I have never read any Christian fiction books in my life, but then again, after reading The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan, you could say that I have read one. However, it’s not totally a fiction in and of itself, because it is just an allegory of the Christian life, put to the backdrop of the fictional pilgrimage of a man named “Christian” and his wife “Christiana” who are journeying towards heaven. People say that it is one of the most popular books in Christian literature, but before taking the Personal Spiritual Disciplines class at Southern, I had never heard of this book before at all. Maybe it is because from my church back home in Toronto (a Christian & Missionary Alliance church), the religious life of the Puritans was rarely mentioned by my Pastor or the other church leaders. Quite frankly, nobody I know has an affinity for the amazing spirituality of the Puritans, and furthermore, they were rarely quoted or mentioned in sermons. John Owen? Never. John Bunyan? Who’s that?!

That’s why it was to my amazement that I heard that it is the best-selling English book in the world. (The Bible apparently isn’t considered an originally English book, since it was originally written in Hebrew and Greek) And thus, going into this book was like jumping into a world I had never even imagined before. I had absolutely no clue what the story about, or what the big fuss was about! And boy, was in for a surprise.

Anyways, I’m still not a big fan of this whole kind of allegory – imho, personally speaking – but I did find that the story was relatively easy to follow, despite its old KJV style English. (Add to that, I think Bunyan deliberately made spelling mistakes in some of his words for the sake of… fancy literacy style?! I honestly do not know why – maybe he didn’t have a dictionary while writing in jail and his English wasn’t so good). If you have never read this great tale, I beseech thee to buy yeself a copy and read it through – I guarantee that you won’t regret it.

In case you’ve never even remotely heard of the basic plot line of this book before, the story is technically the narrator’s dream about a man named “Christian” (duh!) who is on a long journey trying to get to heaven. During his pilgrimage, Christian finds himself in the midst of many trials and tribulations, times of testing that really puts his faith on the line. Everything is set to the backdrop of the Christian faith, and it is through this allegory that John Bunyan explains the God’s plan of salvation in Christ Jesus. There are so many examples of this kind of parallelism to Scripture in this book that it could very well be the clearest description of the Puritan version of Christianity (at least, that’s what I hear; though I haven’t read much of any Puritan literature).

Along Christian’s pilgrimage towards heaven and the salvation of his soul, he has to leave behind all his friends and family at City of Destruction – a parallel really to “the cost of discipleship” as depicted in Luke 14, where Christian truly needs to love God more than all his family, friends and stuff of this world. Through the counsel of “Evangelist”, he is led through the Slough of Despond, Vanity Fair, Doubting Castle, and many other places, on a long and difficult road towards heaven, along which he encounters some good Christian friends like “Hopeful” and “Faithful” but also evildoers like “Mr. Legality” and “Giant Despair”.

At the end of part 1, Christian arrives safely in heaven (the “Celestial City”) but he has left his wife and children back at home. And thus begins, part 2 which tells the story his wife and children’s journey towards heaven. They have a change of heart regarding the difficulty and suffering that Christian had to go through on the pilgrimage, but such is the price they are willing to pay to be united with Christ in Heaven.

People enjoying reading stories, and through this classic story, John Bunyan has written a book that will last for generations to come. Continually being edited for modern English and numerous other languages, it is a book that will be easily accessible for new and old Christians alike. Even during my (so far) brief stay here in Louisville, I’ve already heard at least one sermon illustration used from The Pilgrim’s Progress. It certainly makes explaining the Gospel easier when we already have it in the form of such an exquisite story! I loved reading it and plan on reading it again in the near future