SPIRITUAL BOOK Reviews: The Shack

The Shack – by William P. Young. (Windblown Media, 2007, 248 pp., $14.99)

Mackenzie Allen Phillips lives in Oregon, is married to Nan, and has five children. At age 13, the victim of physical abuse by a drunken father, Mack left home. And he’d always felt guilty about leaving his mother to his father’s abuse.

One day during an ice storm he receives a note from “Papa” inviting him to meet at “the shack.” “Papa” is Nan’s term of endearment for God. And “the shack” is the place where his youngest, five-year-old Missy, was murdered three and a half years earlier. She vanished during a Labor Day weekend holiday at a state park. Her bloody dress found miles away in an abandoned shack. Her body was not found but police discovered that she’d been the fifth victim of a serial child-killer.

Mack descended into The Great Sadness, blaming himself for not being able to protect his innocent Missy. His whole family was affected by the tragedy, especially his daughter Kate, who had retreated into her own private cocoon.

Mack decides to accept the invitation without telling his wife.

(If you’re already persuaded that you want to read the book, stop reading here. You’ll better enjoy the author’s telling of the story.)

When Mack arrives at the shack, there is no one there. His anger at the perpetrator – and God – boils over and he uses a chair to smash windows and furniture, shouting at God, “I hate you!” until he collapses in exhaustion. Gathering himself, he begins to return to his Jeep. But suddenly his surroundings begin to change. The winter snows recede and are replaced with grass and flowers. The shack behind him has morphed into a log cabin.

Confused, he returns to find the place occupied by three people. One is a heavy-set African American woman with a warm, welcoming personality. The second is a Middle Eastern man wearing work clothes. The third is a slight Asian woman who appears to be more cloud than flesh.

“Which one of you is God?” Mack asks. “I am” all three reply in unison. Their names, they tell him, are Elousia (“But you can call me Papa”), Jesus, and Sarayu. Papa does some explaining. “I want to heal some of the wound that has grown up inside you, and between us.” And “When all you can see is your pain, perhaps then you lose sight of me.” And “The God who is – the I am who am – cannot act apart from love.”

That night on the dock, Jesus and Mack look up at the stars and talk. “I’ll never get tired of looking at this,” Jesus says. “The wonder of it all – the wastefulness of Creation!” But again The Great Sadness overwhelms Mack.

The next morning at breakfast, there is a conversation with Papa. Mack asks, “Do you ever get mad at people?” “What parent doesn’t?” Papa responds. “But that anger is an expression of love all the same. I love the ones I am angry with just as much as those I’m not.” (p.119)

Mack asks about authority in the Trinity. Sarayu responds, “We are in a circle of relationship, not a chain of command. Authority, as you usually think of it, is merely the excuse the strong use to make others conform.” And Jesus adds, “If you had truly learned to regard each other’s concerns as significant as your own, there would be no need for hierarchy.”

Later that day, Jesus takes Mack for a walk. They cross the lake behind the shack (walking on the water, of course). Jesus sends Mack on alone into a dark place where a Hispanic woman (later identified as Sophia) makes him sit and demands, “Which of your children do you love most?” “I love each of them differently. Each one is unique.”

They speak about judging. “What about the man who preys on innocent little girls?”

“Damn him to hell!” Mack’s anger is seething.

“What about his father who twisted his son into a terror?” “Yes, him too!”

“What about God? Is God to blame?” “Yes! God is to blame!”

Now the conversation takes a dramatic turn. The woman says, “If you are able to judge God so easily, then you certainly can judge the world.” So . . . “You must choose two of your children to spend eternity in God’s new heaven. But only two. And you must choose three of your children to spend eternity in hell.”

“I can’t do this!” “You must.”

“I can’t. I won’t! I’ll go in their place!”

Now she smiles radiantly. “You have judged well, Mackenzie. I am so proud of you!”

“But I haven’t judged anything.”

“Oh, but you have. You have judged them worthy of love, even if it cost you everything.” And she concludes, “Now you know Papa’s heart. He loves all his children.”

Mack stands. “I don’t want to be a judge any more. I really do want to trust Papa.”

Before he and Jesus return to the shack, Mack gets a peek at Missy, enjoying her heaven. For Mack now, The Great Sadness is gone.

Later at the shack, they speak about church and Jesus explains, “What I see are people and their lives, a living breathing community of those who love me, not buildings and programs.” And Mack speaks with Sarayu about the commandments. “You gotta admit,” he tells her, “rules and principles are simpler than relationships.” “But rules,” she responds, “will never give you answers and they will never love you.”

That night, a heavenly festival provides the setting for Mack to find, forgive, and embrace his own father. It’s the first exercise of his newfound insight into forgiveness.

On the last morning, Papa (now with the appearance of an older, wiry male with a gray ponytail) takes Mack on a long walk. They follow a series of small red arc marks that were left by Missy’s murderer. The marked path leads them to Missy’s body. Papa uses the occasion to coax Mack into a beginning toward forgiving Missy’s murderer.

Now suddenly the Trinity is gone and the original shack is back. It’s time for Mack to go home. On the way, a drunk driver totals Mack’s Jeep and puts him in the hospital. It’s several days until he is out of danger and able to recount the events of his weekend. Nan can believe at least the mellowing change in her husband. Their troubled daughter Kate, who’d thought that she had personally failed in the kidnapping of her sister, is made to understand she has no guilt. More red arc marks lead to the discovery of the missing bodies and the arrest of the murderer.

And God has used the pain of life to bring love and forgiveness.

Summary review by Dan Brent

"Lord, how good it is for us to be here..."  Matthew 17