Shack questions:

A. The following questions are from http://bestsellers.about.com/od/bookclubquestions/a/shack_questions.htm

  1. Were you drawn in by the plot of The Shack?
  2. Why do you think Mack's encounter with God took place at the shack? If God were to invite you somewhere, where would it be? (In other words, where is the center of your doubt and pain)?
  3. Do you think suffering makes people closer to God or causes them to distance themselves from Him? What has been the pattern in your life?
  4. Were you satisfied with God's answers to Mack about suffering? Do you struggle with believing God is good in light of all the tragedy in the world?
  5. How is Young's description of God different from your concept of God? What parts of his description did you like and what parts didn't you like?
  6. Did The Shack change any of your opinions about God or Christianity?
  7. What were some of the things The Shack teaches about God, faith and life that you disagreed with?
  8. Would you recommend The Shack to a friend?
  9. Rate The Shack on a scale of 1 to 5.

from http://friartucksfleetingthoughts.blogspot.com/2008/10/shack-discussion-questionsreading-guide.html

Overview Questions

  1. If you were to rank the book: THE SHACK on a scale of 1-5, what would you rate it and why would you give it that rating?
  2. What part of the book spoke to you the most, and why?(If you can find it please read it)
  3. Are there any brief quotes in the book that you like?
  4. What part of the book confused you the most or created the most questions? Why did you have a hard time with that part of the book?
  5. What were some of the things that the Shack says about God, faith, and life that you disagree with?

Digging In: The Shack, The Garden, and The Human Soul

  1. Why do you think Mack's encounter with God took place at the shack? If God were to invite you somewhere, where would it be? (In other words, where is the center of your doubt and pain)?
  2. Do you think suffering draws people closer to God or distances them from Him? Which has it done in your life?
  3. If you think about your soul as a garden, what do you imagine it being like? Is it neat and all in order? Is it a mess? Do you want it in order? Do you want it to be a mess or in order? Does it need weeding?
  4. Why do you think Missy was buried in the garden?

Digging In: Papa, The Trinity, and All that God Stuff

  1. How did the author's description of God differ from your understanding of God? What parts of the descriptions of God did you resonate with? What parts did you have a hard time with? Why?
  2. Did you have a hard time with the way the author presented God's gender? Why or why not?
  3. Did you find the presentation of the Trinity helpful? Why or why not?
  4. When you pray to or think about God, what is the mental picture that comes to mind of what God looks like?
  5. Mack naturally relates to Jesus the best out of any member of the Trinity? Which do you tend to relate to when you pray? When you think about what is God is like?
  6. Do you think God is too nice in The Shack?

Digging In: The Great Sadness, Relationships and Reconciliation

  1. What do you think about how Papa, Jesus, and Sarayu relate to one another?
  2. The Great Sadness goes from being something that is the grief of Mack, to the thing that defines him. How did this happen? How does this happen in people that you know?
  3. In what ways does the Great Sadness in Mack hurt him in his relationships with other people?
  4. In what ways does Mack blame himself for what happened to Missy? How does this define him?
  5. Throughout the story we see that Mack, although he can hardly speak it, blames God for taking his daughter away. When do we blame God? Why? How do we reconcile with God after this?
  6. What were your thoughts about Mack's reconciliation with his father? In what ways do our relationships with our parents define us? Color our relationship with God? With others?
  7. Why is Mack's forgiveness of the killer important? To Papa? To Mack? For the killer?
  8. How does Mack's forgiveness of himself, God, and others get him to the point where he can be a better husband, father, and friend? Do you think this is true of all of us?

excerpt from http://www.litlovers.com/guide_shack.html

About the Author

• Birth—May 11, 1955
• Where—Grande Praire, Alberta, Canada
• Reared—West Paupua
• Education—B.A., Warner Pacific College
• Currently—lives in Gresham, Oregon, USA


William P. Young was born a Canadian and raised among a Stone Age tribe by his missionary parents in the highlands of former New Guinea. He suffered great loss as a child and young adult and now enjoys the "wastefulness of grace" with his family in the Pacific Northwest. (From the publisher.)

More
William P. Young is an American author, best known for The Shack, a Christian novel. Young initially printed just fifteen copies of his book for friends who encouraged him to have it published. Unable to find a publisher, Young published the book himself in 2007; word-of-mouth referrals eventually drove the book to number one on the New York Times trade paperback fiction best-seller list in June 2008.

In an interview with World Magazine's Susan Olasky, Young, who is no longer a member of a church, said that the institutional church...

doesn't work for those of us who are hurt and those of us who are damaged. . . . If God is a loving God and there's grace in this world and it doesn't work for those of us who didn't get dealt a very good hand in the deck, then why are we doing this? . . . Legalism within Christian or religious circles doesn't work very well for people who are good at it. And I wasn't very good at it.

An article in MacLean's Magazine in August 2008 indicated that Young, is a...

Canadian raised from birth by his missionary parents in Dutch New Guinea, Young was sexually abused by some of the people his parents preached to, as he was again back home, at a Christian boarding school. Young drifted through life as an adult, buoyed a little by his faith and a lot by his wife, Kim, keeping his secrets and building his shack: "the place we make to hide all our crap," he calls it. Until, at 38, he found himself at the nadir. "I had a three-month affair with one of my wife's best friends. That was it, that just blew my careful little religious world apart. I either had to get on my knees and deal with my wife's pain and anger or kill myself.

Young currently resides in Gresham, Oregon, with his wife and six children. (From Wikipedia.)

What do you think of these critical reviews:


Critics Say. . .
The Shack is a one of a kind invitation to journey to the very heart of God. Through my tears and cheers, I have been indeed transformed by the tender mercy with which William Paul Young opened the veil that too often separated me from God and from myself. With every page, the complicated do’s and don’t that distort a relationship into a religion were washed away as I understood Father, Son, and Holy Ghost for the first time in my life.
Patrick M. Roddy - a producer, ABC News

 

Finally! A guy-meets-God Novel that has literary integrity and spiritual daring. "The Shack" cuts through the cliches of both religion and bad writing to reveal something compelling and beautiful about life's integral dance with the Divine. This story reads like a prayer--like the best kind of prayer, filled with sweat and wonder and transparency and surprise. When I read it, I felt like I was fellowshipping with God. If you read one work of fiction this year, let this be it. --Mike Morrell, Mick Mike Morell - zoecarnate.com

When the imagination of a writer and the passion of a theologian cross-fertilize the result is a novel on the order of "The Shack." This book has the potential to do for our generation what John Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress" did for his. It's that good!
Eugene Peterson - Professor Emeritous, Regent College

Also, give these LitLovers discussion pointers a try to get you started.

1. How did reading this book affect your faith? Does it change, challenge, strengthen your image of God? Why is God portrayed as a woman, what reasons does God give Mack?

2. Does God answer convincingly the reason for the trinity?

3. Does the idea of God a character in the book, or God's first-person voice, bother you...or does it work within the context of The Shack's story?

4. Why did God let Missy die? Do you think The Shack answers convincingly the central question of theodicy, the existence of evil—or why, if there is a God, bad things happen to good people?

5. What does The Shack say about forgiveness—toward the self or toward those who have wronged you.

6. Young has been criticized for advocating lawlessness (p. 122) ...or universalism (p. 225)? Do you think that is a fair or unfair criticism?

7. Many readers find the first 4 chapters of The Shack almost too painful to read. Could they have been written in a way that would be less painful—without changing the book's message?

8. Does the book's ultimate message satisfy you? Is it possible to let go of control and certainty in life? Is it possible to live only in the present?

(Questions by LitLovers; please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)


more on the author: http://www.litlovers.com/guide_shack.html