ONE Audiobooks Staff Picks
Done with consuming light and tired content with borderline silly plots that bring little spiritual value? Enter, classic fiction. The stories listed below span hundreds of years and are sure to provide you with plenty of spiritual food for thought. Go through them with a few friends for even more benefit to your soul! Listening is one of the best ways to engage classic fiction (in our opinion!). These detailed and topic-heavy works will quench your thirst for something deeper and will provide the content you’ve been searching for to fuel more spiritually engaging conversations and understanding.
This list was compiled by ONE Audiobooks who has most of these books for sale at a discount at ONEAudiobooks.app.
1. The Pilgrim’s Progress
This Christian classic, originally published in 1678, has become one of the most significant and influential books in the English language. Travel with the protagonist, Christian, on his journey to the Celestial City as he fights temptation, evil, spiritual terrors, and religious pitfalls, but also encounters such helpful characters as Faithful, Hopeful, and Charity. This classic staple of religious literature is beautifully filled with profound allegories that acutely depict the struggles and triumphs of Christianity. John Bunyan’s timeless Christian novel reveals a unique and unforgettable perspective on man’s journey through life in search of eternity and salvation.
2. Father Sergius
Leo Tolstoy brings to light the struggle of finding true faith in this short story about a young man who desperately chases worldly accolades and social status before finding contentment in the last place he would have thought to look. After learning of a societal shame that he receives as catastrophic news, the young protagonist turns to the monastery to prove his moral superiority and his inability to be sullied by the ways of men. While outwardly he appears to be the perfect picture of holy devotion, Father Sergius continues to struggle with his desires and pride. Met with multiple temptations and difficulties, he begins on a path to strip himself of his misconceptions and his love of temporary pleasures to find a peace that withstands all conditions.
3. A Tale of Two Cities
2010 Winner of the AudioFile Earphones Award
Set against the backdrop of the French Revolution, A Tale of Two Cities is an epic story of London and revolutionary Paris – a powerful tale of treachery, forgiveness, and true love displaying the highest sacrifice: “Greater love hath no man than this – that he lay down his life for his friends.”
4. Till We Have Faces
C. S. Lewis reworks the timeless myth of Cupid and Psyche into an enduring and convicting contemporary morality play in this novel about the difference between sacred and profane love, and the need for mercy that goes beyond what we think is earned or deserved. Set in the pre-Christian world of Glome on the outskirts of Greek civilization, it is a tale of two princesses: the beautiful Psyche, who is loved by the god of love himself, and Orual, Psyche’s unattractive and embittered older sister who loves Psyche with a destructive possessiveness. Her frustration and jealousy over Psyche’s fate set Orual on a troubled path of self-discovery. Dedicated to and beloved by his wife, Joy, this final work of fiction by C.S. Lewis is considered his best.
5. Les Misérables
Set in the dark era of post-revolutionary Paris, Les Misérables follows Jean Valjean, who spent nineteen years in prison for stealing a loaf of bread to feed his sister’s starving family. Hardened and bitter upon his release, Valjean is forever changed by an act of compassion from a priest whom he has robbed. Changing his name, the transformed Valjean becomes a successful leader, yet he is haunted by his past, even as he is relentlessly pursued by police inspector Javert, who does not believe in redemption. When Valjean’s adopted daughter Cosette falls in love with a young revolutionary, Javert concocts a plot to trap and destroy the elusive Valjean once and for all. Full of intrigue, suspense, mercy and forgiveness, this epic by Victor Hugo stands as a powerful tale of the redemptive Gospel power of grace.
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