Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Book 6: The Shack
"Mackenzie Allen Philips' youngest daughter, Missy, has been abducted during a family vacation and evidence that she may have been brutally murdered is found in an abandoned shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Four years later in the midst of his Great Sadness, Mack receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, inviting him back to that shack for a weekend. Against his better judgment he arrives at the shack on a wintry afternoon and walks back into his darkest nightmare. What he finds there will change Mack's world forever. In a world where religion seems to grow increasingly irrelevant "The Shack" wrestles with the timeless question, "Where is God in a world so filled with unspeakable pain?" The answers Mack gets will astound you and perhaps transform you as much as it did him. You'll want everyone you know to read this book!"
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I ended up liking this book much more than I expected. I had heard nothing but good things about it, but I had also heard that it dove pretty deep into theology. Considering I have had plenty of experience with questionable mainstream theologies, I was concerned about the theological picture that this book would paint, and I was cautious not to buy into the hype too quickly. While I’m glad I came into it with a questioning perspective, I did not find too much that I would want to contend. Not that I agreed with every single little perspective, but given its broad audience, I found it to be insightful, interesting, and more challenging to me than I had anticipated.
ReplyDeleteWhile there is so much that one could go into concerning a book like this, I was struck most with the amount of involvement that the author portrayed God (or the Trinity) having in the world. This is a perspective that I have been simultaneously very drawn to and very cautious of.
My current view of God and the world (probably most influenced by Karl Barth [either directly or indirectly]) is one that tends to be more separate: God who is wholly other, sovereign, utterly transcendent, who is inconceivably more than I could possibly grasp with my finite mind. This is, in part, a reaction against the personalizations and anthropomorphizations of God, such that God’s grandeur is reduced to a really good best friend, or an ideal, or a few good concepts, something that we merely project out of our own human experience. These projections are precisely the reason I am so cautious of such an involved God. I have heard too many people attribute too many things to God, things that I am almost certain God would want no part of—some terrible things, but even some “good” things as well. Too much harm has been caused by people who cling to an idol of God, projecting all kinds of ideals onto it, and then living and acting as if they have no choice—God is commanding them to do it. I have seen the name of God be so used and abused to justify violence, prejudice, shame, malice, etc., that I have grown accustomed to automatically doubting when someone says that God caused this or that, or that God told them something. “How do you know for sure?”, I always think, “Not to say that God can’t do those things, but how do you know God did?”. I know many people who share these concerns, especially those who do not believe any God exists. They see a whole lot of people using “God” to justify their actions and to feel good about themselves, and they want no part of it. Rightfully so, neither do I.
However, my journey has involved too many conversations and classes and too much experience about these things to allow human folly to cause me to throw out God completely. That’s part of the beautiful mystery of it all, and it’s the story throughout the Bible. Despite humanity’s flaws and failures, God still redeems and loves and blesses God’s creation. Now at this point some will ask, “Well, in light of what you previously stated, how exactly does God ‘redeem’ and ‘love’ and ‘bless’ the world?”. That I don’t know. If anyone does, please let me know. That’s why we have this blog : ).
ReplyDeleteThe history of the Christian church, and the experience of so many people today, speaks to God’s involvement and sustaining presence. God’s prevenient grace (to use a good Nazarene concept) always comes before, to woo, invite, and draw Creation to God. While I am not sure how exactly that works, I do believe it happens. I don’t want to just use the word “faith” as soon as I can’t explain something, but at this point I’m okay with it. When we get into the realm of explaining the actions of a God who is infinitely beyond our grasp, to say anything “without a doubt”, would only be saying something about an idol of God, a false picture, and that is precisely what I have been so worried about.
Let me finish with one example. When something occurs that seems like a blessing, for instance when someone becomes cured of an illness in a way that seems beyond the medical care that was given, Christians often thank God. I am not sure when or whether God causes these things to occur (either directly or indirectly) or not, but is it not better to err on the side of thankfulness to a loving Creator and Nurturer? Furthermore, is it not better to see the world in the way Mac sees it at the end of the Shack? Is it not better to assume a loving God cares deeply about us and the rest of Creation? Is it not better to choose to see the beauty in life at every turn, in good times and in bad, and to live everyday in thankfulness for a life that is all gift?
(Or is it? And are we [am I] just fooling ourselves?)