 |
| *I was just going to use this image for my own post... then I discovered that it was attached to this very good blog post that also addresses the same issue from a professional standpoint; credit goes to him! |
Controversial title, I know... But I never realized the issue of it
till just recently I read a novel where the "preaching" was so overt it
took me right out of the story, and I resented it very much!
"But Leslie, the Gospel is good in whatever form it takes!"
Yes,
but there is also this tiny matter of good writing that will play into
whether or not your "Gospel message" is actually having the desired
effect.
"There is never a wrong time or place to share the Gospel."
In real life, yes, that is true; one doesn't need to loiter around for the cliched "moment of truth" to happen upon them...
But
this is fiction, dear writer. It's a completely different universe, and
it follows different rules... The First Rule being: nothing is actually real. You can use "realistic" props from the era, names, dates,
events... But when all is said and done, you still went and made it all up. Even the fact that your "unsaved" character actually accepted the
words being thrown at him. In that sense, yes I can think of a dozen
situations that would be completely hypothetical in real life, but fit
perfectly into the "real time" of the novel—and each of them would be
the absolute worst time for one character to turn to another and say,
"Hey Fred, I know the natives are about to sacrifice us to this live
volcano, but can I make these five seconds stretch into an hour and talk
to you about your soul?"
Please don't. And here are a few reasons why.
1. In genre fiction, the main focus should support the genre, not the Gospel.
Now, hold on—before somebody brands me as a heretic and starts questioning the validity of my faith, let me say this:
I
believe one does not have to directly reference God in their work in
order to "correctly" reverence and glorify Him in it. Using my God-given
skill to craft a good, solid story with an uplifting message for a
secular audience will still bring Him glory, more so than a
poorly-written novel with porcelain characters and a sermon in every
chapter!
That is not to say that a full-faced
Gospel has nothing to do with literature. The "crisis/journey of faith"
novel is the Christian version of the "coming of age" novel. This type
of novel focuses on the life and choices of one particular character in a
real-world setting, intended to expound, expose, demonstrate and
delineate the choices a real person might face, and the consequences of
whichever choice, for good or ill. In this instance, the "altar call" is
definitely warranted, because it supports the goal of the plot and it
fits into the principal conflict (man vs. self or man vs. God).
This
is why I specified "genre fiction": mystery, fantasy, sci-fi,
steampunk, adventure, thriller—anything that can be categorized beyond
just "fiction" is "genre fiction", and does not have the same goal and
focus as a "journey/crisis of faith" novel. Therefore it does not need
the same kind of emphasis on sermonizing... pretty much at all... (With
the exception of the supernatural genre, for obvious reasons, but I am
talking in the most generic cases) *Note: at this point I realize that maybe by "genre fiction" I actually mean "speculative fiction"... but I am just unfamiliar with that distinction so, sorry!
2. In genre fiction, the characters are entirely fabricated, so the "converts" don't actually exist—so what's the point?
This
is what I would ask a writer who feels perfectly justified in even
fashioning a "tribute" to old classics, while systematically
deconstructing the original character to make room for the "altar call"
in an otherwise "genre" novel:
WHY?
Did
you set out to write a Gospel-focused book? Then why involve the
adventure? Did you want to "redeem" the characters originally conceived
by a nearly-godless writer from another century? If you're not going to
use them as originally written, why use them at all? And—here is where
the irony bites—will we actually see these characters in Heaven?
Then why do you feel the need to insert an "altar call" for characters who are little more than words on a page?
Call me heartless, jaded, and cruel; tell me I'm a heathen and I should not be so opposed to the Gospel—
But
when all the copies of your book go up in smoke, and the files on your
electronic devices get erased, your carefully-devised and
painstakingly-enacted machinations "for the sake of the Gospel" will
cease to exist... And in all that, nobody actually got converted, did
they? All that effort, and outside that fictitious little world you so
cunningly devised, nothing actually happened. The authors themselves are
already dead, so they will not benefit from your attempt; so why "ruin"
a perfectly good story with a worthless "altar call"?
These
characters are just words on a page. Please stop trying to "save souls" where
there aren't any, and just worry about trying to hone your craft within
the genre you are using.
3. It's perfectly
reasonable to include a "Gospel/redemption message" while maintaining
the genre; a "shoe-horned revival" is both unnecessary and it disrupts
the flow of the story
Take a series I recently
read, for example: in the first book, the characters themselves were all
predominantly Christian, except the primary narrator, Florizel, who was on the run, and later
the assassin sent to kill them. Now, those conversions I had no problem
with, because first of all, they made sense within the story (such as
the fact that the assassin, unsaved, would have likely betrayed them
all), and it was tastefully and naturally done, without a lot of leading
questions on the part of the "evangelist" while the "convert-to-be"
really ought to be doing something more important to the result of the
plot than listen to a sermon!
The second time around, it felt
like (at least where the primary narrator, Oliver, was concerned) he would no sooner make an
acquaintance than immediately impress upon them the duty to their soul
(which fictional characters.... Do not have....) even to the point of
engaging another character in a long and drawn-out conversation that was
basically, "Oliver tells a sermon, then the lady responds with an
equally long tale that is almost her entire backstory, laced with
info-dumps that could have just as easily been parceled out if the
author had so chosen."
You see, without letting the Gospel
play into the genre you have chosen (rather than plopping a generic
sermon right in the middle of your story with no regards to plot, merely
for the sake of "getting them saved") the Gospel message is reduced
into "just another info dump"–and the true power that the author would
have the reader understand and be convicted by is hopelessly missed.
The Trouble With "Christian Fiction" As A Genre
Is
this perhaps why "Christian" suddenly became its own genre, with its
own market, wholly separate from the rest of literature in general?
Because we Christians get so caught up in "preaching" in a way that
pleases other Christians—meanwhile the poor unbelieving reader picks up
the book, can't make head nor tails of it, and promptly moves on in
search of a book that more closely resonates with them.
Maybe that could make a fourth point:
4. Our duty as Christian authors is to bring the Gospel to the "Gentiles", not pat the egos of the disciples.
I
don't quite know exactly when "Christian" emerged as its own genre and
market—but, for all my whinging over "come to Jesus" moments in genre
fiction, I think it's sad that there are Christians with skill in
writing who opt to pander and cater to the very ones who do not "need" the
Gospel message because they already believe it, all because the actual plot, the style, and the focus
of the novel is not strong enough to catch the eye of the people who
would most benefit from it. Publishers have created a little "niche" for
Christian writers, and the morality of mainstream literature has
systematically declined, meanwhile the quality of the literature
produced by Christian writers has more or less remained the same—maybe
even improved somewhat—but in such isolation that there is little
benefit from it. The Christian writers see the decline of modern
society, and so the "preaching" increases...
But the market
remains relegated to its own little nook, and all of that effort goes,
in essence, to "the choir." And because those who are already Christians
buy the books that tell them things they already know, the quality of
the writing remains more or less "good enough" for those readers who
think that "anything with THE BIBLE in it cannot ever be terrible!"
Not true, unfortunately.
Am
I the only one who has noticed this trend? The "Christian genre" has
become cliched, because cliche plots can be matched with cliche verses.
Meanwhile, the mainstream trend is to reinvent and renew—so the cliches in Christian fiction
are more deterring than ever before... And yet the market is so secluded
that the potential opportunity for quality literature is lost as the
vulgar, and the immoral and the distasteful occupy the other 90% of
bookstores around the world...
"Christian"
bookstores that do not sell mainstream fiction are going out of business much faster than mainstream ones.
Is this not an indication that writing in the "niche" is really not
having the impact we would like to see?
What if Christians started
working on producing the better books? Taking what is popular and making
it better—not with more "churchy" scenes or sermons or "altar
calls"—but just higher-quality writing, because of the hope of the
calling that we have?
Bonus Section
Stories I have read that involve a "Gospel message" that fits the genre:
Pauline has consistently done a fabulous job working the Gospel message into all of her novels! She creates a story with plenty of healthy adveture, and yet conflict that cannot be resolved without a working knowledge of Gospel truth--but at the same time she does not lose sight of the unique story she is telling, and the message fits the medium so much that the reader can receive it with much grace and thoughtful introspection!
Fantasy: Storybound Series by Marissa Burt
I picked up this book on a whim, and I am forever glad that I did! Marissa gives a fantasy adventure with a premise that is near and dear to a childhood dream I once had, and the more I read, the more I recognized those small hints and subtle overtones of the Gospel allegory worked into a highly-entertaining adventure: the King and His Muses comprising the "spiritual" element of the world of Story... the fact that the King's descendant was "written in" to the story for the purpose of stopping the villain--a former Muse--who wants to "Rewrite Story" for his own purposes... It's absolutely lovely!
I knew the author was a Christian going into it, and I mostly wanted to read it because I loved the premise hinted in the "jacket blurb"--but Curran takes what has been used in mainstream speculative fiction as a treatise on evolutionary development and the fruitless pursuit of an end to the existential crisis... and he completely turns it around using the Gospel for what it is: a message of hope in the face of this very crisis of "why are we here?" and "What is man?" that plagues the philosophers to this day. The Gospel is not just a vehicle for the end goal of saving souls or ensuring entrance into Heaven; it is truly an answer and a message of hope above all else.
Crime novel: Bound by Guilt by C. J. Darlington
I included this one as an example for the "journey of faith" novel I mentioned earlier. It also involves kind of a mystery and a crime--but unlike the "traditional Christian mystery novels" by ones like Terri Blackstock and Dee Henderson (which are fine in their own right... but still formulaic)--Darlington's mystery is resolved by the character accepting the truth of the Gospel--making the inclusion of the Gospel an absolute necessity.
Children's novel: The Wormling series by Jerry B. Jenkins and Chris Fabry
These are just straight-up allegories--but it is also a wonderful story told around it! Using paraphrased sections of the Bible as quotes from "the Wormling Book" in the context of a world where the Gospel (as we know it) and the Bible don't actually exist, Jenkins and Fabry treat their readers to an adventure that could be an inherently Christian novel--or it could be just a fun story with a redemptive message to it, and lots of analogies to Christianity!
If you have any more suggestions, feel free to share them!
*Disclaimer: The views expressed in this post are neither exhaustive nor authoritative... nor particularly-well researched; feel free to share your own thoughts with me in the comments! Do you agree or disagree? I would love to hear some other opinions on this!
No comments:
Post a Comment