Well, it took me months, but I finally got around to reading The Shack: Where Tragedy Confronts Eternity by William Paul Young. I found it moving at some points and problematic at other points. Any book that puts words in the mouth of God is running a dangerous line. Overall, I wasn't that enthralled with the book.
But my intention here is not to give a full-blown review. Rather, I want to focus on one passage that gave me a "phonograph needle across the record moment." The following statement was made to Mack, the lead character in the story, by Jesus:
This is about the most inane commentary I've read in a while… and it's placed in Jesus' mouth. It is sadly a widely shared sentiment among many in more emergent forms of Christianity.
The Christian tradition understands that the mandate to multiply and fill the earth would lead to large communities. The need to coordinate human action in terms of community priorities and economic activity would entail the development of human institutions. Thus, the development of these traditions and institutions is part of the creation mandate.
Because of sinful human nature, every aspect of human existence, individual or corporate, is corrupted. Therefore, every institution has a measure of corruption. Sinful human nature has to be factored into how these institutions function. These institutions need Christ's transforming work. But to suggest that institutions are intrinsically evil is patently absurd.
As revealed in the book, Young's image of heaven appears to be a "back to Eden" model where we all live in bucolic bliss as we skip stones on the lake and play in the garden. The biblical image of the New Creation is not Eden. It is a garden city, the New Jerusalem. To the ancients, the city symbolized the epitome of human culture with all its institutions related to governance, economics, religion, learning, and the arts. These are incorporated into God's new creation. Furthermore, the early chapters of Genesis reveal that, ontologically, God's image bearers were destined for dominion and co-creative stewardship over the earth with God, not endless unproductive play. Apparently, the city's institutions are a piece of how that dominion is exercised.
I think Young does some good in addressing the problem of evil, but I found his rustic paradise free of human cooperative arrangements a major detraction.
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