On the April 4, 2009 Battle Lines broadcast we discussed the immensely popular book The Shack, a work of fiction by William P. Young. As of the week of April 6, The Shack was at number one on the New York Times Best Seller List (Fiction Paperbacks) for 45 straight weeks. According to the publisher’s website, The Shack has sold 5 million copies. It is a story of a man, Mack, and his encounter with God. After his youngest daughter is abducted and murdered, Mack receives a mysterious letter, supposedly from God, inviting him back to the scene of the tragedy. There Mack meets God. The book is the story of Mack’s conversations with and experiences with each member of Trinity. Many people have read and have been impacted by the book. Michael W. Smith claims that “The Shack will leave you craving for the presence of God.”And Eugene Peterson, author of The Message, says, “This book has the potential to do for our generation what John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress did for his. It’s that good!” Both Don and Steven read The Shack and on our broadcast we shared our reactions. Don appreciates that it emphasizes the love of God. Steven appreciates that it helps people see that there’s meaning and purpose even in suffering. That there is hope even in death. The book is very imaginative, creative, and gripping. It has probably helped a lot of people deal with pain and questions in their life… but at a cost. Though there are good things to be said about the book, The Shack is replete with a dangerous and unorthodox theology. Though the book is a work of fiction, every work of literature, even fiction, seeks to communicate something true about the world. Set in the context of this fictional story is the author’s view of what is true about God. Young’s theology jumps off the pages of The Shack and, in five areas, is deficient: the nature of God, the place of Scriptures, the importance of the Church, the way of salvation, and necessity of Christian obedience. On the broadcast we focused primarily on Young’s view of God and the Scriptures. The Shack communicates an incomplete and irreverent view of God. The book emphasizes the immanence of God, to the exclusion of his transcendence. God is too familiar. God the Father is portrayed as an African-American woman named Papa. Young rightly recognizes that God is neither male nor female, but there is good reason why the Scriptures use male pronouns for God. Maleness reflects God’s place at the head of creation order. The image of father communicates something important to us – that God is leader, authority, guide, and provider (as a perfect human father should be). In The Shack, the Father appears as a woman because both Mack had an abusive father. But does God cater to our hurts or does He undo our misconceptions? In the book, God the Father, Papa, is irreverent – she talks slang, wears earphones and dances to the music, and jumps up and down while bear-hugging Mack. The author may be attempting to communicate that God is personal and loving, but in doing so, Young does injustice to God’s holiness and transcendence. The Shack also has a low view of Scripture. The conservative, orthodox position is that God speaks only through the Scriptures; that the Scriptures are our sole source of truth about God. But Young characterizes the Scriptures as “God’s voice reduced to paper” (p. 67). He sarcastically writes of Mack’s seminary training: “God had completely stopped any overt communication with moderns, preferring to have them only listen to sacred Scripture, properly interpreted, of course.” In addition to these problems, The Shack communicates an errant view of the Church, salvation, and Christian obedience. Perhaps you’ve read The Shack or know people who have. Rather than dismissing the book, use it has an opportunity to talk about the truth about God. Though we do not recommend the book to anyone, we appreciate how the book has helped people understand God’s love and His purposes in suffering. But we recommend, when we ourselves or people we know question God, that we go directly to God through prayer and the Scriptures.