The book "The Shack"
I just finished reading a wonderfu book, a New York Times bestseller called "The Shack". It's all about how God wants to heal the brokenhearted and how it's all
about relationship vs. an institutional mindset!
I welcome your comments!
Pat Rallo
about relationship vs. an institutional mindset!
I welcome your comments!
Pat Rallo
Views: 5
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Brenda Harkins on -
Paul Young spoke at the H2H Conference in Dallas and it was beautiful. He gave his testimony about how the book came about through his life wounds and healings. I think the coolest thing I heard him say was that "the shack" is the part of your soul where shame lives. Makes since why Mac was so angry at God for wanting to meet him there. It seemed cruel. But how beautiful it was when he arrived at the shack to find Papa already there! And it looked different than Mac thought. I have just been pondering this for the past week.
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Permalink Reply by Pat Rallo on -
Thank you, Claudia - that was well put! I didn't realize until this morning that there were any negative feedback surrounding this book. There was such wisdom in your response.
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Permalink Reply by Dena Brehm on -
Love it...!
I read it about 18 months ago, when it was unadvertised, and merely passed friend to friend. Our family and house church devoured it, and then Paul Young invited himself to our house, to discuss it. We've since purchased 4-5 cases (lost count), and passed them out (more fun and effective than tithing...!).
I've seen lives transformed, relationships blossom, and theologies get royally messed with. It's all good.
Paul Young was one of the speakers with many of us down in the H2H conference in Texas last week -- his talks were riveting. I've threatened to camp out on his front porch...
What spoke most profoundly to you, Pat?
Shalom, Dena
"The unanswered questions aren't nearly as dangerous as the
unquestioned answers."
"We turn to God for help when our foundations are shaking only to
learn that it is God shaking them." - Charles West
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Permalink Reply by Dena Brehm on
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Claudia, I'm so sorry for the pain you've had to endure -- may He bring you every comfort.
As for the reviews, they're mixed -- based on the number of record-breaking sales (3.8 million and climbing, and each book is likely read by more than one person...), I'd say the vast majority of reviews are actually positive, rather than negative. It's just that those who are defending religion and status quo (those whose very livlihoods depend on the system of religion enduring), stand much to lose by the message found in "The Shack". Thus, they are shouting the loudest. Those positively impacted by the book are quietly weeping, smiling, passing it on to those they love ... the need to shout, except for joy, having been removed from them.
Just one more comment here, about what you said.
Paul has said that while his book IS a novel, it is still true...
Jesus spoke in parables, which were fiction on one hand, and yet truth on the other.
Stories stick with us in a way that sermons never can ...
Shalom, Dena
"The unanswered questions aren't nearly as dangerous as the
unquestioned answers."
"We turn to God for help when our foundations are shaking only to
learn that it is God shaking them." - Charles West
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Permalink Reply by Dana Morrison on -
This is a great book for opening up areas to Papa that still need healing. I found myself feeling like Mac so often as it was easy to put a face to his injustice. We have neighbors (Russian) who lost their daughter Zinna in a very similar manner a year ago on the 4th of July and as I was reading the book I was asking Papa to give us a connection to get this to them. A few weeks later while we were test-driving a Scion being sold by a young lady, we found out she is engaged to the Lennik's oldest son. I was able to share about the Shack with her. She said she will check it out and then share it with the family. Pray for the Lennik family as they are struggling to recover from this loss. They are a strong Christian family and their precious daughter Zinna loved the Lord with a maturity that was beyond her years.
Blessings,
Dana Morrison
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Permalink Reply by Dena Brehm on
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Thanks, Claudia -- I like the quote, too. Very apropos for my life, as everything I once believed (that which I was taught while my husband was clergy, and prior in a mish-mash of varying Christian traditions), has been shaken to the core. It's been a tumultuous, reeling, invigorating, challenging, liberating and mind-blowing time, for the past 4-5 years.
While I understand where you're coming from, regarding wanting to use the Word as our plumbline of truth, I've come to view that a bit differently in recent years. I see that the Bible doesn't refer to itself, but to Jesus as the Word of God. The Bible, I believe, is meant to lead us to Jesus -- and He, rather than the Bible, is our plumbline of Truth... He who declared, "I am the Truth." And, as He tells us, the Spirit (not the Bible, though He may indeed use the Bible), will lead us into all truth.
I also see that He's the one who said, "I, if I am lifted up [crucified, the Atonement], will draw [meaning "drag"] all men to myself." This same one in whom was God, reconciling the world to Himself. The same one who will leave the 99 to go after the one who is lost [the Greek word means "destroyed"], seeking 'til He finds them.
I've come to dare to believe that Jesus is very serious about invading every human heart with an awareness of Himself, somehow, some way, beyond the limits of our human understanding. I believe He calls us all out of religion, every religion, unto Himself ... and that it's a process. It's a wooing, a drawing/dragging process. Incremental ... not so much a momentary decision-event. It seems He invites us to follow Him, get to know Him, and that we come to believe. But, I believe that each one, coming from various places/religions/cultures/baggage, will follow Him uniquely ... each one perhaps even seemingly looking more like what they came from, than like a western-cultured Christian. As Jesus says in "The Shack", I also don't believe that He came to make everyone a Christian (for Christianity is a manmade religion), but that He came to draw all of us to Himself. I also do believe that He will go down every path, to meet each one where they are.
For instance, while He was on earth, and was healing various ones -- have you noticed that He never healed the same way twice? He certainly never used the Judaic healing methods (which hugely irked the Pharisees, and other Jewish leaders). I used to think that was so that we wouldn't create a formula for healing (not that it stopped us...!). However, after some studying, I learned that Jesus actually met each one where he or she was -- using their own religious understanding (the particular pagan or variant belief system they were in), and even used the very healing rituals with which each one would be familiar & comfortable ... however, He supernaturally "sped up" the "process" and miraculously healed them -- so that they saw their own rituals transformed, redeemed, and replaced, by the One who created them in the first place.
I'm coming to believe that Jesus has also invaded every religion -- which may be why we find snippets of truth in all of them... though no religion, including Christianity, can contain the fullness of Him and His Truth.
I have many friends who would describe themselves as either mystics or universalists. In coming to know them, in wanting to understand what they believe and why, I've discovered that very may of them do in fact base their understanding of Jesus on the Bible. Augustine, in describing the universalists of his day, said he had, "a gentle disputation with certain tender hearts", and said that "a great many who, theough not denying Holy Scriptures, do not believe in endless torments." It seems that there were very many who believed that Jesus did, and would, save all, and that they coexisted happily in the early Church, among those who embraced the belief of endless torment in hell (nobody called anybody a heretic on these grounds, 'til Jerome, the emperor declared them thus, long after their deaths).
Would that we, like them, could learn to have unity, even without unanimity. Rather than any of us claming to already have all truth, we could join each other in following Him as He leads us there.
Just one woman's perspective, at this juncture of the journey, subject to further revelation...! ;)
Shalom, Dena
"The unanswered questions aren't nearly as dangerous as the
unquestioned answers."
"We turn to God for help when our foundations are shaking only to
learn that it is God shaking them." - Charles West
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Permalink Reply by Laura S on -
Dear Claudia, I am so sorry about your loss; I too have many friends who have lost children, and yesterday an elderly lady I am just getting to know shared the ghastly way her only child, son in law and baby were crushed to death in a freak accident---she is still devastated, years later. I went silent with the horror of what she shared, I think she felt I was unfeeling.
Maybe I will pass her the Shack although I have to confess that I haven't been able to get into this book, it might be timing as I'm distracted with many things.
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Permalink Reply by Dena Brehm on
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I echo your thoughts and experience, Cynthia. I'm a rather prolific bibliophile, but I'd have to say that this book has impacted me like none other ...!
Shalom, Dena
"The unanswered questions aren't nearly as dangerous as the
unquestioned answers."
"We turn to God for help when our foundations are shaking only to
learn that it is God shaking them." - Charles West
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Permalink Reply by Dena Brehm on
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Sorry for the delay, Claudia -- 'twas away at a conference, and celebrating our anniversary.
My thoughts weren't about the solo scriptura debate ... that's really not on my radar any longer.
I appreciate that we all are in various places in our journeys with Jesus, and that we've each got unique things to overcome, see, and experience. I trust Him to lead us in the way that's best for each one. He's big enough to meet us each where we are. We each have to walk in the Light we've been given, whatever that may be.
I don't think He's nearly as concerned about diverstiy as we tend to be ... in fact, I believe He both created it, and celebrates it.
So, again, for me, it's not so much about making a choice, but in responding to the renewing of our minds, as He does so.
No need for debates or arguments, just respecing His working in each heart and mind. I enjoy that we can have unity even without unanimity ...
Shalom, Dena
"The unanswered questions aren't nearly as dangerous as the
unquestioned answers."
"We turn to God for help when our foundations are shaking only to
learn that it is God shaking them." - Charles West
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Permalink Reply by Mark Winstead on -
The Institutional Church hates it!
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Permalink Reply by Karen Hogan on -
I too have just finished reading The Shack. I found it deeply moving and thought it was a beautiful window in to the type of relationship we are all welcome to have with God.
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Permalink Reply by Dena Brehm on
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Claudia wrote:
Cynthia, I too found some healing in reading the Shack. I had already begin my journey of healing before reading the book, but I still struggle with my responses in my grief. I lost my son Joey 2 years ago in a horribly tragic death--traumatic to say the least. I identified with Mack on so many levels, it was surreal at times. I admit that there were places where I had to stop reading because I could not see through my free flowing tears. I was deeply touched and affected by the Shack. As a matter of fact, since reading the book, I think I have only had one day where I spent a few hours in tears. (I read the book about 6 weeks ago.) That's a big deal for me.
Not bad for fluff, no...? ;)
Shalom, Dena
"The unanswered questions aren't nearly as dangerous as the
unquestioned answers."
"We turn to God for help when our foundations are shaking only to
learn that it is God shaking them." - Charles West
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