We Need More Shack Time

from Between Two Worlds

Paul Grimmond reviews The Shack in The Briefing.

Here is the closing section:

How should we respond to The Shack? My first response was to run away as quickly as I possibly could. But then I realized that The Shack gets one thing right when it encourages us to meet God in the difficult issues. ‘The shack’ functions as a metaphor for two things: it is the place where we stuff the things that are too hard to think about, and the place where we meet with God face-to-face. Young is dead right to suggest that we need to get to know God in the midst of the hard questions. The problem is that he brings us face-to-face with a God who is not God at all. In his zeal to ‘free’ God from the chains of misunderstanding, Young has shackled God beyond recognition.The solution, though, isn’t to run away from ‘the shack’; the solution is to spend more time there—not in William P Young’s ‘shack’, of course, but in the place where the living God speaks for himself about the big issues of life. We need to spend more time gazing into the face of the God who reveals himself in the Bible. We need to think about the big questions of suffering and obedience and truth while we sit at the feet of our Lord. In fact, if we have been reading our Bibles, we will have found that these are issues that he is only too willing to discuss. Indeed, it is the triune God of Scripture alone who is both sovereign enough and good enough to deal with evil.

I am not pretending that there won’t be difficult questions. Nor am I suggesting that the answers will be totally satisfying for everyone. We may even need to accept that God is not willing to answer some of our questions right now. But we will certainly be better off hearing from the God who sent his Son to die for us, than listening to the god of our imaginations.

If western Christianity had spent more time in ‘the shack’ with the true and living creator, and less time wallowing around in our felt needs, then, just maybe, less people would have been fooled. We might have recognized The Shack for the empty shell that it is. Our churches might even have become places where people could meet face-to-face with the holy God of Scripture. Only when we come into the presence of the loving, holy, majestic, glorious, gracious, judging, rescuing, creating, sustaining and redeeming God, who holds the future in his awesome hands, will we have a real message to offer a world obsessed with pain.

The Shack & Universal Reconciliation Pt 3

 

from Herescope

The Theological Implications

Part 3: THE SHACK and Universal Reconciliation

By Pastor Larry DeBruyn

Writing from the standpoint of being a one time “theological buddy” of Paul Young, author of The Shack, James De Young notes that the “the most serious error is Paul’s embrace of Universal Reconciliation which lies imbedded in the book.”[15] When applied to Christianity, Universal Reconciliation (UR) behaves like a computer virus that first invades, and then infects the whole body of biblical Truth. Contradicting distinctive Christian teachings, UR proposes a dialectic that changes biblical beliefs about God’s love and justice, Jesus’ atonement, heaven and hell, and the balance between divine sovereignty and human responsibility.

Divine Love and Justice

In the composite of His being, the loving God is interested in personal relationships (John 1:12). But at the same time, He remains holy and just (Isaiah 6:1-7; Genesis 18:25). At one and the same time, He is both separate from and near to His creation and His creatures. At times, He even becomes angry with people (Ezekiel 16:26; 38:17-23).[16] After all, how should God feel about and respond to the crimes and injustices He sees perpetrated by one group or individual against others? Is He to idly stand by and let the villains get away with it? If UR is true, then, yes. Love trumps anger and justice. But if UR is not true, the answer is, no. Sooner or later, in this life or the next, God will bring the bad guys to justice and punish them. This is the wrath of God. But in sync with a UR worldview, The Shack manifests aversion to the idea of divine wrath.

Alluding to a biblical statement in the book of James—by the way, biblical allusion can peddle spiritual delusion—the sensual Sophia tells Mack that Jesus and Papa chose the way of the cross, “For love.” The “all-wise-Sophia” then explains to Mack, “He chose the way of the cross where mercy triumphs over justice because of love.”[17] Rebuking Mack, who is role-playing Judge, she asks, “Would you instead prefer he’d chosen justice for everyone? Do you want justice, ‘Dear Judge’?” (The Shack, 164-165) For salvation to be universal, the God’s love (mercy) must overrule God’s justice (righteousness) or sense of fair play.

When isolated from the rest of Scripture, and on the face of it, James’ statement (“mercy triumphs over judgment,” James 2:13b), might seem to support the contention that God’s mercy will trump His justice in the end. But as the context shows (James 2:1-13), James is addressing the issue of equity between people, admonishing them to work out their relationships according to God’s rules (“Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself . . . Do not commit adultery. . . Do not kill.”). If they discriminate against the less fortunate around them, if they fail to love their fellows, then they can be certain of one thing: “judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy” (James 2:13a, NASB). In other words, the first half of the verse affirms our accountability to God for how we treat others. Give no mercy in this life, receive no mercy in the next life (Compare Matthew 5:7.). On the other hand, the merciful will be exonerated, for in the last judgment “mercy triumphs over judgment” for them. Ironically, the first half of the verse affirms the opposite from what UR supposes the last half does; namely, that love overrides justice. But because God’s being is balanced, His love does not diminish His justice (Galatians 5:21; Revelation 20:10, 15; 21:8; 22:15). Yet one scene in the The Shack suggests otherwise.

In a comfortable, schmoozing, and relational conversation about the Canadian rock musician Bruce Cockburn, Papa says to Mack, “Mackenzie, I have no favorites; I am just especially fond of him.” Mack then responds, “You seem to be especially fond of a lot of people . . . Are there any who you are not especially fond of?” After pensively contemplating the question, Papa responds, “Nope, I haven’t been able to find any. Guess that’s jes’ the way I is.” (The Shack, 118-119) Bingo! God is as “fond” of Nero, Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, and Saddam Hussein as He is of Jesus, or Mother Theresa. It’s all one big “circle of relationship” (“Kum Ba Ya”). As Morris comments,

The other religions of the world, in either ancient or modern times, lack a deep sense of the purity and holiness of God and of the ill desert of sin. It is thought unpalatable to man that God’s holiness must be taken seriously in any attempt to solve the problem of reconciliation.[18]

Any universalism necessitates imagining a God at variance from His transparent self-disclosure in the Bible. So this exchange of divine wrath in favor of divine love causes The Shack to jettison the doctrine of Jesus’ penal and substitutionary atonement for sin.

Jesus’ Cross and Sin

Theologian Wayne Grudem explains that the penal-substitutionary atonement of Christ “has been the orthodox understanding of the atonement . . . in contrast to other views that attempt to explain the atonement apart from the idea of the wrath of God or payment of the penalty for sin.”[19] Because in The Shack’s view divine love supersedes divine wrath, we would expect to find indication in the book that Jesus did not die as our representative to provide a penal-substitutionary atonement for sin. And this we find.

No Punishment—Oh Really?

In a poignant moment with “deep sadness in her eyes,” Papa tells Mack,

I am not who you think I am, Mackenzie. I don’t need to punish people for sin. Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside. It is not my purpose to punish it; it’s my joy to cure it. (The Shack, 119-120)

Thus, a Christian reader is left groping to explain why Jesus died. We need to understand the relationship of human sin to divine punishment.

Though Paul Young vaguely infers that the atonement might be substitutionary (The Shack, 162), he does not, for reason of love eclipsing wrath, and for Papa’s co-crucifixion with Jesus, present it as the payment of a penalty for sin (Remember Papa said: “I don’t need to punish people for sin.”). The issue is not whether God needs to punish people for sin. After all, who are we to tell God what His needs are, or are not? The issue is whether God does punish sin, and according to the Bible, He has punished and still punishes sin.

The Bible tells us that physical death is God’s continuing punishment for sin. We may deny we’re sinners, we cannot claim exemption from death. The Apostle Paul wrote, “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned” (Romans 5:12; Compare Genesis 2:16-17.). So if God possesses no “need” to punish people for sin, then why not abolish death now? But excepting the generation of the translation (1 Corinthians 15:50-56), we are all destined to die. As a pundit put it, “The statistics on death are overwhelming. One out of one person dies!” Death happens. I know, for as a pastor, I’ve officiated at hundreds of funerals. So about the inference that God doesn’t punish sin, let’s get real. If He still punishes sin in time, how can we be sure He won’t punish sin in eternity? We can’t, and this fact brings us to consider the death of Jesus.

Jesus’ Penal-Substitutionary Atonement

Though men dispute the reason for Jesus’ death, and whether or not He was raised from the dead, they do not dispute that He died. That’s history. He lived. He died. In light of death’s cause, that it remains a continuing punishment for sin, the begging question becomes—why did Jesus die? Did He die to be punished for His own sins? If so, then He was just another sinner like the rest of us because “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). But the Scriptures declare Him to be sinless (Hebrews 4:15; 1 Peter 1:19). Thus, did He, as opposed to the forbidding idea that He died for His own sins, vicariously die as the penal substitute for the sins of others? The Scriptures declare this to be the reason Christ suffered and died (Isaiah 53:4-6; 2 Corinthians 5:21). In fact, that’s why Jesus said He would die (Mark 10:45) Now either Jesus deserved to die for His own sin(s), or He died for the sins of others. As Donald Macleod summarizes:

People speak with horror of ‘the penal theory of the atonement’. But what happened to Christ on the cross? He died. And what is death? It is the penalty for sin! . . . On that cross He was dealt with as sin deserved. The glory of it is, it wasn’t His own sin. It was our sin. He bore the sin of the world (John 1:29). [20]

As with other world religions, and believing that people want a relationship with God,[21] universal salvation rejects the idea that sin is a personal offense against God that deserves punishment (Contra Psalm 51:1-4; Romans 3:21-26; 1 John 2:2; 4:10.). Therefore, the demand for penal propitiation of sin becomes unbecoming of “touchy-touchy-feely-feely” god who has been manufactured by our emoting culture and church.

Jesus’ Death—an Inspiring Example

So if all persons are saved (i.e., universally reconciled), then the question arises, “Why the cross in the first place?” Robertson McQuilken summarizes the dilemma. He writes that universalism,

. . . undermines belief in the atoning death of Christ. For if all sin will ultimately be overlooked by a gracious deity, Christ never should have died. It was not only unnecessary, it was surely the greatest error in history . . . Universalism . . . demands a view of the death of Christ as having some purpose other than as an atonement for sin. [22]

Thus in the salvific scheme of universalism, Jesus died for some reason other than that we might be forgiven for our sins.

Beginning with Abelard (1079-1142), liberal Christianity proposes that Jesus died to provide mankind with an inspiring and sacrificial example. Though His death does give us that (John 15:13), the implications of His atonement are far more profound.

As I see it, the atonement theory of The Shack seems to be that Jesus died to provide a sacrificial example of love for individuals to induce and inspire them to become more selfless as they seek “relationship and reconciliation” with God and with others.[23] (The Shack, 225) One theologian frames the liberal theory of the atonement: “If there is anything liberal theology is agreed upon it is that the frequent biblical references to God’s wrath (anger, displeasure, indignation, rage, vengeance) must be interpreted down to mean something like frustrated love.”[24] And that is exactly how The Shack interprets God’s wrath. Persons not choosing relationship with God merely frustrate His love for them, a love which in the end, will universally win out.

In a Universal Reconciliation scheme of redemption, divine wrath needs to be toned down. This may explain why The Shack pictures Papa as having been co-crucified with Jesus. (The Shack, 95, 102, 107, 222) As evidenced by the Jesus-like scars on her wrists, Papa had magnanimously borne her own wrath. Perhaps Papa even atoned for her sins. Who knows? But in that Papa was crucified with Jesus, it cannot be held that Christ suffered and died alone as man’s penal-substitute.[25] (The Shack, 96) In a supreme exhibition of love, Papa took the hit herself. This is the ancient heresy of modalism in which the three members of the Trinity are so fused in their relationship that any personal distinction between them is lost.

Heaven and Hell

According to the worldview of The Shack, Hell cannot exist because evil, however it may be perceived, is not real. It’s a mirage. Sarayu (the Holy Spirit) tells Mack, “Both evil and darkness can only be understood in relation to Light and Good; they (i.e., ‘evil and darkness’) do not have any actual existence.” (The Shack, 136) The logic of universalism might be constructed like this:

• The omni-present God of light is omni-benevolent toward all people.
• Hell would be a restricted, dark, and malevolent place.
• Therefore, assuming God’s omni-presence and benevolence, hell can’t exist.

Thus, as a place of “eternal punishment” and “outer darkness” (Matthew 8:12; 22:13; 25:30, 46), universalism denies the existence of hell. God is “fond” of everyone. Universal Reconciliation cannot allow for a place where men are eternally separated from God, where any hope for “relationship” with God would be devastated.[26] However metaphorical it might be, I think of the sign over the inferno in Dante’s Divine Comedy, “All hope abandon ye who enter here.” Hope can’t happen in hell.

Divine Sovereignty and Human Responsibility

It can also be charged that UR is fatalistic. Freedom of choice is violated to such a degree that even atheists are forced to spend eternity with a person they do not like in a place where they did not want to go—with God in heaven. There are fools who mutter in their hearts, “No God” (Psalm 14:1; 53:1). Sadly, the Bible describes some people as “haters of God” (Romans 1:30). Are we to project that such individuals, who in this life possess deep animus toward God and who have spent the majority of their lives despising and/or denying Him, will derive one moment’s enjoyment from being in the presence of the One whom they loathe? Will God grab these despisers and deniers by the nape of their necks and drag them “kicking and screaming” into heaven? Thus, C.S. Lewis wrote:

There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, ‘Thy will be done,’ and those to whom God says, in the end, ‘Thy will be done.’ All that are in Hell, choose it. Without that self-choice there could be no Hell. [27]

Similarly, Alister McGrath also remarks: “Universalism perverts the gospel of the love of God into an obscene scene of theological rape quite unworthy of the God whom we encounter in the face of Jesus Christ.”[28]

Conclusion

Absent faith in and acceptance of the truth, the differences between God and sinners are irreconcilable. Exhibiting that people can and do reject “relationship” with God, even after extensive pleading to be reconciled, Jesus lamented over the ancient Jewish nation, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!” (Emphasis Mine, Matthew 23:37, KJV). If any person refuses relationship based upon the terms of the Gospel, they will remain un-reconciled to God—forever. But Christian believers have been reconciled and possess an eternal relationship with God through the penal and substitutionary blood atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ. As a hymn writer states:

Bearing shame and scoffing rude,
In my place condemned He stood—
Sealed my pardon with His blood:
Hallelujah! what a Savior!

Guilty, vile and helpless we,
Spotless Lamb of God was He;
Full atonement! Can it be?
Hallelujah! what a Savior! [29]

The Truth:

“For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:21)

Endnotes:
15. De Young, Back of the Shack, 3. De Young notes that, “The greatest doctrinal distortion in the book is Paul’s assumption of universal reconciliation” (p.3), and that the book’s storyline has “universal reconciliation at its base.” (p.4)
16. “A study of the concordance will show that there are more references in Scripture to the anger, fury, and wrath of God, than there are to His love and tenderness.” See Arthur W. Pink, The Attributes of God (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1975) 82. After describing the fear of a little boy who, because of intimidating scenes recorded in the Old Testament, thought of Jehovah as a “dirty bully,” a liberal preacher explained: “We have long since rejected a conception of reconciliation associated historically with the idea of a Deity that is loathsome. God, for us, cannot be thought of as angry . . . who because of Adam’s sin must have his Shylockian (i.e., ruthless money-lending) pound of flesh.” See G. Bromley Oxnam, Preaching in a Revolutionary Age (Freeport, New York: Books for Libraries Series, 1971) 79. The book comprises the Lyman Beecher lectures on preaching at Yale Divinity School, 1943-44.
17. The allusion is to James 2:13, where the second half of the verse states, “mercy triumphs over judgment” (NASB).
18. Morris, The Cross, 250-251.
19. Emphasis Mine, Wayne Grudem, (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1994) 579.
20. Donald Macleod, A Faith to Live By, Understanding Christian Doctrine (Great Britain: Christian Focus Publications, 2002) 151.
21. Contra Romans 3:11 which says, “there is none that seeketh after God.”
22. Robertson McQuilken, The Great Omission, A Biblical Basis for World Evangelism (Waynesboro, Georgia: Authentic Media, 2002) 41.
23. Vernon Grounds summarized that Abelard’s “view of our Lord’s passion, exhibiting the great love of God, so frees us from the fear of wrath that we may serve him in love.” Grounds notes that by subordinating “everything to the controlling idea that the cross” is the demonstration of God’s love, man’s love for God is “almost automatically” drawn out in return. Ground’s summary of Abelard’s theory describes the meaning of the atonement presented in The Shack. See Vernon C. Grounds, “Atonement,” Baker’s Dictionary of Theology, Everett F. Harrison, Editor-in-Chief (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1960) 73.
24. Robert Duncan Culver, Systematic Theology (Great Britain: Christian Focus Publications, Ltd., 2005) 553.
25. Papa tells Mack, “Don’t ever think that what my son chose to do didn’t cost us dearly. Love always leaves a significant mark . . . We were there together.” (The Shack, 96) This statement is made in spite of the fact of Jesus’ cry, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46).
26. Brian D. McLaren disdains “violence and war” writing that it “is one of the reasons many of us have become critical in recent years of popular American eschatology in general, and conventional views of hell in particular.” See Everything Must Change (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2007) 144. Nobody I know likes violence and war. I don’t. Yet the testaments, both Old and New, from beginning to end, contain it. Is the eschatology, McLaren and others are critical of, American, or biblical? Remember: America did not hatch the Bible.
27. C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce, The Best of C.S. Lewis (New York: Christianity Today, Inc., 1969) 156. I thank Dr. De Young for drawing my attention to Lewis’ quote.
28. Alister McGrath, Justification by Faith (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1988) 106. Again, I note that Dr. De Young drew my attention to Lewis’ quote. Though he is an Arminian within the camp of open theism, Clark Pinnock states: “Universalism is not a viable position because of the gift of human freedom.” See William Crockett, General Editor, Four Views on Hell (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996) 128.
29. Philip P. Bliss, “Hallelujah, What a Savior!” The Celebration Hymnal (Dallas: Word/Integrity, 1997) 311.

The Shack & Universal Reconciliation Pt 2

from Herescope

By Pastor Larry DeBruyn

The Christian underpinnings of The Shack make it necessary for the allegory to deal with fallen humanity’s relationship with God, for as the prophet told Judah, “[Y]our iniquities have made a separation between you and your God” (Isaiah 59:2). For reason of sinning, the Bible depicts man to be living in a broken world and estranged from God. Thus Papa explains to Mack why things are the way they are when she says to him, “The world is broken because in Eden you abandoned relationship with us to assert your own independence.” (The Shack, 146) Consistent with the allegory’s antiauthoritarian and antinomian bent, The Shack defines sin as abandoning relationship.

But the Bible defines sin as breaking God’s rules, for as John wrote, “sin is the transgression of the law” (1 John 3:4). The dynamic of sin is more than deserting relationship with God. In the allegory’s explanation of the world’s brokenness and the importance of relationship over rules, a theological inconsistency arises. It is this: To explain his “sin-is-abandoning-relationship” theory, the author refers to the very Eden narrative in Genesis where God ordered Adam, “from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat” (Emphasis mine, Genesis 2:17). Ironically, by breaking the rule of God, Adam broke relationship with God. For doing so, God expelled Adam from Eden. So rules do have something to do with relationship. In fact, rules are tests of relationship! “Thou shalt not murder,” it seems to me, would have been a good rule for Missy’s killer to have obeyed. If he had, there would have been no Great Sadness.

Though for reason of God’s grace, obedience to rules does not determine a person’s relationship with Him (Ephesians 2:8-9), but His rules do define what a relationship with Him looks like. Those who love God will not place other gods before Him. Those who love other persons will not abuse them. Anyone can say to someone else, “I love you!” Some men use the statement to manipulate and use women. They say it but do not mean it. So the greater question becomes, “Do you love me?” The Apostle Paul wrote that “love does not” (Emphasis mine, 1 Corinthians 13:4). Love is more than saying. Love is doing, and to that end, and as the Ten Commandments indicate, rules define “doing” love.

So the question becomes, after ruining our Eden by our sin, after having broke “relationship” with God, how can we reconciled to Him? Note: Though we need to be reconciled to God, God does not need to be reconciled to us. He has done nothing untoward to offend us. But before dealing with our necessity to be reconciled to God, William Paul Young’s position should to be noted; that is, he believes in a Universal Reconciliation* (UR) which finds basis in God being reconciled to the world.

Wayne Jacobsen, one of Young’s collaborators and editors in writing The Shack, admits that Universal Reconciliation was part of the book’s “earlier versions because of the author’s partiality at that time to some aspects of what people call UR.”[7] And according to a professor and acquaintance of the author, “Paul’s embrace of universal reconciliation . . . lies embedded in the book.”[8] But just what is Universal Reconciliation?

In the words of one theologian, Universal Reconciliation,

. . . maintains that Christ’s death accomplished its purpose in reconciling all humankind to God. The death of Christ made it possible for God to accept all humans, and he has done so. Consequently, whatever separation exists between a human and the benefits of God’s grace is subjective in nature; it exists only in the human’s mind. [9]

In short, Universal Reconciliation holds that without exception, and for reason of Christ’s atonement, all persons are saved. The world needs to do nothing to be reconciled to God, for according to Papa, she is fully reconciled to the world.

While talking with Mack, Papa leans forward, crossing her arms on the table, and says to him, “Honey, you asked me what Jesus did on the cross; so now listen to me carefully: through his death and resurrection, I am now fully reconciled to the world.” (Emphasis mine, The Shack, 192) In a later conversation, Papa tells Mack, “In Jesus, I have forgiven all humans for their sins against me, but only some choose relationship.” (Emphasis mine, The Shack, 225) Rightly, the allegory points to Jesus’ cross as the centerpiece of reconciliation. But wrongly, on a number of counts, Papa’s statements can be misleading.

First, God’s state is not one of being reconciled to the world. In fact, God does not need to be reconciled to the world for He has never done anything to estrange Himself from the world. About the New Testament passages dealing with reconciliation between man and God, James Denney commented in his classic work, The Death of Christ,

Where reconciliation is spoken of in St. Paul, the subject is always God, and the object is always man. The work of reconciling is one in which the initiative is taken by God, and the cost borne by Him; men are reconciled in the passive, or allow themselves to be reconciled, or receive reconciliation. We never read that God has been reconciled. [10]

Denney’s statement contradicts Papa’s.

To see whether Denney’s observation is correct, we should notice three central New Testament passages that mention man’s reconciliation to God (Romans 5:10; 2 Corinthians 5:18-21; Colossians 1:21, KJV). In each of these passages, God is the subject of reconciliation, and man is the object. In these passages, man is reconciled to God, and not the other way around. We quote.

For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. (Emphasis mine, Romans 5:10) God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God. (Emphasis mine, 2 Corinthians 5:18-20) , that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled In the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight . . . (Colossians 1:21-22)

And all things are of

And you

These Scriptures do not reveal God is reconciled to man. God possesses no “need” to be reconciled to sinners. While through the cross God reconciles sinners to Himself, it is not the other way around. In this regard, the two adverbs which modify “reconciled” in Papa’s statement are troubling.

The first adverb “I am now” suggests there was a time when God was not reconciled to sinners.[11] The adverb describes the state of something in the present that was not the case in the past. But as has already been noted, the cross did not reconcile God to sinners, but rather sinners to God. From God’s perspective, the atonement made the world savable.

The following adverb, “I am now fully,” implies that nothing else is needed for reconciliation to occur.[12] Papa’s declaration makes it seem that, as far as God is concerned, reconciliation is a done deal—that peace between God and man has been secured when in fact it has not. Yes, on the basis of Jesus’ atonement, God offers the “olive branch” of reconciliation to people, but it does not stand that they are automatically reconciled to God or are moved to accept His peace plan (i.e., the Gospel). As has been pointed out, people do refuse to believe the Gospel thereby short circuiting relationship with Him. It cannot therefore be rightfully stated that God is “now fully reconciled to the world.”

Second, the world’s standing is in fact, not one of being fully reconciled to God. The “atonement” of Jesus forces nobody into “at-one-ment” with God. Though the cross makes reconciliation with God accessible to man, it is not thereby consequent that all persons will receive the reconciliation He offers, for God does not coerce people into relationship with Him. He invites, but does not impose. Thus, after declaring others and himself to be “ambassadors for Christ,” the Apostle asks, “as though God were entreating through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God” (Emphasis mine, 2 Corinthians 5:20). If everybody stands “now fully” reconciled to God, then Paul’s plea is unnecessary. But in the cross, God is simply saying to man, “These are the terms by which you may be reconciled to Me. Now, it’s your move.” Theologian Thomas Oden states that the completed work of the cross is an offer . . .

to receive God’s reconciling act. Until that occurs through repentance and faith, the sinner remains behaviorally unreconciled to God, even though God offers it already as a gift . . . [13]

But obviously, there is a sense in which, despite the cross, all persons do not receive God’s pleading invitation to be at peace with Him. For whatever the reason, many persons ignore or refuse God’s invitation. They are not moved. They follow their own spiritual agenda. For example, the agenda of some is atheistic. They mock the thought of God’s existence. The agenda of others might be hedonistic. They love “feel-good” experiences more than God. Others are narcissistic. They love themselves more than God. Others in life are materialistic. They love things more than God. If any of these attitudes dictate our lifestyle, then Scripture declares that, “the love of the Father is not in” us (1 John 2:15). Of spiritual infidelity, James states: “Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God” (James 4:4). There are those who mock the Gospel, who think of it as either foolishness or a scandal (1 Corinthians 1:23). Do such attitudes and responses evidence a state of being at peace with God? Without exception, all persons are not “fully” reconciled to God, for if they were, they would all be saved. So the question arises, how can someone be reconciled to God?

Adolf Schlatter stated that because reconciliation is an aspect of justification, “reconciliation occurs by faith” (Romans 5:8).[14] Absent repentance for sin and faith in the Gospel, persons will remain un-reconciled to God (Romans 1:5; Hebrews 11:6). Though God extends the olive branch of peace to people, many refuse to accept the divinely initiated overture thereby imploding the whole reconciliation process. They refuse to accept God’s peace plan. The sinful rebels remain at war with God. We turn now to address the theological implications of universalism—how UR affects other vital Christian teachings.

Stay tuned for the riveting conclusion . . . .

The Truth:

“But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him” neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” (1 Corinthians 2:14)

Endnotes:
7. Wayne Jacobsen, “Is The Shack Heresy? LifeStream Blog, http://lifestream.org/blog/2008/03/04/is-the-shack-heresy/ Windblownmedia.com).
8. An acquaintance of Paul Young, a “theological buddy,” has written an extended essay that tracks The Shack’s universalism. See James B. De Young, At the Back of the Shack a Torrent of Universalism (Damascus, Oregon: Revised May 2008, 39 pages). Professor De Young’s essay can be downloaded online in a PDF format at (http://theshackreview.com/content/ReviewofTheShack.pdf). Like Jacobsen in the preceding quote, De Young states, “About four years ago Paul embraced universal reconciliation, and strongly defended his decision” (p. 5).
9. Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology, Second Edition (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1998) 1027.
10. Emphasis mine, James Denney, The Death of Christ (Minneapolis: Klock & Klock Christian Publishers, Inc., 1982 Reprint) 103. Morris also states: “It is interesting to notice that no New Testament passage speaks of Christ reconciling God to man. Always the stress is on man being reconciled. . . . It is man’s sin which has caused the enmity.” See Leon L. Morris, “Reconciliation,” The New Bible Dictionary, J.D. Douglas, Organizing Editor (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1962) 1077. Further, of the eleven New Testament mentions of reconciliation, “in every instance man is said to be reconciled to God.” See John F. Walvoord, Jesus Christ Our Lord (Chicago: Moody Press, 1969) 179.
11. As dictionaries define the word, “now” means “at this time or moment . . . nowadays.” See The Random House College Dictionary, Revised, Laurence Urdang, Editor in Chief (New York: Random House, 1988) 911.
12. The word means “containing all that can be held; filled to the utmost capacity; . . . complete; entire.” See Ibid. 534.
13. Thomas C. Oden, The Word of Life, Systematic Theology: Volume Two (Peabody, Massachusetts: Prince Press, 1989) 356.
14. Adolf Schlatter, The Theology of the Apostles, Translated by Andreas J. Köstenberger (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1999) 246.

*UR is the belief that every person who has ever lived is, or will ultimately be, either before or after death, reconciled to God. Historically, universal reconciliation leads to Unitarianism which denies the biblical Trinity. After all, if God saves all persons, who needs Christ and His atonement on the cross, or the application of salvation to the human soul by the Holy Spirit? Universalism makes the Trinity unnecessary!

The Shack and Universal Reconciliation

from Herescope

Relationship, Rules and Reconciliation[1]

By Pastor Larry DeBruyn

Reconciliation means a change in “relationship.”[2] The need for reconciliation presupposes estrangement between two parties (Matthew 5:23-24). Whereas they became enemies, two parties become friends again. Often, reconciliation needs to occur between humans, between friends, spouses, races, tribes, and nations. But reconciliation also needs to occur between people and God. Though Paul stated that the Colossians were “reconciled,” he noted that in their former state they had been spiritually “alienated” from God (Colossians 1:21-22). Because of our sinfulness we are all separated from God, and need to be reconciled with Him. As such, the doctrine of reconciliation is core to the Christian faith. As White remarks, “Since a right relationship with God is the heart of all religion, reconciliation, which makes access welcome and fellowship possible, may be regarded as the central concept in Christianity.”[3]

In contrast to those who are “enemies of the cross of Christ” and “lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God” (Philippians 3:18; 2 Timothy 3:4), the Bible calls faithful Abraham “the friend of God” (James 2:23; Romans 4:3). In their relationship to God, all humanity falls into two groups: they are either His friends or enemies. Either, they are reconciled to God, or they are not. The Shacktherefore, is big on relationships.[4]

In a conversation between members of the trinity and Mack, Sarayu tells him (though Papa might be speaking), “Mackenzie, we have no concept of final authority among us, only unity. We are a circle of relationship . . .” (The Shack, 122) Dismissing any idea of hierarchy or subordination amongst members of the trinity, Papa-Elousia later explains to Mack that, “Submission . . . is all about relationships of love and respect.” (The Shack, 145) The vaguely Christian underpinnings of the book, and its emphasis upon relationship on the one hand and its de-emphasis of rules on the other, requires that the connection between law and the Christian life be examined.

Rules and Relationships

In cavalier fashion, the novel dismisses the relevance of rules (law) to relationship (love). (The Shack, 7, 122, 123, 197-205) The “all-God-cares-about-is relationship” theory renders rules to be obsolete (“Kum Ba Ya”). Sarayu even states to Mack, “The Bible doesn’t teach you to follow rules.” (The Shack, 197) This statement reflects an antinomianism that contradicts both the words and spirit of Holy Scripture. As such, it begs questions and raises issues about the role rules play in relationships.

Question one:As taught by Jesus, is there any ingredient more important to relationship than love, first between people and God, and second, among people with each other? Endorsing the Great Commandment and associating love with law, Jesus said,

Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets”(Emphasis mine, Matthew 22:37-40, KJV).

There is no more essential ingredient to relationship than “love,” for as Paul put it, love is “the greatest” (1 Corinthians 13:13).

Question two: Can you, dear reader, think of any element more necessary in the definition of love (relationship) than laws (rules)? No matter how The Shack might spin it, relationships involve rules. Rules inform me where my rights end and another person’s begin. As a deterrent to sinful behavior which can hurt the lives of others, rules are a necessary guide. They tell us what’s right and what’s wrong. Ever hear of the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:1-17), or read the hundreds of other rules in the Bible? Take adultery, for example. What if a man leaves his spouse and children to pursue a “relationship” with another woman? What arbitrates between those two competing relationships? They’re both relationships, aren’t they? Will laws? Will a judge? Or, do we simply endorse the moral chaos of self-indulgent free love?[5] For the sake of arbitrating relationships, both the hierarchy and enforcement of law is needed. While it may not be that way amongst the members of the Holy Trinity in heaven, it certainly is necessary for us folks here on earth.

So like Jesus, the Apostle Paul combined law with the love, rules with relationship. He wrote:

Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law”(Emphases mine, Romans 13: 8-10).

When defining the love of earthy relationships, rules cannot be jettisoned. Like Siamese twins, they cannot be separated. As Jesus and Paul indicated, rules (law) complement relationship (love). Did not Jesus say that upon loving God and one’s neighbor “hang all the law and the prophets”? The sin residing in us ever threatens our relationship with one another. With sinful and selfish dispositions, and sometimes knowingly, we choose to indulge ourselves at cost to others. Breaking rules destroys relationships. When that happens, relationships need to be repaired. When marriages become broken by adultery, when the Seventh Commandment is violated, reconciliation needs to happen in order for the marriage to survive.[6] This is the real world in which we live, a world of broken relationships, and not the ethereal world of a Thomas Kincade painting. But the need for reconciliation exists not only among persons on earth, but also between individuals on earth and God in heaven.

To be continued. . . . .

The Truth:

“And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in His sight.” (Colossians 1:21-22)

Endnotes:
1. Universal Reconciliation is the belief that every person who has ever lived is, or will ultimately be, either before or after death, reconciled to God. Historically, universal reconciliation leads to Unitarianism which denies the biblical Trinity. After all, if God saves all persons, who needs Christ and His atonement on the cross, or the application of salvation to the human soul by the Holy Spirit? Universalism makes the Trinity unnecessary!
2. R.E.O. White, “Reconciliation,” The Concise Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Edited by Walter A. Elwell, Abridged by Peter Toon (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1991) 420. Morris determined that, “The basic idea of reconciliation is that of making peace after a quarrel, or bridging over an enmity.” See Leon Morris, The Cross in the New Testament (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1965) 250.
3. White, “Reconciliation,” 421.
4. Over forty times The Shack uses the word “relationship(s).” Indeed, though perhaps overdrawn, exaggerated, and even at points, profaned, one of the strengths of the story is its emphasis on relationship.
5. Rules in Scripture exhibit God’s righteousness (i.e., justice), and are an essential aspect of relationships. Being sourced in His absolute authority and infinite wisdom, God’s law(s) orients mankind as to the good or evil of behaviors which either help or hurt others. Inherent within real love is right law.
God’s rules declare which behaviors best benefit how people should relate to Him and to each other. His guidelines objectify both right spirituality and morality. Because God is right, God is Righteous. Thus, God’s righteousness might be understood like this: Out of His love and concern for the relational wellbeing of humanity—God does desire that people to live in peace and harmony with one another—He after the eternal counsel of His infinite wisdom, designed rules to promote the harmony of humanity. God communicates His rules in the Bible (e.g., the Ten Commandments). Because He is righteous, God keeps His rules. He conforms to His own standards. Because He is absolutely righteous and just, one day God will bring humanity into account for how they obeyed the laws of love. He will judge the world. He will enforce the rules. “God is a just judge, and God is angry with the wicked every day” (Psalm 7:11; See Romans 2:5-16).
6. On this point, we must note how Scripture employs the images of adultery or harlotry to picture Israel’s breaking “relationship” with God (See Isaiah 1:21; Jeremiah 3:1; 23:10; Ezekiel 16:15-63; James 4:4.). In both its sexual and spiritual dimensions, adultery signals the breaking of relationship, and that is why God said, “Thou shalt not commit adultery” (Exodus 20:15). So for violating the Seventh Commandment, Jehovah divorced Israel (Jeremiah 3:8).

Final Word on “The Shack”

This will be my last post on The Shack. I want to end this series of posts with a command straight from God:

“Finally, my brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think of these things.” ~Philippians 4:8

There is a modicum of truth in The Shack. There is also untruth, an idolatrous conception of the Trinity, and seeds of a Christian cult’s beliefs. Can any Christian afford to fill his mind with such a mixture of truth and deception? ~jb

Review of “The Shack” by Joe Holland

Another thoughtful review. You can reach it here.

The Cult of Christian Universalism

In his sermon on The Shack Dr. Michael Youssef noted that the author, William P. (Paul) Young had told a professor in the seminary that he attended that he had converted to Christian Universalism. I went to the Christian Universalism site and found the following:

“Christian Universalism is different from Unitarian Universalism. Unlike Unitarian Universalism, Christian Universalism is the belief in universal salvation through Jesus Christ, the incarnate Lord. Christian Universalists are both Christian and Universalist. And we believe that is how Christianity as a whole should be understood. The Christian Universalist belief is that God manifested Himself in human form as a man named Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, who was the perfect moral and spiritual teacher for all mankind, for all time. Jesus Christ came to earth to teach people about the unconditional love of our Heavenly Father, and to encourage us to forgive one another for our sins, as God forgives us. Jesus taught his followers to be merciful, peaceful, charitable, and full of love and compassion for all human beings.

Though we may recognize goodness and value in some other religions besides Christianity, Christian Universalists believe that following the way of Jesus is the best way — indeed the only way — of truly walking in the path of God. But it is not any creed, confession, or religious label that saves us; it is the way of Jesus itself, our trust in the Almighty, and our own attempt to live according to the simple yet profound principles taught by Jesus. Some people who call themselves “Christian” but do not have the love of Christ in their heart may actually be less Christian in Jesus’ eyes than some people who do not profess Christianity at all, but who practice the way of Christ in their everyday life.

Universal salvation is the main belief that distinguishes the Christian Universalist faith from traditional, fundamentalist forms of Christianity. Universalist Christian believers accept the authority of the Bible, but we disagree with the way most churches and Christians have interpreted certain Biblical passages about hell and salvation. Yes, there is such a thing as hell for some souls after death, but in the original, untranslated text of the Bible there is not a single verse of scripture that teaches that hell is eternal. In fact, there are many verses in the Bible that strongly suggest that every soul God has ever created will someday escape hell and be reconciled to their Creator.

Christian Universalism, therefore, is Biblical Universalism, the belief that the Bible itself teaches the universal reconciliation of all souls to God at the end of time. The Bible says that this will happen because of the power of Jesus Christ to save souls from hell. There is no “point of no return,” such as committing an “unpardonable sin” or dying without accepting Christ, that could ever cause a soul to be lost forever. No one is beyond hope, because Jesus Christ has absolute power and as much time as he needs to bring God’s goal of universal salvation to fruition. Hell is a redeeming, cleansing, purifying fire that destroys the satanic ego and reforms the human personality in the image of Christ — not an eternal vindictive torture by an angry and sadistic god.

Popular Bible translations pervert the meaning of important verses about hell. This has been done because of misguided religious tradition, in an attempt to support a pagan concept of eternal torment that was not part of original Biblical Christianity, but came to be accepted by the Roman Catholic Church and also continues to be taught in most Protestant churches. The Bible uses colorful language to describe the punishment of the wicked, but this is within the context of ancient Jewish apocalyptic parables and visionary literature and was never intended to be taken literally. Furthermore, every verse in common versions of the Bible (such as the King James or NIV) that speaks of “eternal” or “everlasting” damnation is a blatant mistranslation of the original Greek or Hebrew, neither of which uses a word referring to eternity in the Bible, but only a limited or unspecified period of time.

According to the Biblical Gospel, as affirmed by Christian Universalism, Christianity is not supposed to be a harsh and pessimistic religion that condemns billions of people to an eternity of pain, just because they didn’t happen to profess the correct religious doctrines while they were alive on earth. No, true Christianity is a hopeful and optimistic faith, a faith that announces the good news for all the world — the positive and uplifting message that through Jesus Christ, all souls can someday be saved! That is the belief of Christian Universalism, and Christian Universalists hope that eventually, all Christians will understand that the universalist interpretation of Christianity is what Jesus intended. Jesus came to earth to tell people about universal salvation, not eternal damnation.”

The emphasis by red-lettering is mine. The heretical implications are: (1) Salvation is “by following the way of Jesus” which God will enable all of us to do; the atonement is not a factor. (2) The interpretation of hell is patently unbiblical, as can be seen easily by an examination of the pertinent New Testament scriptures, either in good translations or the original Greek. (3) Although it is not stated overtly, belief in the full deity of Christ is implicitly denied. (4) All persons can or will be saved; the Bible teaches exactly the opposite. (5) The definition of God’s sovereignty is not biblical.

In short, Christian Universalism is a Christian cult.

If you have read The Shack carefully, you should be able to spot the underlying beliefs of Christian Universalism. I would encourage you to go to the Christian Universalism site and investigate for yourself. ~JB

The Consequence of Role Reversals in “The Shack”

Pastor Larry DeBruyn  has written a 3-part article on The Shack exploring the caricature of God presented in the book and its covert message. The articles are cogent. Like Dr. Michael Youssef (see previous post) he emphatically agrees that the god in The Shack is not El Shaddai, as the book remarks, and why. The articles give even more very well-grounded reasons not to read or promote The Shack. ~JB

More on “The Shack”

I just listened to Dr. Michael Youssef’s moving sermon on The Shack in which he highlights 13 heresies in the book. He gives information on the author William P. (Paul) Young’s background as well and makes a powerful plea to the congregation to grow in discernment. He regards the overriding heresy behind The Shack to be universalism and identifies it as perhaps the most dangerous heresy of our time. You can read Dr. Youssef’s response to The Shack and view the video of his sermon here. ~JB

Thoughts on The Shack

I just finished reading The Shack, the current best seller that has surprised everyone with its popularity among Christians and non-Christians alike. I’m a little behind – by this time probably a million people have already read it. That’s okay – I don’t mind being behind.

I haven’t been unaware of the book. How could one? I’ve followed the reviews, pro and con, and at one point vowed not to read it at all. I’m not sorry I did read it, if for no other reason than I now know for myself whether in good conscience I could recommend it to anyone else. I can’t.

The book has a decidedly emotional impact. It is very easy to empathize with Mack, the main character, and his journey to deal with the pain of his severe abuse as a childhood and the loss of his 6½-year-old daughter to abduction and brutal murder. All of us have asked some of the questions Mack asks: “Why is there evil? How can God be a good God when he allows such horrors?” etc. The answers Mack proposes, however, contain theological distortions, at times presenting a skewed version of essential Christian doctrines, at times presenting a blatantly false version of those doctrines.

The book has received reactions from one end of the favorable/unfavorable spectrum to another: from Eugene Peterson’s euphoric statement that the book “has the potential to do for our generation what John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress did for his” to Mark Driscoll’s flat statement that the book is heresy. I consider the review written by Tim Challies (author of The Discipline of Discernment) to be the fairest and most accurate. You can access the review here.

As might be expected, Challie’s review received a great many responses, both positive and negative. He recently posted a response entitled “Open Mind, Closed Bible” in which he answers the two most common criticisms of his review.

An example of one of the criticisms: “Your review reminds me of exactly why ‘stodgy old religion’ is so unappealing to masses of people. William Young wrote a novel – a story that inspired me and thousands of others to want to have a closer, more intimate relationship with God. All your theological arguments can’t erase that.” An example of a second criticism: “Another concerned reader told me of a professor in a conservative seminary who was untroubled by much of the book’s poor theology. ‘I was surprised that he seemed not as concerned due to the fact that it is a novel and so some leeway should be allowed for ‘poetic license.’ He acknowledged my concerns and said he shared them as well but said the novel did not ‘intend to do theology.’” Challie’s response is well reasoned and thorough. The complete response can be accessed here. The following is a portion:

“There are two broad arguments used here.

The first is pure pragmatism, implying that the book should be judged not on theological arguments, not on the basis of comparing it to Scripture, but on the basis of how people have reacted to it. Because so many people are responding positively to this book in opposition to “stodgy old religion,” we must believe that it is good. “William Young wrote a novel – a story that inspired me and thousands of others to want to have a closer, more intimate relationship with God. All your theological arguments can’t erase that.” The danger of such an argument is that it effectively places us over the Bible and over God. No longer do we judge right and wrong by what God says, but we judge right and wrong by how we feel. If the book inspires people to be intimate with God, we must judge it to be good. If it stirs emotions we like, we judge it to be good.

There are profound implications here. Pragmatism necessarily causes us to lose our focus on the absolute standard God has given us in His Word to determine right from wrong. When we lose that focus the church is placed on the slippery slope to becoming like the world. When we discard God’s standards we must depend on our own deeply flawed standards. We begin to trust in ourselves and lose our trust in God. We lose our reliance on His Word as the tool for discernment.

The second argument is that The Shack is not a work of theology and, therefore, must not be treated as such. An article at Christianity Today makes this argument. “It’s tricky to speak definitively of The Shack’s theology. Young could have written a theological treatise, a spiritual memoir, or even a long poem. Instead, he wrote what he calls a “parable” (not an allegory). That should give readers pause about confidently reading off a systematic theology from the book.” And in their review of the book they say, “Readers are talking about The Shack for its theology and its storyline, not for its faulty mechanics. Reviewers have criticized the book for hinting at universalism, as well as for feminism and a lack of hierarchy in the Trinity. Rather than slicing and dicing the novel, looking for proof of theological missteps, a better approach might be to look at significant passages as springboards for deeper discussion. The Shack is a novel, after all, not a systematic theology.”

This is a convenient argument but one we need to guard against. It creates a false, unrealistic division between works that are theological and works that are not. Surely we will admit that there are works that call for great theological precision (such as a Systematic Theology) and works that call for a more general precision, but we cannot neatly divide areas that require correct theology and areas that do not. The Shack is, by the author’s own admission, a work that seeks to change the reader’s perception of God. It is deeply theological! Read the reviews of this book and you will find readers saying how much this book impacted their understanding of God’s person and nature.

Tom Neven, writing for Boundless Line, covers this well in an article titled “But It’s Only Fiction.”

If you’re going to ground your fiction in the real world, then it must conform to the rules of the real world we live in. No unicorns or magic squirrels allowed. Even one of my favorite literary genres, Magical Realism, adheres to certain basic rules.

So if you’re going to have God as a character in your real-world fiction, then you must deal with God as he has revealed himself in Scripture. By using the Trinity as characters in this story set in the real world, The Shack author William P. Young is clearly indicating that he’s supposedly talking about the God of Christianity. But God has said certain things about himself in Scripture, and much of what Young does in this novel contradicts that. I don’t care if he’s trying to make God more “accessible.” He’s violated the rules of fiction.

More important, why does Young feel the need to change the character of God in this story? In a way, he’s saying that the God who reveals himself to us in the Bible is insufficient. Young needs to “improve” the image to make it more palatable. But as I said in the original post, God never changes himself so that we can understand Him better. He changes us so that we can see Him as he truly is. If God changed his nature, He would cease to be God.

The reader who complained about “stodgy old religion” exhorted me to “try to re-read the Shack with a more open mind.” But from her email and the others like it, I can see that in this case an open mind would require a closed Bible. We cannot set aside Scripture even when we read fiction. There is no such thing as only fiction (emphasis mine). The Shack is theological fiction. If it talks about God, it must be so! While it may not require the kind of precision we would expect from a work of formal theology, we cannot deny that the author seeks to teach what he believes to be true about God. And we cannot then deny that it teaches theology that is, in a word, false. It is not an issue of precision but of right and wrong! Fiction is a powerful medium for communicating truth and the evidence of this is in every positive review of the book; the evidence is in the fact that Jesus Himself often communicated using fiction.

Even in times when the church is strongest spiritually, perversion of essential Christian doctrine is anathema. At a time like this when the “winds of doctrine” (see Ephesians 4:14) are blowing at gale force and the discernment of Christians is at a decided low the slightest perversion of essential Christian doctrine is doubly dangerous – especially when coupled with the intense emotional impact of The Shack. The emotional aspect tends to fix the perversions in mind a great deal more than would reading the same things in a theology textbook, for instance.

Besides the distortion of doctrine, the book at times very subtly undermines the veracity of Scripture and is – again subtly – critical of the institutional church. Although I can understand and even sympathize with Mack’s attitude regarding the institutional church, I find the undermining of Scripture unacceptable. -JB