This book is well written, and it often tugged at my heart strings. I could identify with the main character, especially regarding his feelings of love towards his family and his desire to protect and nurture them. The presentation of God’s love is appealing and refreshing. The teaching on the need to forgive, even the most evil of acts and people, is challenging, and after watching the man struggle through his journey I was glad to see him forgive at the end.
However, there is much in this book that is in conflict with fundamental Christian belief. The enormity of our sin is downplayed. For example, God says at one point: “I don’t need to punish people for sin. Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside. It’s not my purpose to punish it; it’s my joy to cure it” (p120). Yet the Bible says, “If a person sins and does what is forbidden in any of the Lord’s commands, even though he does not know it, he is guilty and will be held responsible.” (Lev 5:17); “we were God’s enemies” (Rom 5:10) and “we were by nature objects of wrath.” (Eph 2:3).
Also the place of the Bible and church in Christian life barely get a look in. Rather than God’s Word as the communication channel in the Christian life, The Shack presents ... well... the shack as the place we meet with God. But I guess if you don’t have a shack in which to meet with God, then your Christian life will not be all it could be.
The book shows God as Trinity, a biblical truth that is sometimes difficult to convey, primarily because there is nothing else like the relationship that exist within the Ultimate Being. However, this is no reason to get it wrong. For example, at one point, God the Father shows the scars of the crucifixion that he bears. Yet it wasn’t Him that was on the cross, but Jesus. Generally, the relationship between the man and God does not reflect the biblical picture of a creature coming before his Creator. The man finds a best mate in Jesus, and hangs out with God the Father in the kitchen. Yet when people in the Bible were shown God, their first response was often their unworthiness before a holy God. Yes, we can enter his throne-room with confidence, but we are still the creature and God is still God. “Worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness; tremble before him, all the earth.” (Psalm 96:9)
