Book Review - The Shack, William Young

The small Christian fiction novel, "The Shack" is burning its way through circles of friends across the country. After having 4 different friends independently recommend that I read it, I finally borrowed a copy to read.

It is short enough to easily finish in a weekend, even for a moderately slow reader. And whether your relationship with God is close or distant, it will hit you hard.

Without giving too much away, the book is about a man named Mack who experienced a great tragedy in his adult life when his daughter is abducted. The search leads to an abandoned shack where her bloody dress is found, and nothing else. Police believe it to be the work of a serial child killer. Though not terribly graphic, with that in mind, parents should be sensitive about letting children read it. And frankly many of the messages in The Shack would be lost on readers without a bit of life experience under their belt.

Years later he receives a note in his mailbox, "Meet me at the Shack. --Papa". 'Papa' is the name his wife has for God.

He goes to the shack, and yes, God is there. All three Persons of the Trinity are there...with God the Father showing up as a large black woman.

I've heard some conservative folks struggle with this aspect of the book, especially since the Bible clearly refers to God in the masculine. But the characters in the book actually discuss it. Papa basically explains that God transcends gender, and that if he showed up looking like Gandalf the Wizard that Mack would not have been able to hear the message that God needed him to hear. It was for Mack's own sake that God chose to appear as something completely different than Mack would have expected, solely to underscore the important fact that God is VERY different than we often expect Him to be.

I really hope that this doesn't become a hangup or something that would prevent someone from reading it. I would ask that readers who might struggle with that simply set that fact aside and read through it. The book is not trying to say that God is a woman.

On with the review... Through several conversations with all three Persons of the Godhead, Mack comes to understand God in a way he hadn't previously known. Most importantly, it is a personal relationship that develops, not just an intellectual one. (Mack had been to seminary, and yet that head-knowledge about God didn't seem to apply to his life.)

Though The Shack is a bit strange (I mean, having breakfast with all three Persons of the Trinity is disconcerting!), the messages within it are numerous, theologically accurate, and life-changing.

The bottom line: God really does love YOU and wants a personal relationship with you. How that plays out through tragedy is a complex and individual thing.

It also does a really neat job of describing the interaction between God the Father, Jesus (a jewish-looking Man wearing jeans and a denim shirt wood-working in the shed), and the Holy Spirit. There's a palpable love between the three of Them that creates a desire in Mack (and the reader) to join in the relationship.

I highly recommend reading it. On a personal note, the first night my wife read it she woke me up in tears in the middle of the night. God was touching her heart about some hard things in her childhood and enabled her to release some of that tension.

To sum up, The Shack, by William Young is full of life-changing, applicable messages which will touch readers of all walks. Five stars out of five!