Why Christian Fiction?

Raise your hand if you love a good story. Wonderful! Now, raise your hand if you love Christian fiction. 

Ooh. See lots of hands lowering. Let me guess. It’s not realistic. The stories are cheesy. People don’t actually talk like that…

Yeah. I get it. And I’m not surprised when I hear these types of comments about Christian fiction—mostly because I’ve thought these types of comments at one time or another. And yet Christian fiction is what I enjoy reading most, and it’s what I enjoy writing most.

Why is that?

You know I can’t answer without telling a story.

My first job as a registered nurse began several summers ago on a burn unit. I was twenty-one, living in a new city, and coming to grips with the fact I was now responsible for keeping people alive. In other words…

I. Was. Overwhelmed. 

When I wasn’t pouring over my nursing textbooks to figure out what exactly a central venous pressure meant or why this medication called Levophed had been dubbed “leave ‘em dead,” all I wanted to do in my free time was unwind and not think. 

And what better way to unwind and not think than to eat ice cream and watch movies?

One movie in particular I watched was Mystic River. If you haven’t read the book or seen the movie, let me just tell you…wow. It’s powerful. It drew me in. Hooked me. Held me captive. Problem is, after the movie finished, it didn’t let me go. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. The rest of the weekend, it weighed on my shoulders. Pulled me down. Depressed me. 

But that’s what a great story does, right? Drags you through the mud and leaves you with nothing but your own tears to clean off the grime? That’s real life, after all.

By the time Monday morning arrived, I felt like I’d spent my weekend off attending a funeral.   “Do anything fun?” my preceptor asked while we changed a sedated patient’s dressings later in the shift. I told her about the movie. 

“Yeah, I try to avoid stuff like that,” she said, hiking the patient’s leg in the air so I could get to the burns circling the thigh. “I get enough drama here, I don’t need any extra during my downtime.”

I was beginning to see what she meant. That summer a car accident involving two young brothers and their two cousins occurred, in which all four of them sustained serious burns that required surgery for skin grafting. But the two little brothers had the worst of the injuries. They were nine and twelve at the time.  

 Needless to say, my ice cream consumption sky-rocketed, and I began wondering just what I’d signed on for. 

Sadly, the twelve-year-old brother didn’t make it through the summer. And I’ll never forget the fear I felt when the nine-year-old brother took a turn for the worse, and one of the experienced nurses said, “We’re going to lose him too, aren’t we?”

We didn’t. Thank God we didn’t. He survived. But was that one of the most stressful summers of my life? Well, you have a six foot tall pregnant woman who’s lost a child lean over your shoulder someday as you’re trying to fumble your way through taking care of her other incredibly sick child, and let me know how it feels when she says, “Don’t worry, baby. Momma’s gonna make sure this nurse does everything right.”

Pretty sure I consumed enough ice cream to go up two pant sizes that week alone.

Thankfully, as my confidence level increased over time, my ice cream consumption decreased. But even more thankfully, I discovered the types of stories I needed in my life. And those weren’t stories that left me covered in mud. Because as unrealistic and cheesy as it may sound, God doesn’t leave us covered in mud.  

I mentioned the mom was pregnant, right? Well, before the summer was over, she delivered her baby. A son. Did it take away the pain of losing her twelve-year-old son? No. Not at all. But was it a gift? Was it a reason to not give up hope while her nine-year-old son fought for his life? Absolutely.

And stories with hope are always worth the read.