UPDATE: A lurker suggests that Driscoll or his researcher were reading Challies’ post on The Shack. Decide for yourself.
Just one note: Driscoll seems unaware of the book’s opening chapters and the dilemma that lies at the center of the plot. It is not a book about a conversation with the Trinity. It is a book about reconciliation to something horrible that has happened in the life of a man who believes in the Trinitarian God.
Here’s the blurb from the publisher’s website:
Mackenzie Allen Philips’ youngest daughter, Missy, has been abducted during a family vacation and evidence that she may have been brutally murdered is found in an abandoned shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Four years later in the midst of his Great Sadness, Mack receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, inviting him back to that shack for a weekend. Against his better judgment he arrives at the shack on a wintry afternoon and walks back into his darkest nightmare. What he finds there will change Mack’s world forever.
Odd omission.
The Internet Monk Archives 
Come on, guys… he’s read the book.
Mark Driscoll is a sharp person. Whether or not you agree with him is a different question, but to ask whether he has read the book is ridiculous. Have you ever given a public speech? Anytime you do, even if you are well-prepared, you always open yourself up to accusations like that. It is nearly unavoidable, just because you can’t say everything.
Now to the issues.
I think that the real question is how much Christian doctrine matters. It is beyond any real dispute that the book does not reflect biblical Christianity. The question is, does that matter? My take is that it does, because I think our subjective experience ought to be based on objective realities. In other words, I think the bible is true. But me thinking that doesn’t make it true, it is true because it really, actually is true.
People who love The Shack want to ignore all the ways its ideas aren’t biblical. That is why Driscoll seems angry. He’s not angry at The Shack, he’s angry at what he sees as people being drawn into a worldview where their subjective experience supplants the bible as truth.
I agree with him.
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You know what. I don’t think Driscoll ever gave the impression that he read the book.
He has said it himself on a number of occasions, “Do not waste time on bad books.” I assume as much as he claims (and backs it up) with as many books as he has read, why would he waste his time with The Shack.
The Shack is a bad book. Period. I have read it and it was a bear to get through it.
Why in the world would I want somebody else to waste a single second reading that book?
There are too many other books that need to be read.
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I have a hunch Driscoll had not read the book, but that he knew of people he trusts that gave him fairly good info on it. Still, I think he probably should have read it before being so dogmatic. That said, the book is full of subtle heresy. I’ve read it multiple times. It’s fiction yes, but even as a fiction piece it’s intention is to inform the reader as to God’s true character, and so it is very theological…and Driscoll is right about the modalism. You ought to check out theshackreview.com for a thorough review from someone who knows Young and his theology.
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PS: Original question was “Do you believe Mark Driscoll read the book when he made that sermon ?”
Personally.. I’m starting to doubt whether he did. The book is not necessarily a theological exposition on the Trinity as Mark Driscoll seems to indicate. I accept that it does pose some challenges in certain theological positions, but it’s not meant to be that. Or at least that’s my understanding from what I’ve seen Paul Young explain. If I ever have the chance to meet him face-to-face and ask him some questions I may change my mind.
I think the book is all about how God is reconciling a man, who went through something horrible and excruciating, to Himself.
I read the book, enjoyed it, then noticed all the noise about it in the fall and just found this post.
My suggestion, read it as a novel. A good story, a heart wrenching story for any father out there. But not theology.
In Him
Mick
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Paul william Young, author of the shck, Came t=o our high school last week at CHCA in cincinnati, Oh and he spoke to us for 4 days and was amazing. he actually did something unbeleivable in our school, he broke down our cliques in the grades and made us all one. We can never repay him for what he has done so upon hearing Driscoll bashing him and his extroadinary work almost made me sick. I do not think Mr. Driscoll has any right to bash the shck. Yes he has read it and obviously disgrees with Paul’s portrayal of the trinity, but it is not Driscoll’s to comment on. The point of the shck is that we all have hard times in our lives that we try to cover up and hide so the shack is a place where we can adress our deepest problems and since Paul has created this plce he has spread mass healing to people who have needed it around the world. So for driscoll to bash this man, makes him a hypocrite. look at driscoll’s job, he is a pastor and he paints the picture of God and jesus everyday in his sermons whether he intends to or not. All pastors do. So for him to indirectly call Paul, the author of the Shack a heretic for his work is not only hypocritical but morally unsound and if I where him I would be a little ashamed.
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Well, shucks. I was going to go start worshiping black women . . . but now that I know that’s idolatry and/or goddess worship, I guess I won’t. Thanks, Driscoll.
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I’m so surprised that Mark does not like this book. A lot of what he says in his other sermons lines right up with the allegorical story in this book. I listen to his messages online all the time and believe he is a very gifted teacher. I have not known him to be so “off base” as I really believe he is here in his opinions…no, his strong dissuasive comments about the book.
Listening to his clip and all his arguments with the content of the book, he clearly has not read the book or read it with presumptions of what it was before he read it. I agree he is entitled to his opinion and agree that it is a bad one.
This book really does have the ability to do for our generation what John Bunyan’s “Pilgrim’s Progress” did for his!
Clearly we should go to Jesus and the Scripture for our basis of love and truth and our everything! I just think God can use other works – teachers, authors, artists, and creation itself! – to help us know Him, too.
If you are going to make comments like “how many christians are escaping into novels instead of finding refuge in Christ?” then you need to live that comment/indicated belief further, which would be to believe that then you shouldn’t listen to a story you pastor has to share or listen to a single other teacher out there – because then that is not JUST and ONLY the Bible or Jesus! I’m not saying ALL books and authors should be considered teachers, but some certainly are , and they are inspired by God as teachers.
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These comments sadden my heart. So many divisions today and attacks one against another. Personal feelings are of the greatest purpose for many here. What they think and how they feel toward another who differs instead of knowing who God is by scripture. You must be made new to enter into Gods kingdom!!! Woe is you who are not made new!
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I talked with Paul Young the other day- he’s good friends with the co-author of Mark’s latest books. He knows that as of this point in time, Mark hasn’t read the book.
There were a couple of slightly concerning things here- but not what Mark was accusing Young of. I reviewed it and took on his charges point by point.
Mark’s got his heart in the right place- if he actually read this book and saw how Jesus-centric it was, he might change his mind.
(I started to type something smart-alecky about Mark never changing his mind but got convicted by what I’d recently read in the Shack about how we judge each other… Nice!)
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I read the book. I was familiar with the criticisms before hand. I expected to be critical of the story. I love the book and love how a story can teach the heart about the relationship God so desires with us all.
Mark, read the book as a story. Paul does not try to tell us God the father IS a woman or human in any way. The characters representing the trinity are fictional ideas designed to allow the main fictional character to interact in a more relateable way to the trinity. Later in the book God the father is represented as a male father figure to better relate to the fictional point of that part of the story. Goddess worship?
Mark, I appreciate your zeal for truth and agree truth should be defended and protected. In this case your just wrong, stop and see the good work God is doing with this story.
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Yea…I’m a Pastor and I didn’t get any of that out of The Shack. I don’t agree with anything of Mark’s issues. I understand the theological definitions of all of his problems with the book, I just don’t think he is right. I believe the story is a work of fiction that parallels deep truths about God’s character. Christ himself used the art of story to paint pictures of God and the Kingdom. According to Mark’s logic, that makes Jesus a heretic.
I doubt he read the book and if he did, he did it with a judgmental and pharisaical attitude. He is entitled to his opinion…I just think it’s a bad one.
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Check out MIlwaukee based conservative radio station for CrossTalk Program (hosted by a woman that does seem cross alot) for the show they hosted July 2. A pastor Larry DeBryn (sp?) picked author and book apart. Interesting article still in process of reading posted under herescope.blog.com I believe. what do you think Michael Spencer to his claim re the black madonna theory? LB made ref to a paragraph on 182 beginning with “They arrived at the door of the workshop… thru mac asking the question re all roads. This gentleman seemed to think this was total heresey but I think he missed the words “come from” and “were”. LB also had big issue with Jesus not being addressed as the Christ.
Still like the book but depend on the Bible for all truth.
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how many christians are escaping into novels instead of finding refuge in Christ?
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thank you mark for sticking your neck way out there. when christians take a stand they will be accused,and attacked. Like you’re not supposed to have a conviction? huh?. Am I supposed to learn doctrine from a novel as I do from the Holy Bible?. Thank you for making the point, although not explicitly, that the holy scriptures are the only inspired words necessary and worthy to reveal to us God’s true nature. If some people have been helped along by reading The Shack, they have been helped along in spite of having read it. God’s sovereignty will not be violated, no matter how emotional the appeal.
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Mark Driscoll claims to understand the Trinity.
After listening to the above clip, I can tell Driscoll hasn’t even begun to wrestle with difficult concepts that comes from studying the Trinity.
As a MDiv student who has taken a course by R. Letham on the Trinity, but would claim to still know little of this great subject, it is clear that Driscoll hasn’t read historical or current authorship in this area.
Driscoll is a pastor, with lots on his mind. He doesn’t have the time to be the expert he wishes to be. I hope he realizes his error in his comments and publicly retracts them. Furthermore, there is no reason to mock people like M. Smith for endorsing a book…
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When I started to read “The Shack” I was at first a bit concerned about Young’s portrayal of the Trinity. Continuing to read I was surprised by what unfolded not just in the book but in my heart. First of all I got the fact that this portrayal was a way that a man who had been greatly wounded was able to process and begin to understand the love of the GOD of the Bible. Kind of wierded out by the Sarayu portrayal but again got the
idea that all was being done as Oloryn above stated so well was “He’s using this scenario to get across some things that he thinks people otherwise don’t ordinarily see about God.” Not for a minute did I think that Young intended to confuse his audience or add some “new agey” crud to Christianity, (leave that to Oprah”. Ok finally what occured was I came to a better idea of HOW MUCH GOD LOVES HIS CREATION AND CREATURES!! Me and you. I mean really love and care and desire that we live a life as loved people. Thanks Young. I needed it like a great shot in the arm. When I read Isaiah 54: 5,10,11 , it makes easier for this little pea brain to understand how much our creator cares and loves and desires to have relationship with us.
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one word…. fiction
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Driscoll really missed the point of this book. I don’t seriously think he read it. Wow. He really missed it.
jerry
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Ah, a charming example of a preacher who wants easy potshots at something, and so takes something painfully literally. OMG, this authors really believes that God the father is a woman, the heresy!
Given the BS I’ve already heard from Driscoll about women, this is just another drop in the ocean of his misogyny. Ugh.
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The sad thing about this diatribe is that it is only partially accurate. Tri-modalism (Mark refers to “modalism”) is a pretty old heresy that easily takes root because it is an easy way for our minds to grasp the trinity. I actually preached this once, just to see if the congregation would agree with me and they did. I then told them they had agreed to a heresy and talked about why.
The Shack does not promote modalism. The Shack suggests participation, unity and oneness. In Jn. 17:21 Jesus says, “…that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: 23I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”
It could just be me, but I could swear that Jesus suggests that He is in the Father and that the Father is in him. Not three modes, three persons who are “in” one another.
Unfortunately, with the theological position that Mark has taken as an extreme “complimentarian” (another word for “men are in charge”), he has no option but to take this book to task as it suggests a beautiful picture of relationship that finds its roots in Gen. 1, not Gen. 3.
I wonder if he would criticize Rembrandt’s painting of the “Return of the Prodigal Son”, or would sit and enjoy its beauty as men like Nouwen did.
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Cameron Garet and Jared beat me to it. The day after I read this post I was listening through those very Resurgence sessions and heard Mark say that he doesn’t read all of most of the books he reads, he usually has 50 or so in progress books, he said he doesn’t have time to read them all though he reads tons daily. Also the clip where Driscoll is talking about The Shack is a Q&A where he answers questions from the congrigation on the fly with no prep. I heard the whole session, The Shack wasn’t the topic, it was just an example that he used of a current heresy about the trinity. Maybe he chose a poor example maybe it was a good example I havn’t read it and feel no need to do so. The points about the make up of Driscoll’s congrigation has been made and it is true. I happen to listen to Mark Driscoll the same amount of time that I listen to Imonk, I tend to agree with both, is that ok?
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Thanks for promoting the book Michael. I wondered how long it would be before we started to hear this stuff. Although, I’m a little surprised that Driscoll is the one to do it. It’s hard to tell from his comments if he has read the book. I enjoyed the book and I felt it gave me some edification in my prayer life.
thanks
preachergerry
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To further agree w/ Cameron and Garet, I’ve been watching some of the Resurgence videos. It’s Driscoll’s organization that provides theological materials for church planters, pastors, etc. In one of the Q&A’s, I think, he goes into how he preps for sermons, etc and the volume of books he reads. He also said his goal in that is to be able to recommend good books and guard against poor ones. I haven’t read the Shack, but I’d say his reasoning also lies along the lines that there’s better stuff out there for someone looking for truth/understanding God.
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Cameron nailed it dead on. I read The Shack and think it is poorly written and theologically painful, but it was worth reading for me to know that. But reading with a critical eye is what I and everyone in threads like these does for fun. My concern is for those who have been leapfrogging from Left Behind, to the Prayer of Jabez, to Purpose Driven Life, to Your Best Life Now, and then land on The Shack without a scintilla of true doctrine. And the majority of Driscoll’s peeps lack even the discernment of your average shallow, consumer church evangelical.
I think the Narnia comparison is poor one. The Great Divorce is a better comparison, but also a much better book. The Great Divorce is clarifying where The Shack is mystifying. The Great Divorce is about abandoning pride and self-pity and worshiping Christ, while The Shack is about self-discovery, self-forgiveness and redefining Biblical truths. The Great Divorce uses an imaginative device to communicate Biblically true concepts, the Shack uses a (lack luster) imaginative device to communicate false concepts.
In other words, The Shack teaches heresy. If Lewis responded to Blake by writing of the divorce of heaven and hell, Young seems to be trying counsel their reconciliation.
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To all of the commenters saying “Gee, Mark, we’ve got discernment too.”
Mark’s audience isn’t a bunch of theology geeks who know their Bible and are grounded in their faith. It’s a group of people who vacillate between various forms of spiritualism to find some significance.
An admonition to avoid The Shack comes across very differently when we realize that the primary audience for his remarks is a congregation that is full of young believers and non-believers that aren’t out there reading Chesterton, Lewis, Spurgeon, Packer, to balance out The Shack.
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Michael,
Regardless of the author’s intentions, this book has become a stumbling block for many naive Christans (some of them longtime believers) who have latched onto its assertions about the character of God.
Except in the broadest sense (God loves us, even in our darkest hour), “The Shack” grossly misrepresents the God of the Bible. I’ll skip a discussion of the specific theological issues, as that has been adequately covered elsewhere.
This is tragic, as the Bible itself is not confusing or opaque on this issue. Reading about the life of David in I & II Samuel alongside Psalms, one gets an even better story about tragedy and God’s faithfulness in dark times; AND, it’s the inspired word of God.
The reason books like this are a legitimate cause for concern, particularly when they don’t line up well with the Bible, is that there are immature (despite their many years in the faith) Christians that will latch onto depictions like this and treat them, in their own minds, as scripture-equivalent.
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I guess I won’t read it because Mark told us not to (sarcasm). Do pastors really think we are all so ignorant and impressionable that we can’t sort through books on our own? Watch out when people start telling you what you can and can’t read.
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I compare “The Shack” roughly to C. S. Lewis’s “The Great Divorce”. Lewis in that book wasn’t advocating that those in Hell really had a back door into Heaven, he used that scenario as a literary device for showing people in the act of choosing between heaven and hell. Young isn’t advocating that that the Father is a large, black, woman, or that the Holy Spirit is an Asiatic woman. He’s using this scenario to get across some things that he thinks people otherwise don’t ordinarily see about God.
Somewhere or other, either Chesterton or Lewis (probably Lewis, but I can’t remember where) observed something on the order that sometimes we don’t see truth until we see it in a strange place (I’m probably paraphrasing horribly – hopefully someone else with a better memory of Lewis or Chesterton can spot what I’m referencing). I believe that’s what is intended here.
One of my Sunday Bible Study classes is reading “The Shack”. The comparison with “The Great Divorce” above, I’ve found, has helped some people. I don’t necessarily agree with everything in the book, and I’ve found as the class has discussed it, neither does anyone else. But the book has sparked some very useful discussions. And I think Young takes a good (but not perfect) stab at getting across what I refer to as the “meek side of God” that a lot of evangelicals seem to miss (and before someone complains about that, consider – Jesus characterizes himself as “meek and lowly in heart”; Given that we’re also told that Jesus is the exact representation of God’s Nature (Heb 1:3), and that if you’ve seen Jesus, you’ve seen the Father (Jn 14:9), I see no problem in seeing meekness as an attribute of God….except, of course, that we have a difficult time reconciling meekness with what we understand of God’s character. That probably means that we misunderstand meekness, or don’t completely understand God’s character, or both. For me, the reconciliation starts with recognizing that this may be a Chestertonian balance (see Chesterton’s Orthodoxy, chapter 6 “The Paradoxes of Christianity”)).
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Grace, I think you’re dead on.
Threatening the hierarchy is simply not an option. Consider Elizabeth Elliot’s CBMW article, describing the natural hierarchy, (arguing against feminism). She writes:
This arrangement is a glorious hierarchical order of graduated splendor, beginning with the Trinity, descending through seraphim, cherubim, archangels, angels, men, and all lesser creatures, a mighty universal dance, choreographed for the perfection and fulfillment of each participant.
Click to access essence_of_femininity.pdf
“Lesser creatures” need to know their place.
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Driscoll’s understanding of the Trinity is a case in point on why people find God boring. Thank God no one but the truly reformed take him seriously.
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According to Driscoll, it’s a violation of God’s commandment not to make a graven image to make the Creator God part of the created order. So, by his own reasoning, God broke His own commandment. It’s called the Incarnation. By the same logic, we shouldn’t make images of Christ either. But that’s absurd. So … whatever. Why does anyone take this guy seriously?
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Mark’s first 3 arguments, graven image, goddess worship, and modalism are flimsy and unsubstantiated and are probably decoys for his big complaint. His fourth argument, hierarchy in the trinity, is likely his real complaint against the book.
Young’s description of mutuality in the relationships among the trinity directly opposes Mark’s doctrine of “equal but deferent.”
“Equal in being, unequal in role” is the same argument used by complementarians regarding subordination of women. Most people know this is a hot-button issue for Mark, which likely explains his reaction to the book.
I find it interesting (but not surprising) that he would throw around the word heretic when subordinationism has long been considered a heresy in regard to the trinity.
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Wow, he really didn’t like the author’s portrayal of the Trinity. I’ve heard of Mark Driscoll but haven’t read/listened to any of his stuff…is he really as legalistic as he sounds?
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Driscoll starts off saying “Don’t read it” and then gives details about it that he could have gotten from a commentary, but… Almost seems to make fun of it, “Mack from the Shack” etc.
Anyway, he missed the entire point of the story. The age old problem of those with TMI (too much information) missing the message that does not fall into their framework of theology.
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Just one note: Driscoll seems unaware of the book’s opening chapters and the dilemma that lies at the center of the plot.
Wouldn’t be the first time someone decided to preach using the example of a book he was actually clueless about.
I see some justification for the concerns he expresses because of the way book that acquire this kind of must-read status in the Christian community are regularly taken with far less than the necessary grain of salt by the general readership. Witness the pop eschatology that has sprung up around some very popular novels on the end times. — Wolf Paul
As in these 22 volumes of Awful Apocalyptic hackwork that went BestSeller on the strength of the Born-Again Bored Housewife/”Delta Dawn” demographic?
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I liked Driscoll’s appeal to the 2nd commandment. Especially after I read Genesis 18 this morning.
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Let me start with a story. I once was ministering to a kid who really liked The Lord of the Rings. I’m a bit of Tolkien geek myself, so he and I had a lot to talk about. This young man decided that he liked the mythology of the Tolkien so much that he wanted to create his own religion and call it Tolkienism. This is ironic since Tolkien deliberately left overt religious references out of the LOTR, and the Silmarillion is a mythology that has no religious structure. I had to lovingly tell this young man that the idea was just plain kooky.
The point is this: for some people, a story is more than a story. Sometimes, a novel is not just a novel. It can become a manifesto of sorts for people looking for something to fill their lives.
I’m not defending Driscoll. I haven’t read the book, but it seems to me that a pastor has the responsibility to point out to his people things that he sees as potentially problematic for them. That said, a pastor should also help his people view these things in their proper context and not go off on something that he doesn’t really understand himself.
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I especially like the shot of MD talking about the 2nd commandment and not making images of God with that three-fold-ring of fire diagram hanging in the background. 🙂
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Curtis: I don’t know. Did he?
More to the point here, though: Jesus’ parable tells us about the Father’s love, and tells us about sheep and goats. It is instructive.
How does the Shack do that? What does it tell us about God?
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Driscoll needs a chill pill.
He also needs to learn what the prohibition against creating graven images is for.
It’s that we don’t worship graven images.
A cross worn around the neck is graven. The Bible is graven. The little prayer card with a picture of Jesus on it that an old woman has on her dresser is graven.
No we aren’t worshiping these things, and we aren’t reading ‘The Shack’ as if it’s the Bible.
Thanks.
– Steve
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Witness the pop eschatology that has sprung up around some very popular novels on the end times.
In that particular case pop eschatology was already in the air – and just needed to be exposed to another generation.
In this case something similar but more subtle is at work. Most people don’t really have a ‘balanced’ view of the Trinity to start with, if you actually ask them to describe the Trinity you can soon pick up traces of Modalism or something else. Actually, if you want to be a very very picky watchblogging type, you could probably accuse Driscoll of sounding like he’s subscribed to Monarchianism in the video clip above – something which I don’t for a moment suggest he believes.
At the end of the day the Shack is a novel presenting an analogy to truth, I suspect that the only Christians who might be swayed by it are those who don’t already have a good grasp of the truth.
Going down this particular rathole is going to lead to very strange conclusions; You could equally argue that the Narnia stories are all orthodox except for ‘The Magicians Nephew’ – as it presents a false picture of the Christ-figure creating on it’s own.
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Haven’t read “The Shack”, will read it soon. Although “The Shack” may not be a theological or doctrinal statement about the Trinity, readers who do not know or hold to a biblical picture of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (or who do) are likely to have their perception of God shaped by “The Shack’s” portrail. Sure the book may move me emotionally but stirring good thoughts about God may not be good if a non-Christian is lead to believe God is something He is not. Just a novel, maybe, but “a novel” can affect perceptions and feelings. I really am struggling with the issue as I do enjoy art and a good book Christian or not. I do like Pilgrim’s Progress and even The Singer Triology by Calvin Miller. Maybe a discussion on just how far can we go with Poetic license. Struggled with reformed theology in the same way and landed in a comfortable place, Probably will with this one too.
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“He’s like a mean version of John Piper” – he he.
He does seem surprisingly annoyed at this book. It’s just a novel . . .
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Don’t know whether Driscoll’s read the book, I haven’t yet but may read it, but I see some justification for the concerns he expresses because of the way book that acquire this kind of must-read status in the Christian community are regularly taken with far less than the necessary grain of salt by the general readership. Witness the pop eschatology that has sprung up around some very popular novels on the end times.
In view of that my question to the author of this book, however enjoyable I will probably find it, would be, Was it really necessary to depict “the Father”, if you had to depict Him at all, as a woman?
Of course I can think of a number of questions I would like to ask Driscoll, too.
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I have a question for you, oh cyber cleric. Why do people refer to Driscoll as Emergent? I realize he used to be buds with McLaren and Pagitt, but doesn’t it take more than a necklace and a pair of jeans to be considered Emergent? He’s like a mean version of John Piper.
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Driscoll didn’t read it.
It is weird to hear the word heresy come out of Mark Driscoll’s. Such a rarity!
I didn’t know that the Shack was a systematic theology book. I thought it was a novel. Huh. I should go and read it again.
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Dale- too long. Link it please.
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I think people read the book and feel that they have been in the presence of a powerful presentation of God’s personal love for them; that God’s love is there even in the worst situations. They feel the love of God has been portrayed in warm, personal images.
Modalism? Of course, it’s a concern, but that’s not the level people read this kind of book.
Calvinists seem to think evangelicals want to be theology geeks. Most of us are not quite so cerebral.
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I gave The Shack an OK but not glowing review and truly don’t understand all the hoopla and ecstatic praise it has received (e.g., “next to the Bible this is the most important/best/most life-changing book I’ve ever read!”). I appreciate the book’s value as a springboard for further discussions about the nature of God and why bad things happen, and I found the scene where Mack visits Wisdom particularly compelling.
Driscoll seems to have entirely missed The Shack’s central theme, and the notion that it promotes goddess worship is over the top and leads me to believe he only skimmed the book at most. However, I have to agree with his concerns about Christians “going nuts” about this book. I don’t believe it’s intended to be taken as a theologically solid depiction of the Trinity, but a lot of people seem to be reading more into this work of fiction than perhaps they should. What to do about that, I don’t know other than to engage them in discussion. But attacking strawmen, as Driscoll does in the clip, seems like a really poor way to address it.
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Gummby: I don’t think Jesus “taking the Pharisees down a peg is the same as the Shack.” But this does go against what Driscoll was saying–that Jesus did describe the Father as a human being in a parable. Did Christ break the 2nd commandment when He did this? Did His listeners break the commandment when they understood through this description?
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Someone did an interview with him in the last couple of weeks on “how my mind has changed” and he noted that chapter of Knowing God was one of the changes.
I don’t have the link, but perhaps someone else will.
NOTE: I am removing references to this in the comment thread until I find the link. If I am mistaken, I apologize.
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iMonk: do you have a source for that quote from Packer? Just curious. His book still sits unread on my shelf, but I’m interested to hear if he’s changed his opinion.
Curtis: Do you really think Jesus taking the Pharisees down a peg is the same as “The Shack”?!
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I was actually at Mars Hill when Mark gave this sermon… and I hadn’t even heard of the book before he started ripping on it. I like most of what Mark has to say, but he spends so. much. time. on the gender issues (which I don’t disagree with, though I absolutely disagree with how often that topic comes up at Mars Hill…), that to me it just struck me as yet another incarnation of some way to insert Mark’s fixation on gender stuff into the sermon 😛
I still haven’t read the book- not because of Mark or because of anything else I’ve read about it, simply because I’ve got other books to read first (currently: The Year of Living Biblically and Useless Beauty)… but I strongly suspect that I would find it mildly compelling and useful. Of course, I’m one of those Christians that actually sees value in art (some art, subject to my approval, and certainly not much CCM) that has a Christian overtone or undertone as a tool for encouraging myself in my faith.
Mark, on the other hand, strikes me as someone who would agree that all we need is the word of God, that is beautiful enough, and therefore, we shouldn’t have need of anything outside of it. I get where he’s coming from, but dang, I sure do like Pilgrim’s Progress and Narnia, and find them encouraging, somewhat instructional, helpful, etc. (obviously subject to a grain of Biblical salt)
*edited to clarify some stuff…
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It’d be a lot odder if he wasn’t preaching on heresies against the Trinity.
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I was actually at Mars Hill when Mark gave this sermon… and I hadn’t even heard of the book before he started ripping on it. I like most of what Mark has to say, but he spends so. much. time. on the gender issues (which I don’t disagree with, though I absolutely disagree with how often that topic comes up at Mars Hill…), that to me it just struck me as yet another incarnation of some way to insert Mark’s fixation on gender stuff into the sermon 😛
I still haven’t read the book- not because of Mark or because of anything else I’ve read about it, simply because I’ve got other books to read first (currently: The Year of Living Biblically and Useless Beauty)… but I strongly suspect that I would find it mildly compelling and useful. Of course, I’m one of those Christians that actually sees value in art (some art, subject to my approval, and certainly not much CCM) that has a Christian overtone or undertone as a tool for encouraging myself in my faith.
Mark, on the other hand, strikes me as someone who would agree with a former pastor of mine that all we need is the words of God, that is beautiful enough, and therefore, we shouldn’t have need of anything outside of it. I get where they’re coming from, but dang, I sure do like Pilgrim’s Progress and Narnia, and find them encouraging, somewhat instructional, helpful, etc.
Well, anyway, that’s just my take- I like literature that has a deeper meaning, I don’t care if it’s exactly Biblically accurate, and Mark’s ranting about this doesn’t sway me in part because he spends too much time yakking about gender issues.
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It’s just odd how angry Driscoll is.
And as far as explaining God, didn’t Jesus himself do this with stories like the prodigal son?
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There’s no way he read the book. If he had read the book, surely he would have caught on to the allegorical feel that the author gives to the story. I myself have a few questions about some of the theology in the book, but it is not a theology textbook and was obviously not intended to be read as such. Driscoll is off-base to give it the same treatment as a Bible commentary.
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There is also a literary device in the story that leaves open the possibility that the whole experience was a vision or hallucination, or at the least, not a “real world” experience.
The three characters in the book are not intended to be a true exposition of the nature of the Trinity as much as an experience by which the Trintarian God speaks to Mack. Burning Bush? Remember?
Remember that Wisdom also appears as a character, and does someone believe that Young was suggested wisdom was actually a woman?
This all gets ridiculous as literary analysis.
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Has anyone seen the movie about the Bridge operator whose son is caught in the bridge gears and the operator decides to take his own son’s life in order to save the train?
I’d judge that piece chock full of heresy and error, but I GET what the story-teller is trying to say.
Subjecting that story to theological critique would be a one sided slam dunk. But why does the story captivate so many of us?
There are a lot of levels to human experience beyond the logic of systematic theology.
How many different IMAGINATIVE images of God are used throughout the Bible?
I’m sorry, but the Puritans don’t have a corner on the interpretation of the 2nd commandment.
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I’d be interested in how many of you who have read the book believe that Driscoll had read it when he gave this analysis.
I may be wrong, but I don’t believe he had read the book when he gave this talk.
I also assume that, to be consistent, Driscoll is opposed to the Narnia books and movies.
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