Extreme Home Make-over God

I just got done listening to an interview with William Paul Young, the author of the #1 Best Selling book "The Shack" on the Catalyst podcast. Bekah (my wife) and I just finished reading through the book together at the end of last year and it was an incredible experience. The book is a parable/metaphor for Young's journey through his issues into freedom and chronicles, in fictitious story form, his conversations with God that led him into healing.

His testimony is staggering and I would encourage anyone to go and listen to it here: http://www.marinerschurch.org/theshack/av/index.html
and then I would recommend that you read the book. All I'll say is that there's a reason it has done so well. Knowing that he just wrote it for his kids as a Christmas present without intending to publish it at all, also says that this is definitely a move of God amongst many people. This book will shake you up and let you down gently, a little more healed, into the arms of our Papa God. He describes the Shack as that place in our hearts where all of our secrets live and where all of our addictions fester. God took him into his 'shack' and the incredible thing is that he came out on the other end with no secrets and no addictions. This struck me right through the heart as someone who struggles with my own secrets and addictions and wants to be free of them. I asked myself, "How could anyone not have any secrets or addictions anymore? I so badly long for that, but it doesn't seem possible!"

In this last interview, he said something very interesting that ties into how this is possible in his life. He said, "So often, we want God to be like Extreme Home Make-over ... you know, send us off to Disney World while he renovates our hearts and makes it a glorious place for Him to live in." He went on to say that that's not how God works. He wants to come into our 'shack' where all of the crap is, meet us there in our mess, and heal all of the junk. And that's where the true freedom comes from. When we can bring our junk to God, realizing that He already knows it all, and already knows all of the other stupid stuff we're going to do, we can honestly let Him move in and work on healing the wounds. 'Cause it's really our wounds that get us trying to find love and validation in so many unGodly ways that so easily become our addictions.

This has been something very huge in my life lately ... just trying to be honest with God. I need to do this, because honesty is the foundation and starting point of intimacy. Without honesty, you will always come up against the facade that the other is trying to erect to show you who they would like you to think that they are. The problem (and blessing) with God is that He already knows us, intimately, we just have to catch on to that and invite Him in ... He will not force His way because that is not the way of relationship. When we can finally get honest with God about the junk in our life (which is, in essence, confession) we can finally move beyond trying to prove to God that we are worthy of His love. He's loved us ... it's done! Then we can move into the intimacy of knowing God and reveling in the deep joy and peace that comes from knowing that He knows us more deeply than anyone ever will and He will never leave us or forsake us.

The other outworking of this is in our relationships with each other and the community that we're supposed to be as the body of Christ. There's something incredible that happens in your soul when you no longer have anything to hide from God and can live in the freedom of His grace, inviting Him into the mess: you can start living in that freedom of relationship with others. Granted this is something that can only happen with other people who are as screwed up as you are and who are willing to take the glorious journey of grace together. As God begins to heal our wounds and our poor attempts at coping with the realities of life (where all addictions come from), we can stop asking others to give us the things that only God can give and we can start discovering what true intimacy looks like. When we're not trying to hide from each other and not trying to erect our facades of who we wished we were, we can finally start seeing each other for who we really are ... broken people, in need of the Lord's healing, all on the road to redemption. That, my friends, is a journey I hope to be able to walk with you face to face, for the long haul.