Discernment: Doctrine Matters

Albert Mohler blogs about The Shack by William P. Young (no relation to me as far as I’m aware). This novel is immensely popular. Mohler points out that it has become one of the best-selling paperbacks of all time. I know that much has been written about the book in the blogosphere and in print. While I have not read the book myself, I did appreciate Mohler’s post. He argues that the book is a sustained theological argument, even if it is fiction.

Given the central place accorded to theology in the book, any evaluation of it as a work of literature must consider the theology it presents. Mohler concludes: “The popularity of this book among evangelicals can only be explained by a lack of basic theological knowledge among us — a failure even to understand the Gospel of Christ.” That final statement particularly caught my attention; it seems to me that Mohler’s point is well taken. The widely accepted notion that there can be such a thing as an atheological Christian is incoherent. Such a notion is self-contradictory.