The Shack

I read The Shack last year. Not because it seemed like the best book around, but because I believed so many Christians were caught up in the frenzy of this book without considering the heretical nature of it. I had read many Biblical reviews and critiques of the book, but felt compelled to "read it for myself" in order to thoughtfully engage fans of the book. I haven't seen as much hype about it lately, but enjoyed this perception from Albert Mohler.

I am especially thankful today for a church and pastors that care greatly about Biblical doctrine and discernment. This is a treasure that I am realizing more and more people do not possess. True love comes from truth about God.


Here is an excerpt of some thoughts from Al Mohler on The Shack:

When it comes to The Shack, the really troubling fact is that so many readers are drawn to the theological message of the book, and fail to see how it conflicts with the Bible at so many crucial points.

All this reveals a disastrous failure of evangelical discernment. It is hard not to conclude that theological discernment is now a lost art among American evangelicals — and this loss can only lead to theological catastrophe.

The answer is not to ban The Shack or yank it out of the hands of readers. We need not fear books — we must be ready to answer them. We desperately need a theological recovery that can only come from practicing biblical discernment. This will require us to identify the doctrinal dangers of The Shack, to be sure. But our real task is to reacquaint evangelicals with the Bible’s teachings on these very questions and to foster a doctrinal rearmament of Christian believers.

The Shack is a wake-up call for evangelical Christianity. An assessment like that offered by Timothy Beal is telling. The popularity of this book among evangelicals can only be explained by a lack of basic theological knowledge among us — a failure even to understand the Gospel of Christ. The tragedy that evangelicals have lost the art of biblical discernment must be traced to a disastrous loss of biblical knowledge. Discernment cannot survive without doctrine.

Entire article located here.