PLEASE READ PART 1 BELOW FIRST. I just couldn't go to bed without posting Part 2 tonight also.
Now to take each member of the Trinity separately, I must give you another description of "Elousia" (a.k.a. "Papa", God) from the book.
Mack followed her soft humming down a short hallway and into an open kitchen-dining area, complete with a small four-seat table and wicker-backed chairs. The inside of the cabin was roomier than he had expected. Papa was working on something with her back to him, flour flying as she swayed to the music of whatever she was listening to. The song obviously came to an end, marked by a couple of last shoulder and hip shakes. Turning to face him, she took off the earphones (pg. 90).
Let me first say, GOD IS NOT A WOMAN!!! We do not know the face of God but the Bible clearly refers to God with the male pronoun and so it seems sacrilegious to envision God as a woman while reading this book. Also, no where in the Bible does God appear to anyone in such cavalier a manner.
When the LORD saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, "Moses! Moses!" And Moses said, "Here I am." "Do not come any closer," God said. "Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground." (Exodus 3:4-5)
In the year that King Ussiah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphs (angels), each with six wings: with two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another: "Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory." At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke. "Woe to me! I cried. "I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty." (Isaiah 6:1-5)
God is holy. We should be fearful if we allow our perception of Him to be anything other.
Now, I shall discuss Young's portrayal of Jesus. Young has Jesus stumbling around in his humanness, just hanging around this shack drying dishes with Mack (pg. 108) after creating a mess in the kitchen.
Mack was shocked at the scene in front of him. It appeared that Jesus had dropped a large bowl of some sort of batter or sauce on the floor, and it was everywhere. It must have landed close to Papa (God) because the lower portion of her (!!!) skirt and bare feet were covered in the gooey mess (pg. 104). (My God does not have gooey mess on HIS feet!)
At one point in the book, Mack and Jesus are laying on a dock, looking up at the stars. Mack says he feels closer to Jesus than to Elousia or Sarayu.
Jesus chuckled in the dark. "Since I am human we have much in common to begin with" (pg. 110).
Jesus was born to Mary in the stable, being fully man and fully God. However after fulfilling His Father's plan to die as our redemptive sacrifice, He rose again and ascended to Heaven, being fully reinstated in His glorious preincarnate state. Jesus is no longer human.
The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of His being, sustaining all things by His powerful word. After He had provided purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So He became as much superior to the angels as the name He has inherited is superior to theirs. (Hebrews 1:1-4)
Jesus is my Savior and Lord. I cannot wait to meet Him face to face one day and see Him in all of His radiance.
Finally, the Holy Spirit character Sarayu did or said nothing of which I will quote, but the disturbing part comes from Young's own comments during another interview. He was looking for a name for this character and was on a business phonecall with a woman from India. Here's what he said.
"I was looking for a name for the Holy Spirit so I asked her, Can you give me words in Hindi for the wind? And you know by the way, this is why I'm a closet Hindu now."
I'm not sure if he was joking or not, but it disturbed me either way. He also made a side joke about "another kind of wind", refering to passing gas. So juvenile and uncalled for during an interview to promote a book "starring" the Trinity.
Our pastor did a great study on world religions this past summer. He said to determine the validity of something, you should examine its creator. Young did not impress me during that video and I'm still shocked how so many people are buying into this book.
I pray my comments will cause you to think twice before reading this book. It honestly began to get in my head and I would think about things in a way as to how "The Shack" would lead my decision over the wisdom of the Bible. I only was reading this book for four days, but during that time, I had no desire to pick up my Bible. Scary, very scary. For someone like me who deeply desires to study the Word of God to get to that point, it terrifies me to think of the people who have only surface knowledge of the Bible (or none at all!!) and are living their lives based on teachings from "The Shack".
Click here to read a likeminded review by Chuck Colson.
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