Posted on 06/07/2010 6:51:41 AM PDT by Jim W N
Shocker! "Burning Down 'The Shack,'" [is] a hard-hitting, no-holds-barred biblical critique of the book by someone who knew author Paul Young well and understands what's behind its strange theology. "It's often said that one can understand a book better by knowing the author," James De Young offers in "Burning Down 'The Shack,'" which he wrote to "expose the greatest deception to blindside the church in the last 200 years!" De Young isn't only a New Testament language and literature professor at Western Seminary in Portland, Ore., he holds multiple degrees from respected seminaries including Dallas Seminary, Talbot Theological Seminary and Moody Bible Institute. In addition, and possibly most important, De Young is a former longtime colleague of Paul Young, and was his Portland-area neighbor when Young wrote "The Shack." In 1997, De Young and Young co-founded a Christian think tank, called M3 Forum, and for the next seven years they discussed and probed topics, doctrine and problems facing the church as it approached the New Millennium. Then, in April 2004, Young submitted a surprising 103-page paper in which he embraced universal reconciliation and said, "He was putting aside his earlier evangelical paradigm." Less than two years later, Young asked friends to read the early draft of a novel he was writing as a Christmas gift for his children. Though highly impressed by the manuscript's potential, the friends were opposed to the universal reconciliation they found in it and acknowledged publicly that they spent over a year trying to remove that message. Mainline Christian publishers declined interest in publishing what became "The Shack," so Young and his friends formed their own publishing company to self-publish. "When I carefully read 'The Shack' in January 2008, I was dismayed to find universalism still embedded, deeply and subtly, in it," De Young recalls.
(Excerpt) Read more at wnd.com ...
Unfortunately, I know exactly what you mean. I have a friend who thinks what is said in that novel could have happened. I told her, "You know it was just a novel, right?" She just gave me that deer-in-the-headlights stare.
That depends on how one approaches what is read for entertainment.
I certainly wouldn't support a Christian reading porn novels and the like. However, I did read the Left Behind series and have actually moved farther from the ideas presented in those books than I was before I read them. I knew they were novels, of course, and as I've continued to study the scriptures, I've come to a new understanding of some biblical prophesies.
Bingo! I had the exact same reaction to it! I couldn’t get over the feminization of the Godhead and the casualness of the relationships. The Lord is a wonderful Savior but he is still deserving of all praise, worship, and adoration.
I had Dr. James De Young as a professor at Western Seminary for a number of courses... outstanding man of God who really knows the Word of God. I am sure he has done a tremendous job in exposing the lie that is “The Shack”.
There are many wolves among the sheep.
In wanting to give people the benefit of the doubt, we attribute their lack of discernment
to ignorance or stupidity, when in reality they are well aware of the deceptions of Satan.
The Lord Himself tells us how He will deal with pseudo-christians in Matthew 7:22.
If you have not read The Shack and decide to read it, you'll find, as many have, that this theological issue doesn't have much to do with the book's main "touchstone(s)."
There's a lot to like in it but as they say, "Take what you want and leave the rest."
I have no problem with selling the Shack in bookstores. I do have a problem with churches promoting a book to warps the nature of God.
I would agree that it is not the business of a church to promote novels.
You didn’t miss anything. It was boorish, emotionally manipulative, and wholly self serving. Gag.
The more I think about having spent even a small portion of my life on the reading of that book, the angrier I get. I just remembered another reason I hated it. Characterizing portions of the Godhead in female gender is no where to be found in the Bible, further, the author does so in a most condescending and sexist way! Argh! I wish I hadn’t seen this thread. This book made no contribution to anything—you couldn’t even attempt to expand your vocabulary by reading it! Drivel.
“Feels” like a leonard cohen song... (oh yeah)
The worst part of the book is the page on “relationship”, where the diety says God isn’t into judging, or into authority, just relationship. Jesus blew this concept out when He said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.”
The book is sick.
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