The Shack: Where Tragedy Confronts Eternity

by William Paul Young

grace rarely makes sense for those looking in from the outside.

I am neither male nor female, even though both genders are derived from my nature. If I choose to appear to you as a man or a woman, it’s because I love you. For me to appear to you as a woman and suggest that you call me ‘Papa’ is simply to mix metaphors, to help you keep from falling so easily back into your religious conditioning.”

“Don’t ever think that what my Son chose to do didn’t cost us dearly. Love always leaves a significant mark,”

“You, on the other hand, were created to be loved. So for you to live as if you were unloved is a limitation, not the other way around.”

Hierarchy imposes laws and rules and you end up missing the wonder of relationship that we intended for you.”

If you knew I was good and that everything—the means, the ends, and all the processes of individual lives—is all covered by my goodness, then while you might not always understand what I am doing, you would trust me.

Trust is the fruit of a relationship in which you know you are loved. Because you do not know that I love you, you cannot trust me.”

Both evil and darkness can be understood only in relation to light and good; they do not have any actual existence.

Paradigms power perception and perceptions power emotions. Most emotions are responses to perception—what you think is true about a given situation. If your perception is false, then your emotional response to it will be false too.

You love each person differently because of who they are and the uniqueness that they draw out of you.