown up under Biblical instruction all of our lives, and the essential message is summed up by what God, the Father figure, (i.e. “Papa”) tells Mack: “I’m not asking you to believe anything, but I will tell you that you’re going to find this day a lot easier if you simply accept what is, instead of trying to fit it into your preconceived notions.” (p. 119) Unlike the Bereans, Mack is not urged to assess whether his notions are Biblical but rather to abandon his notions en masse. As he does so, he tells God that “This weekend, sharing life with you [i.e. with God] has been far more illuminating than any of those answers.” (p. 198)

Similarly, Mack is told to abandon the way in which he has commonly understood the Church. The Jesus character tells him that Christians have gotten the Church all wrong by failing to understand that, “It’s all about relationships and simply sharing life.” (p. 178) There is certainly a valid critique in this assessment of the Church as it is understood by many, but Young’s description of the “ideal Church” as needing no organization or expectations is overly simplistic and puts forth an organic and natural association that requires no effort, struggle or work. Mack responds to this revelation in these excerpts:

“For Mack these words were like a breath of fresh air! Simple. Not a bunch of exhausting work and long list of demands, and not the sitting in endless meetings staring at the backs of people’s heads, people he really didn’t even know. Just sharing life.” (p. 178)

“I find the way you are so different from the will-intentioned religious stuff I’m familiar with.” (p. 179)

“Mack was thinking of his friends, church people who had expressed love to him and his family. He knew they loved Jesus, but were also sold out to religious activity …” (p. 181)

I have no problem admitting that the Church needs to always keep relationships and life sharing at the center of its existence, but I do have a problem with the way in which Young portrays life sharing and relationships as being diametrically opposed to “meetings”, “exhausting work”, and “religious activity”. He seems to be advocating a Christian life that has everything to do with “being” and very little to do with “doing”. It is closer to the truth to say that our being and our doing must work in tandem.

My second broad concern is that The Shack seeks to explain something of the nature of God as three persons in one essence; however, it does so in ways that must be approached with caution. As the Trinity is an incomprehensible reality, I am inclined to grant Young a significant amount of latitude and artistic license in his portrayal. He rightly indicates that relationship is bound up within the very nature of God and that love is not merely a created reality, but that it is the essence of the dynamic that exists between Father, Son and Holy Spirit. No doubt the portrayal of this in the book will provide some help in attempting to apprehend this reality; yet, Young makes certain assertions about the nature of the relationship within the Trinity that need to be read with discernment. The two assertions that are most problematic concern authority and gender. The Bible is clear that God does not possess gender, bot He clearly reveals Himself to us in Scripture in masculine terms. Young’s portrayal of God the Father as an Aunt Jemima figure (a.k.a. “Papa”) is intended to be an iconoclastic way of declaring that God is neither male nor female. As “Papa” tells Mack, “For me to appear to you as a woman and suggest that you call me Papa is simply to mix metaphors, to help you keep from falling so easily back into your religious conditioning” (p. 93) Here we see what we have seen earlier, namely that “religious conditioning”, even that formed by Biblical truth must be overcome. In light of this, Mack asks why God seems to prefer being referred to in masculine terms in the Bible:

He asks, “why is there such an emphasis on you being a Father? I mean, it seems to be the way you most reveal yourself.”
“Papa” responds, “Well … there are many reasons for that and some of them go very deep. Let me say for now that we knew once the Creation was broken, true fathering would be much more lacking than mothering. Don’t misunderstand me, both are needed—but an emphasis on fathering is necessary because of the enormity of its absence.” (p. 94)

In other words, the principle factors that have motivated God’s self-revelation in masculine terms have been pragmatic. God reveals Himself as Father because the state of fatherhood is so deplorable. Presumably, He would have revealed Himself as mother had motherhood not been in relatively good shape. This is the typical way that feminist scholars deal with the Bible’s treatment of gender. Any portrayal of gender roles or distinctions are attributed to God’s accommodating Himself to cultural pressures or practical realities and are never seen as being in any way essential to the nature of God Himself. It should be understood that there is no Scriptural reason to believe that God’s masculine self-revelation is simply a concession to human depravity.

Young’s treatment of authority is equally troubling. He asserts that all authority is a result of man’s attempt to exert his independence from God. Authority structures have absolutely been corrupted by the fall, but the message of The Shack is that submission to authority itself is a result of the fall. Or, in other words, the universe is intended to have no authority structure to it because God’s nature is without authority. Jesus explains this to Mack as follows:

“Papa [i.e. “the Father”] is as much submitted to me as I am to him, or Sarayu [i.e. “the Holy Spirit”] to me or Papa to her. Submission is not about authority and it is not obedience; it is all about relationships of love and respect. In fact, we are submitted to you in the same way.”
“How can that be? Why would the God of the universe want to be submitted to me?”
“Because we want you to join us in our circle of relationship. I don’t want slaves to my will; I want brothers and sisters who will share life with me.” (pp. 145-146)

The concept of sharing life is Young’s central picture of what it means to have achieved godliness. It is a vision in which there is no authority but rather a simple being being one with everyone else. This conception bears far more similarity to the Hindu idea of Atman or the Buddhist idea of Nirvana than it does to the Christian notions of our submission to God as bride, servant, and child. Gone apparently is the Lord Jesus before whom every knee will bow and every tongue confess. Gone apparently is the King seated upon the throne of David judging the nations with equity. It is certainly a comforting truth to know that God lowers Himself to be of service to us, but the assertion that the Father is submitted to the Son is nowhere found in Scripture. Likewise, to contend that God is submitted to me in the same way that Jesus is submitted to the Father is to empty the terms "submission" and "authority" of any meaning.

Next week, I will treat the most significant problem I have with The Shack, namely its insufficient portrayal of the nature of the ministry and work of Jesus on behalf of sinful people.