Not only is this trend seen more and more in Christian writing, but it is commonplace in Sermons, and rapidly becoming a staple of Presidential speeches. It goes on and on. Reagan had his anecdotal welfare queen, and Clinton has his uninsured millions. Sadly, perhaps unconsciously, it seems that this argumentum ad anecdotum does, however, fit in with certain assumptions. Of course, I would rather that Christian writing challenge these assumptions.
Readers are basically stupid and lazy.
The elementary discussion which relies heavily on anecdote fits with an assessment of the audience that thinks the audience incapable of deductive thinking. Journalists long ago learned that people enjoy relating to other real characters. Character-development is fine for novels, but little of the Christian literature I read is great fiction. If everyman is everyman, then it may be that no man is no man. Indeed, these anecdotes lose their effectiveness if all we do is focus on persons and hear examples ad nauseam .