Good, True, and Beautiful Books

Awhile ago I came across this post from a Christian mom:

"Looking for child/teen fiction books written by Christian authors (Christian themes preferred) but without witches/ sorcery/ magic (no Narnia), no name calling (including stupid, dumb, etc), no romance/ crushes, no killing/ war, and nothing scary or anxiety inducing. Just good clean wholesome Christian fiction."

I think most Christians can resonate with the impulse to protect your children or yourself from harmful material. However, removing difficult topics from our reading material is not actually helping.

As a teen, I read a book by a Christian author about a Christian teen girl who got pregnant with her boyfriend. Just reading that description may make many Christians balk. How could a Christian author write about that? However, the story did not glorify her mistake. It showed it through a biblical lens and showed how family and friends came around her or failed to do so. I remember thinking often about that story and wondering how I would react if a friend of mine made a similar choice. What would be the right and helpful and God-honoring response? The story helped me to expand my worldview and think about a difficult topic, and it prepared me for hard conversations I later had with friends who shared life mistakes with me.

If Christian authors fail to talk about dark or difficult topics, they miss the opportunity to help fellow believers think wisely about the godly response to sin. Characters in Christian stories do not always need to make the right decisions. Not only would that be as boring as mud, but characters who make wrong decisions are far more instructional to readers than impossibly good characters.

As a caveat, I always include a "discern" section when I recommend books because I know that some topics are difficult for certain readers based on their life experiences or struggles. Other topics may not be suitable for certain ages. However, this does not mean these topics should be avoided by Christian authors. Quite the opposite! We need a vast array of books dealing with all the difficult topics to help prepare Christians to walk wisely in our sin-cursed world.