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@obrian-of-the-surface-world

I’m sorry about the delay—you gave me quite a bit to think about and my weekend got a little crazy, so I didn’t have much time to sit down and write a response until now.

I would say yes, I think there are Christians who are like that—although I was not. When I first became a Christian, I was very young and very shy, and most of the people I was in contact with were Christian families from my church. Those who weren’t were my mostly adult extended family members, and I was not comfortable verbally sharing the gospel with them. Now, as a teen, I try to be ready, prepared, and willing to explain what I believe when topics come up. With my grandparents, who are very antagonistic to the gospel, my main approach is to show them the power of the gospel in my life through my obedience to God and by honoring my parents.

If I knew it was a flaw that the character was becoming aware of and changing through, I would have no problem with it at all. Are you showing the consequences of his attempts at evangelizing in this way? I haven’t had a chance to read your story, but it sounds like from your post above that your character starts to realize his method is flawed, which is good. I would want to see that the character was going through an arc and not just staying stagnant with an annoying flaw. If he was going to have an arc, I think that would be an excellent topic to address. I think it’s an issue some Christians do have, and although we should not fall into the other end of the spectrum like I did and hold back because of discomfort and fears, we do need to be tactful and well timed when we share our faith, and give them the message that we’re telling them this because we love them.

You would also want to cause the reader to empathize with his Godly intent although his method is flawed. I would just be careful, as @taylorclogston said, that you’re making it seem like a flaw and not a positive character trait. Do you also have a character who holds back from telling the gospel because of fear? A foil like that would help balance the two out so that the reader could see the flaw in both sides.

Good question!

I think there are two main reasons Jesus spoke in parables.

“He said, ‘To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, but for others they are in parables, so that ‘seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.’’” (Luke 8:10 ESV)

First: According to the verse above (and its counterparts, Matthew 13:11-17 and Mark 4:11-12), Jesus is purposely teaching in parables so that those who desire to know the truth will understand and those who don’t will not.

Second: Just like a pastor—or any sort of teacher for that matter—uses anecdotes, analogies, and examples of situations familiar to the listeners to illustrate his point, so I believe Jesus is using the parables. The characters and situations in the parables would have been very familiar to the people Jesus was speaking to. Because they could identify with the parables personally, it would be easier for the message to resonate with them. Whenever I am listening to a teacher and they use an illustration that I can identify with, I’m better able to grasp the concept than if they were to just tell me what they’re trying to convey. It’s a very powerful way to deeply root a point into the listeners’ minds. It’s hard to forget a parable and easy to forget a command.

Also, I think the parables do cause people to ask questions—mainly questions about themselves. For example, when one hears the parable of the Sower, he might ask, “What kind of soil am I?” This could lead to a deep self examination. What does he do when he hears the truth? Does he shun it, or embrace it for a while before it is choked out by worldly desires? Or does it take root and transform him? Pondering these types of questions can result in a resolve to learn more and change.

There definitely can be.

When I say that fiction isn’t meant to “teach”, I don’t mean that the reader can’t learn anything they didn’t already know. I would love for my readers to learn something new about the Christian walk through my writing.

However, one of the things that I strongly dislike about a lot of Christian fiction is when the author writes a story in which the character has, say…anger issues, and constantly interrupts the story to talk about everything the character did wrong, then lectures about how it should be applied to the readers life, etc. It’s not always that blatant, but little Christian fiction that I have read was not preachy or poorly paced in some way because it is trying to teach the reader on the spot.

Of course, if handled well, a mentor or a foil character could teach the protagonist something that would push him along in his arc. I just want to be careful not to spend paragraphs and pages writing a sermon in the disguise of dialogue, because that kills the pace of the story.

Like I said before, I believe the purpose of good, meaningful fiction is to touch the reader’s heart with an experience and prompt them towards change. That could include showing them something new, or it could just provide a new perspective. The books that caused me to realize I was selfish didn’t directly tell me how I should act, but they changed my perspective on what selfishness is and how it affects people. Because of that, I was prompted to study God’s word for ways in which I could become more selfless.

Readers can learn things through the experience of identifying with the character and watching him struggle through his flaws. It’s through the character arc that the theme will shine, and through the character arc that the reader will learn (or be reminded of) an important lesson.

Thank you very much for the encouragement. It’s a difficult journey when a great percentage of people I know are discouraging or skeptical of my choice. But God has provided me with a few people who are supportive and encouraging to me through all this, and I’m very thankful for them.

I can definitely relate with being discouraged about our writing not being perfect, and it is a distraction. Although I believe learning the rules and how to implement them and knowing why they’re there is one of the most crucial components of becoming a good writer (I’ve improved more in the past six months of learning than I did in the prior ten years of practice), I do need to learn to shove aside the self-critic for the time being and just write. The edits can come later.

Thank you for taking the time to be an encouragement and engage me in a conversation!

~Steward