World Impact Ministries / Peter Youngren

Well written Peter!
The Shack was never intended to be a textbook on Theology. Sometimes our familiarity can blind us. ‘The Shack’ causes us to bypass pre-conceived ideas and think in a fresh new way so we can receive again His amazing truth and grace found in Jesus!

The Shack is a fictional spiritual book, and terribly misleading to many who read it.  I do not have this book with me any longer, but I do recall that God (the woman) was in the kitchen cooking bacon.  God, Elohim, would never be cooking bacon according to Leviticus ll:7 -  That law has not changed since the Father created it for man.  There were other uncharacteristic personalities of Yahovah mentioned in the book that I had to not let into my spirit therefore got rid of this book, the Shack as quickly as possible.

Who cares, God Is Great!

Pastor Peter,
Now I must read this Novel! Perhaps the critics need more of Jesus! So many people need to realize that God is perfect LOVE and he will use whoever yields to His magnificent Grace and Mercy.It is hard sometimes to let our human, physical reaction to criticism go and realize that the KIng of KIngs and the Lord of the universe knows all we have been through and uses flawed human vessels for His Glory! ( I pray especially for my brothers in Christ who need to accept the fact that our Heavenly Father can and does use women! Black or White!)
Love and Prayers,
Gigi

To me God speaks all around us-we just have to stop and listen-whether in a book, such as the Shack,which I believe contained some deep insight, which could only be Holy Spirit inspired.
God is All In All- I believe that says it all to me.
Thankyou for God’s Ministry Flowing Through You
Blessings, Erin

Dear Pastor Youngren:
I was introduced to the Shack near the very start of it’s great ride to popularity. It touched me deeply…but it did need a little effort to get used to the various characters and who they represented in the story. However… once past that…it became an encouraging eye opener in some ways/ I especially loved the walking on water scene with Mack and Jesus. I too always want to walk on water with Jesus…accept the invitation to faith and do through Christ the impossible”.
Your summing up sentence re the theologians is excellent. Sometimes they get in the way and block out the light.
Your fearless manner of expression and clarity lets the light of the Gospel shine through….excites me and lifts me up to meet Jesus in a most intimate and personal way.
Thank you and all the Lord is doing through you.
Blessings,
Jon

at last! a balanced non-emotive appraisal of ‘the shack’.
thanks so much Ps Peter - from one ‘theologian’ to another

I really enjoyed The Shack and identified with God the Father as warm, forgiving, and loving. 
Since it is fiction, I had no problems with the author taking fictional license in expressing how he saw God.

Peter, sorry to hear you endorse ‘The Shack’. Not everything with $$ success is truly a success…Today’s modern Christians has been seduced by devils by equating ‘worldly’ success and $$ signs with God’s favor and blessing. I disagree with your view of WP Young’s book, and with your idea that Scripture could be ‘twisted’ to describe God as a woman.
Our Lord Jesus Christ called God, ‘Father’...not ‘mother’...He said, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do…”
The only real ‘benefit’ of Young’s confusing ‘spiritual voice’ and book, is that it may spark people’s hearts to ‘seek’...Jesus said, “Those who seek will find ...My prayer is that readers of Young’s book won’t be led astray, including by compromising Bible teachers who endorse the book, but that the Spirit will guide them home to the One whom Jesus clearly called, ‘Abba’...‘Father’...

I just loved this book and I had read it several times and even made it a study with my Bible.  I found this book, or should I say the LORD led me to this book when I was questioning the LORD’S love for me and I couldn’t put it down until I had read it from cover to cover.  After I was finished, I passed it on with all of my study reference notes from my Bible.  I felt God’s presence and after reading the Shack, I now understand that it is not the LORD who leaves us but we allow circumstances to remove us and not feel His presence and unconditional love.  I thank the LORD for sisters and brothers that have the gift to write and encourage us.  Praise the LORD, thank you Jesus!

I found the Shack to be a wonderful, comforting and inspiring writing. I must say I was taken aback by the authors introduction to the Trinity but as I read on it introduced me to a feeling of closeness and understanding to God the Father,God the Son and God the Holy Spirit.GOD was glorified in this book and for me it has sent me searching in the scriptures seeking to become closer to God
Thank you
Joan

I agree. It challenges their theological box, especially since it’s not one of their own. Paul is being treated like “St. Paul”, one who fought the good fight against ” religiosity and the controling systems.”
Our God is one of Mercy and Grace, who redeems our sin and pain and is NOT into pointing fingers. Are his critics afraid to enter their “shack” and bare their pain and wounds [given and recieved] to a compassionate God? ?

I thought the book was fantastic!!!!!!!!
It made me smile, and cry at the same time.  I am letting it settle with me and then I will reread it.  It gives us all hope!!!!
Write another please.

Hi Peter,
“The Shack” was a springboard to discovering “the REAL JESUS” in “Classic Christianity” by Bob George and “Jake’s Story” (free download) by Colson ....these were “set in place” to meet you, your ministry, and God’s AMAZING GRACE.
Thanks SO MUCH,
Harv

We should not box God. He will use whatever method to relate to the individual.All in all you can’t help but sense the awesomeness of LOVE; When you read this book .Personally i feel if you really feel its not for you then dont read it. We all are different here; and as i know God; He has lots of flavors .

Thanks Peter, for a job well done.
The story of The Shack, is a great example, of how much God really Loves us and cares for us and how important each one of us, is to Him.

Genesis 1:27 clearly says that God first created ‘man’ in His own image (twice), and then He goes on to say that He created man and woman.  Woman was created out of the rib of a man as a companion to him.  Men and woman are definitely equally important in God’s eyes, but with diverse roles.
“...For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine…” (read 2 Tim 4:1-5).
If people are defending ‘The Shack’ as a purely fictionist book on spirituality - then they shouldn’t be holding it up as a measure to the inspired word of God.
God is full of grace and mercy, and He gave His only Son to die as a sacrifice for our sins so that we can have everlasting life - but when Jesus returns, make no mistake, He will have fire in His eyes and the sword (word of God) will proceed from His mouth and He will judge the nations!!!
I don’t want to be one of those Christians that Jesus talks about in Matthew 7:21-23 (And He is talking about professing Christians).
Mark

The Bible says : So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created Him; male and female He created them.
Jesus says that unless we receive the Kingdom of God as children we will never enter it.
Therefore this book was written for the children.
Aww I love the Papa goes about it.
Praise the LORD !!!

Yes, i agree!  I don`t know why people limit God so much. The Lord can use anything or anyone at any given time to fulfill His plans and purposes in our lives. Just think, He is the Lord of Lords and the King of Kings.

The Shack is an awesome book.  The author is certainly not trying to add to what Jesus done for us.  God’s love is poured throughout Williams story, and you can’t help feeling the LORD’S love in the Shack.  Anyone willing to enter the Shack will experience a spiritual awakening.  Praise the LORD!  He’s not punishing us for our sins as in the Old Testament,. We should learn from the Old Testament and practice and live in the New Testament.
Neither do men put new wine into old bottles: else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish: but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved.  Matthew 9:17 The New Testament is like new wine and meant to be placed in a new container, and we are the new containers.
I praise the LORD that we are in the law of grace and not the Old Testament.  I can eat bacon if I please. 
For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect. Hebrews 10:1
Thank you Jesus I can get on with the new.  I stand alone on the word of God but if I read any other book I certainly want to know it is in agreement with the Word.  That’s called freedom, not bondage, and the Shack is a great read! 
Thank you for sharing Peter.

Thanks Peter! I aggree with everything you mentioned, as it’s the spirit of the message & the story itself which is so inspired! I listened to it as a E-book just over a year ago when I believe the Lord knew I really needed it as my Dad was dying of Cancer (& died) & my girlfriend & I were having relationship issues (& she; broke up with me).
So the Shack was just one of the ways that The Lord comforted me!

Pastor Youngren,  The book ministered to me on different levels. This book had me in many emotions that made me laugh, cry, and mad, but the most important revelation was I want more of the Lord. I had to repent from time to time on how I saw the Lord in my eyes. (Isa 55:8, Micah 4:12)  I read from the time i woke up and going to sleep.

If only the critics would understand that God the Creator can do whatever He wants to do, with thing or willing person. He is the Creator of All things.

And Please, Please, Please let’s stop putting The King of Kings and The Lord of Lords in a box with limitations.
Did not the Lord say that apart from Him we can do nothing?  ( john15:5)

I have a question? How many can say they have been in their own personal shack
and got what Mack received?

I have been in my “shack” dealing with the issues that are and were at hand in my life. Now my view of my garden being plowed, seed sown, watered, and plucked is being taking care of by (Papa), as an African American woman, (Jesus) the Middle Eastern carpenter, and Sarayu, an Asian woman (Holy Spirit). i see all of them as they truly are,  not as fictional characters.

In conclusion, The Shack ( your heart where the Trinity reside in us)  that’s where The Love of The Father, The Son and The Holy Spirit is.  It’s all about the LOVE of CHRIST and entering into your Shack and getting oppression, depression, guilt, condemnation, pain, etc. and in turn receiving the healing of life, and the freedom to be free, and being made WHOLE!!!!!

I pray that every living soul who reads the “Shack” will see it as fictional, but being able to relate to what the message is, and that’s the LOVE of CHRIST. The Word of God is the Living Word and there will never be a book of any kind that can ever top the Bible.

Pastor Youngren, I want to Thank you for the opportunity you have given all of us to reply with comments whether we all agree or not.
Thank you again, Sincerely Carol  

P.S. We don’t know what assignments God gives others to do, so let’s just do what the Lord said to do and that’s to pray for all.
Amen

Yes, God does work outside ‘the box’ and His ways are not our ways - but He is always true to His word.  Does God (and men for that matter) have the qualities of a mother at times?  Yes, because God created male and female and also because female came from the rib of man.
This does not mean that God is a ‘mother’.  He is not ‘mother nature’ or ‘mother Gaia’.  He is God the Father.  The forementioned are examples of titles of fertility goddesses and false deities in the worship of nature and witchcraft - worshipping the creature (creation) and not the Creator.
As for receiving the Gospel as a child does:  “When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish thngs.  For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.”  I Cor. 13::11-12.
Maybe Willam P.Young found it necessary to change the ‘nature’ of God, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit so that others would more accepting of the ‘new image’ - but God the Father; Jesus the Son an the Holy Spirit have been the same from the beginning; as they are now; as they will always be!
Mark

Thank you Pastor Peter for endorsing this book.  Beyond the story itself was the deeply moving love and presence of God Himself.  I have been deeply stirred by this book.  It moved beyond my ‘religious’ and ‘traditional church’ upbringing and brought me face-to-face with my Creator.  My favorite part was the depiction of the three sitting at a dinner table, finishing each other’s sentences, serving one another and really just being a ‘family’.  It really gave me a visual of God’s nature and character, how he interacts amongst the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  It was beautiful!  I think to be truly free, we need to have our eyes of understanding enlightened and allow the truth (which is Christ as He said He is the way, the truth and the life) to set us free.  Open our hearts to receive revelation, knowledge and understanding, God.  We need You!

I read The Shack and absolutely loved it. I could go on and on about all the things I read several times to savor the full flavor of their meaning and significance.  But I can certainly understand how this book could be a colossal stumbling block to people stuck in religious legalism.  <sigh>  I have to keep reminding myself that legalism is a choice and God gave us the free will to choose. 
I find it unfathomable how anyone would choose legalism and its bondage.

Thanks for your uplifting comment Peter. I read The Shack about a year and a half ago and loved it. I was taken through a series of emotions as I felt everything the writer described. It brought me closer to my Pappa God and showed me things I needed to repent of. I bought a bunch of these books after and gave them out as gifts. I wish William P. Young would write another book. This was very inspiring spiritually for me.
Thank-you..

Thanks for the great information, It need to everyone.