The Shack:
Idolatry or Iconoclasm?
Having read the book and personally met the author years ago, I was very interested in seeing how the book was translated into a movie. So, yesterday, I went to my local theater and watched it.
I was not disappointed in what I saw. The movie was a well executed piece of art and storytelling even if I did not agree with every message therein.
Some have taken exception at the movie (and book) depicting God as a black woman and the Holy Spirit as an Asian woman. (I have not seen any objections to Jesus being depicted as a middle eastern, Jewish man as that is who he is.)
The charge leveled at the book and movie is one of idolatry. God–who is spirit–is being depicted as human, which God is not (with exception of Jesus).
I consider the idolatry charge a weak argument to dismiss the movie as heretical.
The same argument could be made for whitewashing the Sistine Chapel in Rome (as well as any numerous instances of humans attempting to express an understanding of God visually.)
Michelangelo did not paint the Sistine Chapel in order to create an idol. The point was not to worship the painted image but rather the God to whom the image–however imperfectly–was pointing.
A challenge to those theologically offended by the movie:
Is it any less idolatrous for us to allow people to continue imaging God as a white, Santa Claus like figure when God is not?
One could argue this movie does the important service of iconoclasm in addressing that especially popular, distorted image of God.
Also, the movie and book undermines the idea that God is only one gender as if God is limited to our sexual binary. God is beyond gender. With the exception of Jesus, God is neither male nor female.
So…
Isn’t insisting that God be confined to an elderly man depiction idolatry as well?
The movie and book certainly challenges that more culturally acceptable form of idolatry.
All that said, I did take issue with some messages in the movie:
1. In particular, I disagree with the idea that God is never wrathful. A person who cannot become angry is a person who cannot love, IMO. God is love. So, God must be filled with anger at times.
To be fair, the movie does hint at that anger in speaking about being angry with one’s kids. Yet I think it underplays righteous anger, which I consider important for healthy relationships including with God.
2. Also, I do not agree with how the movie depicted God referring to every human as God’s children. This is not how Jesus spoke about the Pharisees (John 8:44) or those who willfully rejected God and truth.
Yes, we are all children of God in the sense that God created us all. However, we do not enter God’s forever family until and unless we repent and accept Jesus’ atoning sacrifice upon our behalf naming Him our Lord (e.g. Acts 2:38, Romans 10:9-10, I John 4:7-8, etc).
The movie nailed the central struggle to forgive.
My favorite part of the movie was how it depicted the central struggle to forgive. The author and director correctly identified this struggle as a matter of trust.
Namely, we struggle to forgive when we lack trust–i.e. faith–that God is good and willing to deal with the painful injustice(s) we have experienced.
I know my struggle to forgive often comes down to my struggle to trust God with my pain and the injustices I have experienced. When I experienced God’s sovereignty as resulting in pain, my faith was shaken.
God allowed me to experience the painful injustices, after all!
Like Mackenzie in the movie, I struggled to believe God is good after that. Further, I wrongly believed I cared more about my pain and the injustice than God does.
Really, I questioned whether God actually loves me, and I decide God does not when I choose not to forgive.
And this brings me back to my first objection to the movie:
God needs to have anger and wrath if God is to be trusted.
God must be moved to anger by injustice or I am right in believing that I care more about my personally experienced injustices than God.
After all, we are not indifferent to our loved one’s unjustly experienced pain, or they are not ones we love.
But the truth is God does care about our personally experienced injustices. Evil and injustice move God to anger and wrath (Psalm 7:11, Proverbs 6:16-19, etc).
Evil and injustice move God to anger and wrath, because God loves us and cares about righteousness and justice more than we ever could.
In conclusion, I believe the movie, like the book, does much good in helping those with a broken and unhealed image of God–the Father, especially–connect with God. The movie is an excellent corrective to an image of God as distant, displeasing, and disinterested.
So, I do not consider it idolatry. The movie is iconoclastic attacking the idea of God as the angry, evil, incompetent grandpa despot and replacing that image with the true God who is especially fond of you!
I have not seen the movie and will not. It seems like another sappy vehicle just to make money. And the cliched image of God as a black woman are tired and silly, or that black people are somehow magical or more spiritual. Stephen King did the same thing in The Stand.
But, anyone who believes anger and wrath is not in the Bible should go back and read Psalm 109! Talk about anger:
6 Set thou a wicked man over him: and let Satan stand at his right hand.
7 When he shall be judged, let him be condemned: and let his prayer become sin.
8 Let his days be few; and let another take his office.
9 Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.
10 Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.
It is a curse against an enemy….let his prayer become sin? That’s serious. I have read it a few times out loud to help with revenge thoughts or foggy plans!
Another thought: If G-d did not care about our personal injustices, the outlook for what adulterers and cheaters do to our lives would tremendously bleak. To the point of despondency. If we don’t believe G-d will avenge us….we might start plotting diabolical revenge fantasies in earnest.
I have moments of doubt, but I believe that is part of the package.
I read the “non” review you cited. I think his strongest argument is this:
“God is so other that any visual representation harms instead of helps our understanding”. But, I think he is way over the top with his declaration that even seeing the movie would be a sin.
It reminds me of the people who are so harsh about Joel Osteen: stating he is not Biblical (he actually is) and that he is heretical.
Osteen responded in a 60 minute interview: There is enough negative in the world. I want to focus on the positive!
I agree and the same thing can be said about The Shack. If it leads even one person in the right direction, its clear PC agenda silliness can be overlooked or even ignored to absorb its larger meaning.