Monthly Archives: July 2017

What are the Real Issues with the Shack?

Reflection.
It’s not surprising that with the success of the book (with sales of over 10 million) ‘The Shack’  has now been turned into an incredibly successful film with takings of over $96 million on a $20 million budget!

The story, in brief, revolves around Mack,  who four years previously  suffered the brutal murder of his  young daughter.   Mack suffers from what he calls his  ‘Great Sadness’.  Yet, during the course of the story, a meeting with God   (at the shack of the title)  brings him to a point  of resolution concerning his pain and anger.  The story seeks to deal seriously with suffering. It shows God as compassionate and that ultimately sufferings and heartache can only really be healed through meeting and knowing him.  But opinion has been divided concerning ‘The Shack’.  Some Christians have embraced it  as a positive tool for outreach.  Others have  called it   a work of heresy!   But what are the real issues ?

Firstly, its representation of God.  Any time we  portray God as we imagine him we run the risk of being  in violation of the Second Commandment.  The story also downplays the use of the Bible  with personal experience being more important.  Christ’s work on the cross is side-lined, hence the holiness of God  and the issue of sin being an affront to him  is sacrificed.  Christianity, depending as it does on this, is pushed to one side to present a more ‘Universalist’ view.  Even when ‘The Shack’ is at its best, as some Biblical concepts are well illustrated, very often a strong sense of ambiguity  prevails.   In the end we are  left with a ‘touchy-feely’ God who is  a completely user-friendly re-invention!

Those embracing  it as a tool for outreach prove the Church is in retreat  in this country.  It has become  concerned  with its image, seeking to have what it sees as a more user-friendly  and politically correct one,  Hence ‘The Shack’ ticks all the right boxes!

Yet when writing to the Galatian Church the apostle Paul refused to accept any other purported  Gospel  regardless of who preached it  (Galatians 1:8-9).    The issue of sin  and the cross  is central  as: ‘Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”’  (Galatians 3:13).  This demonstrates the seriousness of sin.  It’s such an affront  to a holy God  that we are  literally cursed  and, true to his nature, he would have to  judge us as such!  But this, and the willingness  of Christ, by his  voluntary  obedience to his father, to become a curse  for us makes the Gospel all the more remarkable (Philippians 2:6-8).   I’ve recently been reading ‘Preaching – an Awesome Task’  by  Eryl Davis.   Its subtitle ‘Wrath, Final Judgement, Hell  and the Glorious Gospel’,  struck me as really appropriate as the Gospel’s is the remedy to the first three.  And that’s what makes it glorious!  Its message  of Christ’s sacrifice for our wrong doing  is the  only way that  we can ever possibly be  reconciled to God who, because of his  holy nature, could never   coexist  with our sin!  No wonder  Paul would accept  no other Gospel!

In the end we all  need the authentic Gospel and ‘The Shack’ with it’s strong sense of ambiguity falls short!   At best to use it as such  could be interpreted as  sincere   but misguided.  Let’s be bold enough  to believe in the power of the true Gospel with the centrality of the cross as the remedy for sin.  And let’s repent of the times we’ve been tempted of depart from it in our witness!

The subject of  Gospel integrity  is dealt with in the sermon  Accept no Imitations! (Galatians 1).

The Heroes of Faith: Sarah.

Scriptural Thought for the Month

 ‘By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised.  Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore’ (Hebrews 11:11-12).

Sarah is the first of the only two women who are named in Hebrews 11.  She is held up as an example of faith in relation to her bearing Abraham’s son, Isaac, in her old age.  This might cause us to raise our eyebrows – after all, in Genesis 18:1-15 when the Lord revealed to Abraham that he would father a son, despite of his age Sarah, overhearing this, found it laughable, and then lied to try and save face!  That being the case, how is she seen as an example of faith?

The probable answer is far from spectacular, but that said, it is one that can provide believers with great encouragement.  Over the period of time, and encouraged by Abraham’s belief in the promises the Lord made to him, she grew in faith.  After all she too was part of the Lord’s promise to Abraham which had been reflected in her name being changed from Sarai to Sarah, meaning Princess (Genesis 17:15).

There is some debate as to whether Sarah or Abraham is the main subject of verse 11 as how it is translated in some versions put the emphasis on Abraham.  Lee Cockerill translates the text as: ‘By faith Sarah herself, although barren, receive power for the disposition of seed even though she was past the season for childbearing’.[1]  And I consider that to be the right emphasis as those receiving the letter would have known the scripture concerned and would have known that Abraham had had no problem impregnating Hagar (Genesis 16:1-4), which then does not particularly make this an act of faith on his part (although by the time Isaac was born he was considerably older).  So in my thinking the emphasis is on the: ‘power to conceive’ which strongly suggests that Sarah is the main subject of the verse.[2]  Genesis 18:11 helps reinforce the view as it states: ‘Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in years. The way of women had ceased to be with Sarah’ (a biblical way of saying she had gone through the menopause).  So, in the course of time, Sarah came slowly to believe, trusting that God would make her capable of bearing a son.

But how refreshing this was for the readers of the original letter and also us as believers today!  Very often faith is not formed by bold steps but by us stumbling, falling because of our lack of trust in the Lord’s promises, then him graciously picking us up again, and so we learn the lesson to put our trust in him!

But that said, in in the end this is still amazing faith!  In verse 12 the writer makes it clear that this is a major miracle.  It could not have been easier than raising the dead yet: ‘from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sands by the seashore.’  This is a faith that trusts the Lord to bring about his purpose, even when circumstances are against it!  And this has got to be a major encouragement to Christians in any day and age!

Want to listen to a sermon on this passage?  Sarah: Faith by a Progressive Experience.

[1] Garth Lee Cockerill, The Epistle to the Hebrews, The New International Commentary on the  New Testament, (Michigan, Eerdmans publishing company, 2012), 535.
[2] As the ESV (English Standard Version of the Bible) also concludes.  Hence  the use of it here.