Chapters 8-11: Tough Stuff

The next morning, after a night riddled with terrors and nightmares, Mack joins the three for breakfast. Mack begins to talk with them about his understanding of the trinity. He asks who is in charge. Papa, confused, says, "We are in a circle of relationship, not a chain of command...What you're seeing here is relationship without any overlay of power." Upon Mack's look of confusion in response, she continues: "Humans are so lost and damaged that to you it is almost incomprehensible that people could work or live together without someone being in charge." When Mack replies that this is how everything on earth works, Papa laments at how much of a waste that is. Jesus says this is why experiencing true relationship is so hard for human beings, especially relationship with Him. We are used to, he says, "a system of order that destroys relationship rather than promotes it. You rarely see or experience relationship apart from power. Hierarchy imposes laws and rules and you end up missing the wonder of relationship that we intended for you...If you had truly learned to regard one another's concerns as significant as your own, there would be no need for hierarchy."

Finally, getting to the crux of the whole book, Papa says, "We created you, the human, to be in face-to-face relationship with us, to join our circle of love...everything that has taken place is occurring exactly according to this purpose, without violating choice or will." Mack replies, "How can you say that with all the pain in this world, all the wars and disasters that destroy thousands? And what is the value in a little girl being murdered by some twisted deviant? You may not cause those things, but you certainly don't stop them."
In quiet reply, Papa says, "I am not evil. You are the ones who embrace fear and pain and power and rights so readily in your relationships. But your choices are also not stronger than my purposes, and I will use every choice you make for the ultimate good and the most loving outcome."
Mack says, "I just can't imagine any final outcome that would justify all this.
Papa softly says, "We're not justifying it. We are redeeming it."

So why does a loving, merciful God allow awful things to happen? He has given us free choice, and will use our choices for His ultimate purpose. God is good, and everything He does is good. Even though human beings make awful choices and do awful things, He will use those for His good purpose for the world and for each human being. So, while I was heartbroken upon the ending of a relationship in high school, that set me up for the wonderful relationship I am in now. Without those experiences of that first relationship, I would not have known how to handle the experiences of this one. The conflicts I have been through when I was a kid have helped me help someone else who is going through similar conflicts. My birthmother's choice to give me up for adoption brought me out of a bad situation into today, where my future is currently pointed toward being a social worker in the foster care and adoption field. All things work toward God's perfect and perfectly good purpose, and that is a comforting thought.

Skipping ahead, after a talk with Sarayu while tending her garden, which is a big mess and is meant to be symbolic of Mack's heart and soul, we find Mack talking with Jesus in the workshop behind the cabin. They are talking about imagination and the future. Jesus says, "I do not dwell in the future you visualize or imagine...your imagination of the future, which is almost always dictated by fear of some kind, rarely, if ever, pictures me there with you...It is your desperate attempt to get some control over something you can''t...You try to play God."

How convicting is that?

They continue talking, and get onto the subject of Adam and Eve in the Garden. Jesus says,

From the first day we hid the woman within the man, so that at the right time we could remove her from within him. We didn't create him to live alone; she was purposed from the beginning...Our desire was to create a being that had a fully equal and powerful counterpart, the male and the female. But your independence with its quest for power and fulfillment actually destroys the relationship your heart longs for.

They end their conversation, and, since it is Jesus after all, walk straight across the lake to the other side into a cavern underneath a waterfall. Jesus tells Mack that he must enter alone. He has an appointment.

Inside the cavern is a woman whom we have not yet met. She is very beautiful, clothed in a dark flowy robe. She speaks much like Gandalf, in riddles and never saying outright what she really means. The beginning of the conversation is very Socratic -- she questions continuously, wanting Mack to arrive at the answers himself.
Mack begins to feel like he is on trial -- after all, she is dressed as a judge. However, she says that he is not the one on trial here. He is the judge. He denies his ability. She replies,

That is not true. You have already proven yourself capable...you have judged many throughout your life. You have judged the actions and even the motivations of others, as if you somehow knew what those were in truth. You have judged the color of skin...You have judged history and relationships. You have even judged the value of a person's life by the quality of your concept of beauty. By all accounts, you are quite well practiced in the activity.

Aren't we all?

Mack, ashamed and embarrassed, asks who he is judging. "God," she says, "and the human race." He is very surprised. She says,

There must be at least a few who are to blame for so much pain and suffering. What about the greedy who feed off the poor of the world? ...What about the men who beat their wives...? What about the fathers who beat their sons for no reason but to assuage their own suffering [alluding to Mack's childhood]? Don't they deserve judgment? And what about the man who preys on innocent little girls? Is that man guilty? Should he be judged?

Mack, incensed, yells that he should be damned to hell, and that man's father, who twisted him into a terror, should also be judged. But, the woman says, "How far do we go back? This legacy of brokenness goes all the way back to Adam...But why stop there? What about God? Isn't this where you are stuck? That God cannot be trusted? Isn't that your just complaint? That God has failed you, that he failed Missy?...That God know that one day your Missy would be brutalized, and still he created? Isn't God to blame?" Mack bursts out that yes, God IS to blame.

"Then," the woman softly replies, "you can certainly judge the world. Choose two of your children to spend eternity in God's new heavens...but only two...And you must choose three of your children to spend eternity in hell."
Mack is struck to silence.
"I am only asking you to do something that you believe God does."

Mack refuses to make that decision. Finally, after several tortuous moments, he says, "Could I go instead? If you need someone to torture for eternity, I'll go in their place." He cries and begs. The woman says, "Now you sound like Jesus...You have judged them worthy of love, even if it costs you everything. That is how Jesus loves. And now you know Papa's heart, who loves all her children perfectly."

A bit comforted, but still confused, Mack says that his still doesn't understand why Missy had to die. The woman, who we later find out is Sophia, the personification of God's perfect wisdom, says,

 She didn't have to. This was no plan of Papa's Papa has never needed evil to accomplish her good purposes...What happened to Missy was the work of evil, and no one in your world is immune from it...Give up being her judge and know Papa for who she is. Then you will be able to embrace her love in the midst of your pain, instead of pushing her away with your self-centered perception of how you think the universe should be...Only you, in the entire universe, believe that somehow you are to blame [for Missy's death]. Even if you had been to blame, [Papa's] love is much stronger than your fault could ever be...Judgment is not about destruction, but about setting things right.

So why does God allow bad things to happen? He doesn't. Bad things just happen as a result of a world that has sought independence instead of God. And God responds with infinite and perfect goodness, with sharing our griefs and sorrows, our joys and laughter. He responds with Jesus, who judged that we were worthy of love, even if it cost Him everything.