Write Grace

I post this entry from my blog,  Grace Notes, at least once a year, because I think it's worth remembering--a reminder for Christian novelists to hold closely in our hearts.

So--one more time ... Write Grace.

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As Christian novelists we're continually aware of elements we don't want to include in our work. There are excesses and "freedoms" and improprieties that simply don't belong in the writing of those who create from a Christian worldview. Just as an artist has choices in the elements he chooses to paint, so does the writer have choices in the stories he chooses to develop, the words he uses, the imaginary worlds he creates, and the people who inhabit those worlds.

On occasion, we  hear grumbling about the "restrictions" of fiction written from a Christian worldview, about too many "do's and don't's." But the truth is that we have many more choices for what we can write than what we shouldn't write: a world of choices, really--a wealth of resources from which to draw whatever we need in order to create and add richness and beauty to our creation. We can choose the settings in which we place our stories, the characters in those stories, the arenas in which they contend and struggle, succeed and fail, what they give and what they take. It has less to do with what we can't write as it does how we write it. 

With such limitless material at our disposal, need we really be concerned about what we can't do?

An element which I long ago committed to always  keep as a part of my fiction is the same as that which many other Christian writers continue to include: that element is Grace. I want to write grace, to weave naturally and freely, if subtly, through my stories the grace of God ... to have story people who are not only touched by divine grace but who also extend it to others.

One continual challenge that keeps writing interesting for the Christian author is the exploration of the ways in which grace makes a difference in our lives and in our world. Although there is a line of thought that would have us believe that for fiction to be "realistic" or "convicting," it must also be void of redemption and tenderness and hope, in truth that's dishonest fiction. It's also unrealistic fiction. For the Christian writer to even make a pretense of writing a novel without hope, without grace, would be a lie and an affront to everything we believe. I can't imagine writing in a more bleak or desolate climate. 

Some of the finest novels I've read, both literary and commercial and whether published in the general market or in CBA, do far more than keep grace a peripheral element of the story, but instead allow it to be an essential part of the story. We spend much time in our fictive worlds among our story people. I want those landscapes to be fertile and rich, and no matter how troubling the times or severe the struggles or torturous the pain, no matter how much fear or even violence is inflicted,  I want to provide my readers with at least a glimpse of hope and grace by the time they finish the story. 

That's not always an easy task, but as Christian writers, I hope we always have the courage and the conviction to "write grace."

BJ