The Bible offers something better for your suffering than The Shack

Let's get three things out of the way from the start. First, I've spent the bulk of my academic career studying what the Bible has to say about human suffering. In academia, it's called the problem of evil. Thinking through suffering from a biblical perspective, then, isn't something I've taken up over the past weekend. Second, I'm not an arm-chair quarterback when it comes to suffering--some guy sitting on the sidelines with no skin in the game. I have no interest in playing the 'my scar is bigger than your scar' game, but I believe it's safe to say walking through childhood cancer with your two-year-old daughter counts as suffering. And third, I believe the book "The Shack" gives a very poor answer, wrapped in Christianity, to the problem of our suffering. And by poor, I mean an answer that doesn't agree with the answer the Bible offers.Back that upI've got several problems with The Shack. As an aside, I've got a problem with any book, other than the Bible, attempting to speak directly for God. I'm not talking allegory here. I have in mind books that basically say, "Hey I'm God, this is what I think," and what follows are not words from Scripture. But I'll leave all that alone for now. For this post, I want to focus on what The Shack says about human suffering and point out its flaws. Why these flaws matter...Offer better resources...