It’s always seemed strange to me that reading good literary works—poetry, drama, short stories, novels—is something that needs defending, particularly among Christians. After all, most people seem to understand (even if we don’t make time to do it often) why we visit art galleries, attend symphonies, and go to plays.
But words are greedy things. They fill our days from the emails we wake up to, to the meetings that take too many hours, to the news stories that buzz each evening, to the pages of the books we read in order to live better, eat healthier, think right, and categorize our personalities. Words consume us all day long.
And the pastor, of course, must be about the business of consuming the Word. Not only the Word, but also the infinite river of words about the Word. When called to such a task, what could seem more frivolous or counter-productive than sitting down to read the words of Pride and Prejudice, Beloved, or King Lear?
But the truth is that we are made of words, by words, and for words. Immersing ourselves in beautiful words (even if only for a few precious minutes most or a few days) is like getting a burst of oxygen in air-deprived lungs. Most of us live and work in polluted environments. We are surrounded by words of anguish, anger, anxiety, and—most of all—efficiency. Literary language, on the other hand, is evocative, rich, resonant, and inviting.
Works of literature invite us into other worlds, other ways of seeing, imagining, and thinking—all while remaining tethered to our own world. In this way, literature demands and exercises our perceptiveness, our discernment, and our understanding—not only of ideas (although certainly those) but of ways of living and being in the world.
Mark Vroegop, Lead Pastor of College Park Church in Indianapolis, has recently come to see this. When I first met Pastor Vroegop at a conference a few years ago, he told me that he had only in recent years been inspired to read literature and to incorporate that reading into his sermons. I asked him to share a bit more about how he came to see literature as an aid to his preaching. He explained,
After reading On Reading Well, I was a bit embarrassed about the number of classic books I’d never read. With new motivation and curiosity, I picked a few classics and started reading. I found myself lost in the narratives and continually pondering the messages of each book. On a personal level, my journey created a delightful oasis for my mind and heart. But I also found new illustrations for my sermons. Rather than using the standard sports illustration, I quoted from Jane Eyre. It was remarkable how both the illustration and the source created new connections with people in my church. For some, it felt like I finally entered their world – a classic realm of literature that is often missing in the pulpit. Much to my delight, my new reading helped my weekly preaching.
Andrew Wilson, teaching pastor at King’s Church in London, England, likewise came lately to the love of literature. He now sees classic literature as enriching not only for him personally, but for his preaching as well:
I only got into serious literature in my late thirties. I wish I’d started earlier. Novels help you with three things that are indispensable for good preaching: using language well, telling stories in an engaging way, and seeing the world through the eyes of other people. I was fortunate in that the serious writer I started with, Graham Greene, is a master of all three (and also provides countless illustrations of Christian themes like sin, grace, and redemption). But all good novelists will help preachers, and the great ones find a way of penetrating to the heart of a culture: its hopes, anxieties, and gods. I now find them indispensable.
It's true: the overarching pattern of every great story reflects the overarching theme of the Bible: creation, fall, and redemption. As Dr. Jordan B. Cooper, President of the American Lutheran Theological Seminary, and a voracious reader of literature, points out,
The Bible is itself largely narrative. Spending time in novels helps to appreciate the narrative character of Scripture. When only reading with the categories of systematic theology in view, we tend to notice certain things and miss others. If you read it in a narrative lens, characters, stories, and narrative patterns stand out that otherwise would not have. This helps to fill out one's preaching and teaching. The reading of literature gives you a new lens with which you can approach the Scriptural text.
In Reading for Preaching: The Preacher in Conversation with Storytellers, Biographers, Poets, and Journalists, Cornelius Plantinga writes that “reading preacher will discover that great writers know the road to the human heart and, once at their destination, know how to move our hearts.”
But hearts are not to be moved merely for the experience of being moved. (That is mere sentimentality). Rather, Plantinga, explains, knowing how to stir the heart—and to be so stirred himself--is important for the preacher in order to know “how the power and beauty of the gospel might be presented so that the hearts of his brothers and sisters may also be moved.”
This idea of being “moved” is the essence of aesthetic—sensory, bodily—experience. (To grasp this, it helps to remember what anesthesia means). Literary art differs from the non-literary use of words because it attends to form not just content. Literature’s artful use of words creates an experience that is felt as well as understood intellectually.
And as crucial as our rational minds, intellectual understandings, and theological positions are to the Christian faith, they are not all there is to it. As Dr. Cooper explains:
When the intellectual life of a pastor is dominated solely with theological concerns, and particularly with points of debate, one can get so caught up in the ideas of theology that it doesn't touch down into real life experiences. At worst, you can develop an attitude of debate and argument in your interaction with congregants. Good literature does often explore theological and philosophical concepts (such as in the writings of Dostoyevski or Tolstoy), but those ideas are interacted with through the lens of a person, rather than in abstract.
The aesthetic aspect of literature (and any art) doesn’t subtract from theological or intellectual content. Rather it deepens such understanding. Dr. Cooper puts it this way:
Reading the stories of other people in fiction brings you into a different mindset where you consider people instead of just ideas. We tend to assume (often unconsciously) that other people think and respond to situations like we do. This can really harm people if we counsel people with such a mindset. A well-written novel will help you to step into the thought process of another, whether that character is making positive or negative decisions.
The power of literature—and the power of the Gospel itself—is the power not only to inform our thinking, but to move our whole beings, much as the shepherd moves the sheep.
This resource is part of the series Seeking Wisdom: Reading, Writing, and Theological Reflection in the Life of the Pastor. Click Here to explore more resources from this series.
Karen Swallow Prior is Professor of English at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. She writes frequently on literature, culture, ethics, and ideas. She is the author of several books, including On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life through Great Literature (Brazos, 2018) and a new series of introductions/editions of literary classics, Guides for Reading and Reflection (B&H Books).
