When you know you are loved

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I am reading the book, The Shack. Again. I read it a few years ago and it changed the way I think about a lot of things, particularly the way that we (I) view God and also the issue of pain and suffering in this world. When I was in the airport a couple of weeks ago and found myself without anything to read, I picked up a paperback copy to read on the plane. I didn't. But I am reading it now. There is so much in the book that is incredibly insightful and so very profound. I am glad I am reading it again.

Here, God (Papa) is speaking to Mackenzie:

"The real underlying flaw in your life, Mackenzie, is that you don't think I am good. 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 understand what I am doing, you would trust me. But you don't."

Years ago, I was working with a client that had not built up trust in me yet. She would worry unnecessarily about details that she did not need to worry about. One morning, I was thinking about her and had the thought that if she could just trust me to do my job, she could relax and enjoy the process. She would not have to lay awake at night and worry about how something was going to turn out. Because I had it all under control. And as I formed the idea in my head, "if she could just trust me," I realized that is what God is asking of us (me) as well. Ah, if I could just trust that HE is in control then I could also sit back peacefully and let Him work things out.

"Trust is the fruit of a relationship in which you know you are loved."


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"Mackenzie," It was the voice of Papa again, especially gentle and tender. "You really don't understand yet. You try to make sense of the world in which you live based on a very small in incomplete picture of reality. It is like looking at a parade through the tiny knothole of hurt, pain, self-centeredness, and power and believing you are on your own and insignificant.  All of these thoughts contain powerful lies. You see pain and death as ultimate evils and God as the ultimate betrayer, or perhaps, at best, as fundamentally untrustworthy."

"I am good, and I desire only what is best for you."

(excerpt from The Shack by Wm. Paul Young, chapter 8 (last page).