The Shack

What is God's heart towards us? What does he really think about us? Does he have our best interests at heart?

Author and counselor John Eldredge has built an entire ministry around these very ideas. It is a ministry I have been blessed by, and because of the truth, grace, and freedom God has revealed through Eldredge and others like him, William P. Young's The Shack spoke right into the deepest, most sensitive parts of my heart. God used this book like a love letter. He used it as another experience, another step, in his pursuit of me, to father me and restore me.

I could go on and on and deeper and deeper, but I want to keep this simple. If you haven't read this book, I urge you to do so immediately. Non-believers and Christians alike can be blessed by it, if they only would read it with an open mind and heart, expecting to hear the very words from God that they have so longed to hear, that they so badly want to be true, yet fear so greatly to be false, hollow, meaningless, even a lie.

From where I stand, and most likely because I'm standing in this exact group, The Shack is a good remedy, or at least a start, for those who have moved lifeless through a world of legalistic and cerebral "churchianity." It is a light in a way for some who have struggled in darkness, guilty over their lack of zeal for God, floundering for a faith in a real Christ, and hoping (PRAYING) that there is more to this thing we call being a Christian. Is it really about rules? Is it really about Sunday mornings and putting more butts in the seats, volunteering for never ending programs and looking spiritual? Is it really about figuring out all the right answers, being a good person, not pushing the envelope, and remaining calm and collected? Is this really it? And even more so, it is a blessing and even a healing balm to those who have experienced tragic loss, and for those who have been damaged by their earthly fathers.

Young does an amazing work in his ability to personify the Trinity, as dangerous as that can be. I do not blindly accept something that is not the Bible as Bible-truth, so don't get me wrong. But in reading the words Young penned for God the Father, for Jesus, for Sarayu the Spirit, I couldn't help but think, "This is everything I've ever wanted to hear God speak to me." In reading the ways Young has these "characters" interact with each other, the love they share, the wholeness that makes God the communal and loving being that he is, I can't help but let my heart swell in love as I think, "This is the God I serve."

For those of you who do not have access to even the synopsis on the back cover, I'll throw out some quick foundational details ( just follow the link above, sillies). The protagonist, Mack (does that make God the antagonist?), is invited through a simple note to meet with God in the very shack that, several years earlier, his little girl had been murdered in by a serial killer. That right there is some heavy crap. Mack has history in the church, even attending seminary, but his struggle over the loss of Missy, his youngest, has destroyed his faith, and his ability to believe in a loving God who cares for and protects us and works for our best. It is a foundation for some phenomenal conversation and interactions. I will go no further, other than to once again urge you to read this book.

Father, thank you for the gifts and passions you bless us with. Thank you for the desires of our hearts that you not only give us, but allow us to live out, and for the myraid of ways you turn those back to your glory, inviting and helping us to turn back to you.