A protagonist without an antagonist is like crackers without cheese.
Nice, but boring.
Antagonists often show the other side of life—the evil; the horrific; the sinful, heartbreaking story of a life gone wrong. They are important, not just because writers say so or because they’re interesting, but because they’re real.
How do we write about villains in a God-glorifying way?
Well, to glorify God, we must understand what He loves and desires. He desires a bride unspoiled by the world’s language, immorality, and hazy view of good and evil. We must:
- Write pure speech
- Avoid details of sin
- Address sin for what it is
PURE SPEECH
“… the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity.”(James 3:6)
This is a huge problem in today’s literature. Books are littered with profanity and expressions that don’t fall under God’s standard of purity.
“But hey!” some authors cry, “Only the villains talk like that! We’re portraying it as evil. Besides, it’s not realistic otherwise.”
That’s great that it’s portrayed as evil … but do we really need to have those sinful words imprinted in our minds? We are bombarded by them every single day; do we want to give Satan more ammunition to wound our readers?
“Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.” (Ephesians 4:29)
This goes for slang versions of serious words also. Did you know that words like gosh and golly come from the word God? Or that ‘heck’ comes from ‘hell’? Or that ‘crumbs’ comes from ‘Christ’? Or that ‘gee’ comes from ‘Jesus’?
Some authors opt for saying someone cursed without putting direct words. Please don’t. We can too easily fill in the blanks, deepening the imprint.
And as far as realistic portrayal, who cares? We don’t feel the need to write that our characters drink water every day or speak with unfinished sentences, and most people do. We get to choose what to write—why would we choose something God hates?
“Keep thy tongue from evil…” (Psalm 34:13)
THE GRIMY DETAILS
Walk through a swamp, and you’ll come out smelling like it.
But while you can wash off swamp scum, it’s different with the scenes you read in books. God made us in a fearful and wonderful way. We see, hear, or read something once and immediately ‘download’ it and store it in our brains. But we’re a lot quicker than computers, and we can’t delete the files so easily. That means we need to be extremely careful with what we allow. One wrong thing, one improper detail, and it can mess with your system like a virus.
That’s why writing is a frightening thing. We are choosing what to put in our readers’ minds and it can’t be reversed.
This should guide us in writing about sin—because we don’t want to burn our readers with details that defile. Yes, we need to address difficult topics. Yes, we need to deal with the social issues of today.
We can understand sin without the specifics. We can apply principles without poisoning ourselves.
We confront evil by being filled with God’s word, not the evil itself.
Are you getting this? Are you seeing the effects our stories have? So many authors are treading on perilous ground—and they don’t see the DANGER AHEAD sign because of the crowd around them.
HAZY LINES
Our enemy, Satan, loves subtlety.
‘Yea, hath God said …?” (Genesis 3:1)
He loves to smudge the line between good and evil, giving us a grey area to step into without realising that it’s wrong.
Sometimes he uses the lie “You’ll reach more readers if you include this edgy subplot, or don’t put God in so blatantly …” We see this in the crossover market all the time: the books are ‘clean’ enough to fit into the Christian market, but secular enough to fit in the general market.
Compromise. Satan revels in it.
So how do we make sure we aren’t stepping into the shadows?
- Ask yourself why you’re writing what you are. Iffy content will suddenly show its true colours if we think through whether it will fully glorify God.
- Ask if you would have written this content a year ago. The journey downward is often made of little, seemingly inconsequential decisions, and only hindsight checks us in our tracks.
- Ask family and friends about it. Discuss the issues you’re writing about—saying things out loud and hearing other opinions can bring so much clarity.
- And study, study, study the Bible. It is all we need for life and godliness.
Our characters will sin, but don’t smudge the lines. Don’t give your readers a chance to see sin brushed off as inconsequential or accidental. Someone may have a bitter past, but he is choosing to respond with revenge. Someone may have grown up with criminal parents, but she decides to follow in their footsteps.
The Bible talks about sin a lot, yet it declares it as evil, and it never makes it attractive. Always we see the consequences for wrong thoughts and deeds.
O, Master Author, show us the way!
Praise God there is grace, strength, and hope for us as writers! As we pray, study His Word, and listen for His voice, He will guide our pens to glorify Him, prepare His bride, and share His salvation for sinners.
Write, fight, and be a light for Him!
TRQT
