I am still processing my experience at The Shack Conference in Jackson, MS April 17-19. It was an incredible coming together of several threads of independent but related “spiritual movements.” The Conference was sponsored by the ministry of C. Baxter Kruger (www.perichoresis.org) and they will make it available as audio and DVD in August. The speakers were Paul Young, Malcolm Smith, C. Baxter Kruger and Ken Blue.
Some background is important to understand my experience. My good friend, Ron Thornton, gave me The Shack for Christmas 2007. I read it twice before giving it to Susanna on New Year’s Day and she read it through that day - tears flowing all day.
A few days later a blog I follow had a link for videos of Paul Young sharing about the backstory of writing The Shack at Mariner’s Church. I watched them and was deeply moved. I made a mistake of telling Susanna about it before we were to leave for some appointment and she started watching. I walked in to see if she was close to being ready to leave, saw the tears and backed out knowing that we were going to be late. She says it was as moving as reading the book. If you know the story then you know that Paul really understands the power of shame to create and protect “the shack” from exposure.
I thanked Ron and he said that the author was connected to Wayne Jacobson whose ministry Lifestream (http://www.lifestream.org) had published several of his books including: So You Don't Want to Go to Church Anymore
Calling Paul Young proved impossible but I spoke briefly to Wayne and asked him how he came to understand the significance of shame. He said he was impacted by a group of people he met in Australia and they changed his understanding about the Atonement. He did not really have a name for that group and we agreed to talk again sometime.
Now I had a mystery about who this group was in Australia. My Google search turned up the name of C. Baxter Kruger whose ministry Perichoresis has a presence in Australia and the US (www.perichoresis.org). I listened to the audios available and read his book The Great Dance: The Christian Vision Revisited
To say the least, Baxter is an interesting man. He is a Mississippi boy who grew up in a Presbyterian church, attended Bible College and found himself in Scotland working on a PhD in Systematic Theology. You have to understand that he is also an avid fisherman. So avid that he started making fishing lures as a young boy and now has a fishing lure company, Mediator Lures. His research was on the theology of Thomas Torrance, one of the leading voices in recovering the early church's Trinitarian theology.
I called Baxter in November and found that he was on tour in Australia with - of all people - Paul Young. Later, I invited him to come to Kansas City and speak in conjunction with the HCM Gala in January because his theology was so consistent with what we are doing in HeartConnexion Ministries. A commitment in Thailand made it impossible but we talked about shame. He suggested that once you step back to the Early Church Fathers before Augustine’s legal definition of sin the best way to talk about what is wrong with humanity’s ability to accept grace is shame. He told me about a conference he was putting together in Jackson, MS, his home base, with Paul Yound and Malcolm Smith and maybe one other who were all coming from a Trinitarian point of view.
Of course, that set me on a course to explore what Trinitarian theology and reading the books of Thomas Torrance, James B. Torrance and others. I have known Malcolm for a dozen years and appreciated his teaching ministry but had to wonder if the three had known each other for a long time or had influenced each others writing.
It has been so rare to find clergy and theologians who really “get” the significance of shame that I was overwhelmed with all these voices becoming public at the same time. I was ready to sign up for the conference.
Next: Paul Young Sharing About the Backstory and the Book
