I read the novel The Shack by William Young last week. I didn't want to like it. It seems like every year there is some new Christian book or film that everyone rallies around, claiming it is going to change the world. The purpose driven passion of Jabez or something like that. But as often happens, though, I find there is a reason this stuff is so popular - there is something powerful and worthwhile in it. I plan to write a few blog posts in order to help me untangle my mixed reaction to the novel...in this one, I just want to summarize my general impressions.
First, while it was not great literature, it was a powerful story - one that touched my emotions in both warm and painful ways. I was afraid going in that it would be overly sentimental - as I find Christian fiction often is. It seems that Christian authors want to write about suffering, but the way they do it comes off as if they are just using their character's suffering to get to emotional pay off in the end - much like a Saturday afternoon TV special would. The Shack did not come off in that way. I think the author knows something about suffering - and his honest, simply way of explaining it helped me to enter into that suffering and see myself in the story. I have never lost a child (thank God) but I have suffered at the hands of others, and I found myself grappling with my own history, my own wounds, as I read about Mack struggling with his. And when Mack moved through the epiphany of forgiveness (for himself, God, and his enemies), I was drawn in to struggle with my own challenges to forgive. In the end, I found it to be a story that dealt with real pain, real struggle, and moved toward real redemption.
Secondly, I was struck by the way Young portrayed the trinity, God himself. While there were parts where the story walked the line of corny - I didn't find it stereotypical. It surprised me with a creative perspective of God - and how God interacts within himself and with others. I was studying the incarnation for a message while I read this, so I found Young's presentation of Jesus particularly interesting. Did I completely agree with Young's portrayal of God? No (see point three below). Did I find it engaging, challenging, and even personally encouraging? Yes. The best part of the book for me was the way I walked away feeling invited into deeper relationship with God. I found myself in the shower the next day praying to Papa (the name the character uses for God in the book) - it caught me be surprise. It wasn't that I didn't feel close to God before. I did. But I found myself entering God's presence with a renewed intimacy. This has happened before (numerous times as I studied the Bible, in 2001 at a U2 concert, and many times in nature), and I welcomed the experience again.
Thirdly, and disappointingly, I struggled throughout with some basic theological misrepresentations or even errors. At this point, I will only deal with what I found to be the most glaring omission - and the greatest disappointment for me - was that Young missed a golden opportunity to contextualize the doctrine of substitutionary atonement. The cross of Christ was referenced - sometimes quite powerfully (as in the chapter where Mack is challenged to face his self-righteous judgment) but if the reader does not bring a fundamental understanding of the cross to the text, they will not walk away with it either. The cross is presented as God's greatest act of love. It is presented as God being willing to pay any cost in order to win back his lost children. It is presented as God's way of entering into our suffering and not standing apart and aloof (all three members of the trinity bear the marks of the cross - an interesting way of showing the suffering of God as a holistic person).
But at no time does Young tackle the issue of God's wrath being satisfied in the death of his Son. In fact, he never even offers any kind of explanation of why Jesus had to die for us, other than to imply it was an act of love. Some might say I expect too much because this is a novel, a work of fiction and not meant to be a systematic theology. Those "some" would be wrong. This isn't normal fiction - it is clearly designed to be theological treatise. It has page after page of God "explaining" his nature to Mack - which is nothing short of a fictionized form of narrative theology. Penal substitution isn't always a popular doctrine today - some going so far as to present it as divine child abuse - but it is central to understanding the cross. Jesus died in our place not just to give us a good example, not just to enter into our suffereing, but to act as our propitiation, satisfying God's righteous wrath toward our sin so that we could righteously enter into his free and unrestrained grace and love. Without a serious estimation of sin, we lose the serious depth of God's love. It is as we come to see the beauty of Jesus bearing the wrath of God on our behalf that we come to also see the true depth of his love (and the true nature of justice).
So, I liked the novel. I am glad I read it and it has impacted me in positive ways...but I will only hesitantly recommend it, though, and then to only select people who have a theologically sound foundation. Sadly, most people who read this will not have this foundation and - as systemic in our culture - these same people will establish their theology on this book made them feel instead of on the revelation from God.
First, while it was not great literature, it was a powerful story - one that touched my emotions in both warm and painful ways. I was afraid going in that it would be overly sentimental - as I find Christian fiction often is. It seems that Christian authors want to write about suffering, but the way they do it comes off as if they are just using their character's suffering to get to emotional pay off in the end - much like a Saturday afternoon TV special would. The Shack did not come off in that way. I think the author knows something about suffering - and his honest, simply way of explaining it helped me to enter into that suffering and see myself in the story. I have never lost a child (thank God) but I have suffered at the hands of others, and I found myself grappling with my own history, my own wounds, as I read about Mack struggling with his. And when Mack moved through the epiphany of forgiveness (for himself, God, and his enemies), I was drawn in to struggle with my own challenges to forgive. In the end, I found it to be a story that dealt with real pain, real struggle, and moved toward real redemption.
Secondly, I was struck by the way Young portrayed the trinity, God himself. While there were parts where the story walked the line of corny - I didn't find it stereotypical. It surprised me with a creative perspective of God - and how God interacts within himself and with others. I was studying the incarnation for a message while I read this, so I found Young's presentation of Jesus particularly interesting. Did I completely agree with Young's portrayal of God? No (see point three below). Did I find it engaging, challenging, and even personally encouraging? Yes. The best part of the book for me was the way I walked away feeling invited into deeper relationship with God. I found myself in the shower the next day praying to Papa (the name the character uses for God in the book) - it caught me be surprise. It wasn't that I didn't feel close to God before. I did. But I found myself entering God's presence with a renewed intimacy. This has happened before (numerous times as I studied the Bible, in 2001 at a U2 concert, and many times in nature), and I welcomed the experience again.
Thirdly, and disappointingly, I struggled throughout with some basic theological misrepresentations or even errors. At this point, I will only deal with what I found to be the most glaring omission - and the greatest disappointment for me - was that Young missed a golden opportunity to contextualize the doctrine of substitutionary atonement. The cross of Christ was referenced - sometimes quite powerfully (as in the chapter where Mack is challenged to face his self-righteous judgment) but if the reader does not bring a fundamental understanding of the cross to the text, they will not walk away with it either. The cross is presented as God's greatest act of love. It is presented as God being willing to pay any cost in order to win back his lost children. It is presented as God's way of entering into our suffering and not standing apart and aloof (all three members of the trinity bear the marks of the cross - an interesting way of showing the suffering of God as a holistic person).
But at no time does Young tackle the issue of God's wrath being satisfied in the death of his Son. In fact, he never even offers any kind of explanation of why Jesus had to die for us, other than to imply it was an act of love. Some might say I expect too much because this is a novel, a work of fiction and not meant to be a systematic theology. Those "some" would be wrong. This isn't normal fiction - it is clearly designed to be theological treatise. It has page after page of God "explaining" his nature to Mack - which is nothing short of a fictionized form of narrative theology. Penal substitution isn't always a popular doctrine today - some going so far as to present it as divine child abuse - but it is central to understanding the cross. Jesus died in our place not just to give us a good example, not just to enter into our suffereing, but to act as our propitiation, satisfying God's righteous wrath toward our sin so that we could righteously enter into his free and unrestrained grace and love. Without a serious estimation of sin, we lose the serious depth of God's love. It is as we come to see the beauty of Jesus bearing the wrath of God on our behalf that we come to also see the true depth of his love (and the true nature of justice).
So, I liked the novel. I am glad I read it and it has impacted me in positive ways...but I will only hesitantly recommend it, though, and then to only select people who have a theologically sound foundation. Sadly, most people who read this will not have this foundation and - as systemic in our culture - these same people will establish their theology on this book made them feel instead of on the revelation from God.
Comments
Brian (Carol Warke's husband :-))