I try to maintain a limber mind whenever someone tries to express the unexpressable. For instance, with anything spiritual (especially anything concerning God) words aren't really going to do justice to the situation. You just can't blame a human for that. None of us are smart enough. It’s very important to understand this when reading anything written by a human concerning spirituality. That material is going to be subjective, personal, and might not fit in perfectly with your own views and emotions.
So…
Just so you know…
That’s how I try to read this kind of stuff.
The Shack is fiction. And this isn’t a review so I’m not going to spoil the ending for you or anything like that, but reading this book did raise a line of thought that lead me to a dogmatic conclusion concerning God.
William P. Young was very creative in animating the Trinity into this novel. While doing so, liberties were taken on the personality of God. I love to wonder about God, about how he thinks, feels, smells, etc. There’s plenty to wonder about and even though the Bible reveals bits and pieces of God, it really just encourages my question asking habits. Despite all the wondering and questions, I try really hard not to accept assumptions and hypotheses of God as fact because somebody once told me in junior high just what you make of “you and me” when you assume…
:)
In The Shack, I don’t really see evidence of this type of fear and respect.
So you should read this book and be affirmed that no human can enclose the personality of God into a fictional story. The Shack was essentially written to try to get people to think of God outside of their religious box, but this story is itself a box that tries to contain the personality of God.
My dogmatic conclusion is this: God is what God is and no human can or should conclude any of those “is’s” outside of scripture.
--andy
http://theshackbook.com/
