It seems the movie The Shack has caused quite a stir in the faith community. Is the author a Universalist, does he believe in hell, did he deny Jesus and walk away from Christianity…??? On and on the accusations go.
Here’s what I know...
I read the book 10 years ago and loved it. However, it took me a couple of weeks to finish it rather than in one sitting, because when I got to the part about Mack’s youngest daughter being taken, it undid me. I threw the book on the floor and cried for 3 days. When I was finally able to pick it back up again, I was trembling; all the while wondering… “What is going on with me? This isn’t a true story. It’s only fiction, yet I’m so angry at God for allowing this tragedy! This is ridiculous!!”
I knew the answer. It was the same reason I struggled my entire faith walk with the love of the Father. I had all the right answers in my head, but my heart couldn’t quite wrap itself around the truth that God is love. He is good all the time and all the time He is good. When I would hear people sing that song, or quote that quote, I would say to myself, “Yeah right, shut up already!” Of course no one knew this. No one except the only three that matter… Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
A long time ago, there were some very traumatic events in my young life. I wrestled with God for years over the fact that I believed He wasn’t there to protect me. Why did He, the all powerful God, allow those events to happen and why hadn’t He stopped them or rescued me? I knew the “right answer” and had been told that answer a thousand times by other victims of abuse, counselors, church people, friends, and the like... “He was there with you through it all and is using it for good now, you can minister to others who have been there…” blah blah, on and on it went. Right, well that did nothing for my heart.
Most days, I could give glory to God for how He showed up in my life, providing, protecting, leading, and caring for me. But it always came back to that one haunting thing…the child in me. Her heart would not accept His GOODNESS in light of her experience. How could this be reconciled?
What I found in the pages of The Shack through the story of Mack, the lead character, was his lifeline to the Trinity by a black woman posed as God the Father, a middle eastern man cast as Jesus, and an Asian woman, very ghost like in appearance, playing the Holy Spirit. The story takes a man who grew up in religion, in a church-going family, that was horribly abused (along with his mother) by an alcoholic father filled with rage. The story then moves to his adulthood, with the abduction and murder of his youngest daughter while he and his family were camping at a beautiful lake campsite. His pain almost destroys he, his wife and two other children. God who? God where? God of love? That was not his experience. The beautifully told story of how the Trinity captures him to spend a weekend with him at the shack where his daughter was taken, killed, and later hidden, is remarkable.
But having giving you a synopsis of another man’s work, back to my point...
I wanted a “shack encounter” of my own ten years ago… Though I regularly had communion with the Lord, the Father always seemed in the background. I put Him there. I wasn’t sure, I wasn’t safe, I doubted. That’s why the Christian slogan… “God is good all the time, and all the time God is good” always set me off. It seemed so trite, so frankly...glib. I began wrestling with this, really wrestling with this, and then it sort of got shelved again. Life got so busy, then the adoption of five children from the Urkaine, and more farms… it was all consuming, or was it?
After seeing the movie twice now, crying through it the same amount both times, I was relieved and surprised that the “great sorrow” as they refer to it in the film, didn’t wreck me like it did on the first read ten years ago. Why not?
You see, God has been working on me the last ten years through all the additional trials, tribulations, joys, and sorrows to communicate to my heart that He IS good in and through every event in my life and those around me.
I walked away from the theatre both times more illuminated and amazed at how the Father so creatively revealed Himself to one of His dearly loved, but severely wounded children, in a way Mack could receive Him, or at the very least, listen to Him.
Over the years, through some very, very heartbreaking moments of loss, the Father has been using innumerable imaginative ways to reveal Himself to me. To reveal His goodness and love for me, not unlike the way He did for Mack in the Shack.
Left to Himself, the Trinity, God always seeks out His wounded and lost, leaving the many for the one… always. And along the way, I was a lost sheep. Lost in my pain, trapped in the past of unbelief about His goodness and love, allowing past and present events to define Him rather than the “story” of the life He has given me to live and His purpose in my life….Lost, but STILL a sheep in His flock that the Shepherd watched over and cared for.
I’d love to say that today we relate perfectly and constantly without any “hitches”... Ha Ha ha!!
BUT…. Ahhh, and there’s always a “but”, no?
Now, I can say… God IS good all the time and ALL the time God is GOOD, and it’s for real.
So keep an open mind. See the Shack and let me know what He has to say to you… You may be amazed!
P.S. Look to see the 4 part interview on TBN with the author, Paul Young. It’s revelational. :)
Here’s what I know...
I read the book 10 years ago and loved it. However, it took me a couple of weeks to finish it rather than in one sitting, because when I got to the part about Mack’s youngest daughter being taken, it undid me. I threw the book on the floor and cried for 3 days. When I was finally able to pick it back up again, I was trembling; all the while wondering… “What is going on with me? This isn’t a true story. It’s only fiction, yet I’m so angry at God for allowing this tragedy! This is ridiculous!!”
I knew the answer. It was the same reason I struggled my entire faith walk with the love of the Father. I had all the right answers in my head, but my heart couldn’t quite wrap itself around the truth that God is love. He is good all the time and all the time He is good. When I would hear people sing that song, or quote that quote, I would say to myself, “Yeah right, shut up already!” Of course no one knew this. No one except the only three that matter… Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
A long time ago, there were some very traumatic events in my young life. I wrestled with God for years over the fact that I believed He wasn’t there to protect me. Why did He, the all powerful God, allow those events to happen and why hadn’t He stopped them or rescued me? I knew the “right answer” and had been told that answer a thousand times by other victims of abuse, counselors, church people, friends, and the like... “He was there with you through it all and is using it for good now, you can minister to others who have been there…” blah blah, on and on it went. Right, well that did nothing for my heart.
Most days, I could give glory to God for how He showed up in my life, providing, protecting, leading, and caring for me. But it always came back to that one haunting thing…the child in me. Her heart would not accept His GOODNESS in light of her experience. How could this be reconciled?
What I found in the pages of The Shack through the story of Mack, the lead character, was his lifeline to the Trinity by a black woman posed as God the Father, a middle eastern man cast as Jesus, and an Asian woman, very ghost like in appearance, playing the Holy Spirit. The story takes a man who grew up in religion, in a church-going family, that was horribly abused (along with his mother) by an alcoholic father filled with rage. The story then moves to his adulthood, with the abduction and murder of his youngest daughter while he and his family were camping at a beautiful lake campsite. His pain almost destroys he, his wife and two other children. God who? God where? God of love? That was not his experience. The beautifully told story of how the Trinity captures him to spend a weekend with him at the shack where his daughter was taken, killed, and later hidden, is remarkable.
But having giving you a synopsis of another man’s work, back to my point...
I wanted a “shack encounter” of my own ten years ago… Though I regularly had communion with the Lord, the Father always seemed in the background. I put Him there. I wasn’t sure, I wasn’t safe, I doubted. That’s why the Christian slogan… “God is good all the time, and all the time God is good” always set me off. It seemed so trite, so frankly...glib. I began wrestling with this, really wrestling with this, and then it sort of got shelved again. Life got so busy, then the adoption of five children from the Urkaine, and more farms… it was all consuming, or was it?
After seeing the movie twice now, crying through it the same amount both times, I was relieved and surprised that the “great sorrow” as they refer to it in the film, didn’t wreck me like it did on the first read ten years ago. Why not?
You see, God has been working on me the last ten years through all the additional trials, tribulations, joys, and sorrows to communicate to my heart that He IS good in and through every event in my life and those around me.
I walked away from the theatre both times more illuminated and amazed at how the Father so creatively revealed Himself to one of His dearly loved, but severely wounded children, in a way Mack could receive Him, or at the very least, listen to Him.
Over the years, through some very, very heartbreaking moments of loss, the Father has been using innumerable imaginative ways to reveal Himself to me. To reveal His goodness and love for me, not unlike the way He did for Mack in the Shack.
Left to Himself, the Trinity, God always seeks out His wounded and lost, leaving the many for the one… always. And along the way, I was a lost sheep. Lost in my pain, trapped in the past of unbelief about His goodness and love, allowing past and present events to define Him rather than the “story” of the life He has given me to live and His purpose in my life….Lost, but STILL a sheep in His flock that the Shepherd watched over and cared for.
I’d love to say that today we relate perfectly and constantly without any “hitches”... Ha Ha ha!!
BUT…. Ahhh, and there’s always a “but”, no?
Now, I can say… God IS good all the time and ALL the time God is GOOD, and it’s for real.
So keep an open mind. See the Shack and let me know what He has to say to you… You may be amazed!
P.S. Look to see the 4 part interview on TBN with the author, Paul Young. It’s revelational. :)
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