How Dracula Can Help your Preaching

Do you ever have to work at coming up with topics to preach on?  You may well not be a pastor, but you might still want to be able to share the gospel with people, (or maybe you just like vampires!) and if you have new ideas on how to do that, it will make it easier to keep engaging those around you. So, here’s a new idea for you: copy Dracula! (the book, not the villain) I know that sounds like an odd thing to recommend, but here’s what I mean. We all know that when we want to become better at something, one way to do that is to copy those who are the best at it. Bram Stoker’s book, Dracula, is one of the greatest horror stories we have.  On the one hand, the Bible tells us that “God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” (2Ti 1:7) So, I’m not trying to get you to be afraid. However, the Bible also tells us, “The fear of the LORD [is] the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do [his commandments]…” (Psa 111:10)  The second part of Proverbs 1 is written as being from the voice of wisdom and ends with the words, “but whoever listens to me [wisdom] will live in safety and be at ease, without fear of harm.” So, it will be of great use to our audiences if we can bring them the fear of the Lord. I’m not saying that all our time should be spent trying to make people afraid. Rom 2:4 says, “…the goodness of God leads to repentance.” So, our preaching has to be balanced. But, people love to read about villains they love to hate, otherwise, Dracula would not have been so successful (as a book). So, how can Dracula be useful to us in our efforts to teach people the fear of the Lord? First of all, he sticks in your mind, as your words to people about the Lord should. Another thing about Dracula that makes him a great villain is that he is obviously bad. One of the biggest hurdles we face when trying to evangelize is that people don’t actually see sin as being bad. The book, Dracula, shows us how to make things that are bad appear as being bad. Jonathan Harker, the main character aside from Dracula himself, doesn’t really understand what Dracula is for the first several chapters. And yet, he is still subject to mounting fear. One of the biggest things that bothers him about his situation is the isolation. He is all alone in a castle where his only companion is his captor. Why is he all alone? Although I didn’t get this part from the book, sin and evil isolate us. Sin breaks our relationships with those around us and with God. Thus, it is natural that Dracula must be largely alone. That’s it for today. I hope you enjoyed reading some ways that fiction can be used to strengthen our message about the most real subject there is: God.

Tell me what you think. I’d love to read your reactions to my ideas.