The Shack - Book Review

The Problem of Evil - reconciling the coexistence of a perfectly good and all-powerful God with the terrible evil and suffering in the world - has long confounded the human race. In fact, the Bible dedicates a whole book to the subject. Many scholars believe the Book of Job to be one of the earliest canonized Scriptures written, if not THE first. Job, we are told, "was blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil" (Job 1:1).

In other words, Job was God's man. Yet God allowed him to suffer at the hand of Satan beyond both his and our understanding. It confronts head on one of life's greatest mysteries: why do bad things happen to good people? This is a question that everyone, Christ-follower or not, wrestles with sooner than later in this fallen world. By the way, God's answer to Job? "I am God and you are not."

Job, meet Mackenzie "Mack" Philips.

William P. Young's The Shack has been a popular foray into not only the Problem of Evil, but the character and nature of the triune God - Father, Spirit, and Son. One major mind-bending philosophical/theological reality at a time, please! The two realities are intertwined and explored around the life of Mack, a complex character who deals with his Great Sadness as tragedy strikes his life and shakes his often flawed understanding of who God is and how He works.

The book's popularity has not come without controversy, namely over some portrayals of the nature of God as well as some of the themes that are born out of Young's upbringing as a missionary kid among the Dani tribe in New Guinea. Many reviews and rebuttals have even made their way to Youtube and countless websites and blogs. Even prominent leaders are weighing in on it because of its popularity.

Lost in all the fuss is an important feature of the book - its genre. Most detractors stand on theological ground about God's nature, yet The Shack is not a theological work. In fact, it is at the very least a work of fiction, arguably an allegory. Some negative reviews I came across admitted to not even reading the book in its entirety; they were just taking aim at the most widely circulated theological complaints. I believe you need to 1. fully investigate (i.e. read cover to cover) something you harshly criticize, and 2. understand and judge it by its literary style and purpose.

I understand their criticisms from a theological perspective, and it does need to be read with discretion, but I can't help but to feel that some people have missed the forest for the trees. The main source of contention? Young gets in trouble for not-so-subtly challenging our preconceived notions that God is a bearded, grandfatherly figure who floats on clouds wearing a blazing white robe and reigns over creation by hurling bolts of lightning not unlike the Greek king of gods, Zeus. Without spoiling too much of the story, let's just say that God (as Father, Spirit, and Son) is humanized in a rather unorthodox way!

In doing so, he apparently did some "sacred cow" tipping. Young demonstrates that God's true nature is not that we merely know about Him, stuffing Him into our finite systematic theologies that mean little to nothing in the midst of a tragedy, but that we personally know Him as intimately as He knows us. You see, I think we all are guilty of casting our own graven, humanized images of God that, at the end of the day, fall woefully short of grasping who He truly is.

I'm theologically conservative, and I was not at all offended by The Shack. It blew fresh wind into the sails of my relationship with God and caused me to consider it in a new light. I believe it would do the same for you. I would recommend it without reservation, yet as with any fiction work (i.e. Left Behind series, Frank Peretti's works, etc.), I would caution you to read with discretion and not take it as a theological authority.

Does Young rattle the cage a little? Sure. Does he have good reason? You betcha. I'm I closer to God for reading it? Absolutely.

Will I put it on the shelf next to Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology or The C. S. Lewis' The Great Divorce?

I'll give you one guess...