The Shack Phenomenon

My latest favorite book is The Shack by William Paul Young. I'm not being original here apparently, since it's been on the New York Times Best Seller list for 9 weeks now, with 2.5 million copies sold; Oprah's reading it now, there's a movie deal for it, and Jay Leno even mentioned it on the Tonight Show!

So, why is this book so great, you might ask? Well, my short answer is that it gives us a glimpse of God - with skin on! :)

All people have been created by God. And so whether we've grown up in the Judeo-Christian West and maybe are the poster child for the Bible Belt, pray to Mecca five times a day, believe in spells and evil spirits, claim there is nothing but science and believe that our need for God is just a human weakness to overcome, or anything in between, we all have a desire to know God, somewhere deep within us. And especially those of us who engage in a growing relationship with God would just love to really know who God is, what he'd be like if we could physically sit near him and ask him questions face to face.... The hard questions like Why can't/don't you stop all bad things from happening?... Why do you answer some prayers in wonderful ways and others with dreaded outcomes?... Why do good people/children have to suffer?... How can you love someone as messed up as me?...

In The Shack, we get to know, in Young's view, who God is ...with beautiful imagery, descriptions rich with emotion, and amazing words sometimes hard to read through the tears. The mass appeal of this book I think is due to our broken world's need for love. All who read this book are met head on with the immense width, length, height and depth of the love of Christ. Young gives us "God with skin on" so that we can go further in our imagination to discover who our Maker is... even if it is still just a glimpse more.

Of course, I recommend reading The Shack and passing along the copy to someone else when you're done. It's an easy read and hard to put down, so you'll likely get through it in a weekend or so. It's not a book with "churchy" words or Bible quotes. Since you get to know God himself, there is no need for that. I promise that it's different than anything you've ever read. If you'd like to dig in more or read an excerpt, go to the website: http://www.theshackbook.com/. And maybe this phenomenon can start a revolution of love in you, as it has in me.

Ephesians 3:14-21