Women of Grit
Courage — resolve — perseverance — strength of character. That’s grit! Come and run with me through history to see what Christian women have been up to through the centuries.
A cursory look at the Bible shows that women have shone in diverse and often prominent roles, from the Old Testament right through to the New Testament. There is Moses’ sister Miriam, a worship leader and prophetess. Judge Deborah excels as a prophet and military leader. Naomi mentors Ruth, who becomes part of Jesus’ lineage. And then there is Esther, the Queen. The Samaritan woman at the well becomes an evangelist. Mary anoints Jesus’ feet, and Jesus promises that “wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her” (Matt 26:13, NIV). Lydia and Phoebe are house church leaders. Priscilla (with husband Aquila) join Paul as missionary partners. Grandmother Lois, and her daughter Eunice, disciple Timothy.
By the fourth century a woman named Paula helped the church father, Jerome, to establish monasteries, and became an abbess for all the women’s monasteries of that time. She also initiated, and helped Jerome, to translate the Bible from Hebrew and Greek into Latin.
Susanna Wesley lived during the late 1600s. She had nineteen children! Only ten survived, and one of them was a cripple. She diligently home schooled and discipled them, and managed the household on her own. Her relationship with God was the most important part of her life, but she struggled to find a place to spend time with God. So, she told her children that when they saw her with her apron over her head, she was talking to God, and they should not disturb her.
Two of her sons, John and Charles Wesley, became famous and left an amazing legacy. John Wesley preached to nearly a million people in his day and brought revival everywhere he travelled. His brother Charles wrote over 9000 hymns, many of which we still sing today. If you think your life doesn’t have that much impact, look again at her life — ‘only’ raising and discipling her children led to the development of two remarkable men who helped change church history for ever.
Rebecca Protten was born a slave on the island of St Thomas, but was freed when she was a teenager. When Moravian missionaries came to the island to bring the Gospel to the slaves, she joined the movement, and became one of the leaders of the ministry on St Thomas. She later left with some of the Moravian missionaries who returned to Germany. There she married Christian Protten. In 1763, they moved to Christiansborg (present day Ghana), where they spent the rest of their lives teaching African children. Was that a big deal? You bet it was — in 2015 the literacy rate in Ghana was over 70%.
During the nineteenth century Hudson Taylor established the China Inland Mission with a radical policy. He sent small teams of unmarried women into the China interior on their own! These women became known as ‘Bible women’ and had a profound impact on the growth of the church, especially amongst women in China and Korea. Most of these amazing women remain unknown today, even though they had a huge impact on the growth of the church.
Dora Yu was one of these Bible women, who became one of the first female medical missionaries to do work in China and Korea. Most Christians usually recognize the name of Watchman Nee, but how many of us know that it was Dora Yu’s preaching that led Nee to Christ? He became a prominent church leader and teacher in China, published many books and trained bible students and church workers.
What about Lilias Trotter? She was a volunteer at Dwight Moody’s London campaign meetings while in her twenties. Despite suffering from poor health her entire life, she felt that God had called her to North Africa. A few years later she and two other women went to Algiers as missionaries. The group grew to seven workers, and became known as the ‘Algiers Mission Band’. Trotter became the leader of this group, and within only a few years they grew to thirty full-time missionaries.
I bet you don’t know who Edmonia Moon was! She went to North China in 1872, and was the first single female Baptist missionary to China. But it was her older sister, Lottie Moon, who followed her a year later, who became well-known. Lottie spent nearly forty years in China as a teacher and evangelist. After she basically starved to death, the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention instituted the Lottie Moon Christmas Fund, laying the foundation for solid financial support for Southern Baptist missionaries from America.
Then there was Bola Odeleke from Nigeria, the first female African bishop, and Evelyn Harthcock who went with her husband to the mission field in 1985, at age sixty-five. They served in six countries over a period of thirty years. While they were living in Cambodia, she baked birthday cakes for the Buddhist monks, and they loved her so much that they allowed her to hug them — a big taboo for women to touch monks! Many monks became followers of Jesus. She lived out her years ministering, even while suffering from Alzheimers, until she died in Thailand at the age of ninety-four.
Since the early church, women have been very active in ministry and missions. Most of these courageous women remained unnamed and unknown. SJ Escobar describes this phenomenon as “the strange loss of memory about the massive involvement of women in missions” (1996:18).
I want to inspire you with a quote from Margaret Kraft:
“Women, stirred by the task that lies ahead, can mobilize, devoting their skills, their accessibility, their knowledge, their tenderness, their intuitiveness, their own distinctive fervour to the work. The pioneer spirit, full of dedication and faithfulness, which women throughout history have shown will set the standard.”
Reflection
Hebrews 12:1-2, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith” (NIV).
What is keeping you from running the race?
Bibliography
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Cunningham L and Hamilton DJ 2006. Why not women? A fresh look at Scripture on women in missions, ministry, and leadership. Edmonds, WA: YWAM Publishing.
EL 2017. Women in China’s Protestant church and missions. Online article. Accessed from https://www.chinasource.org/resource-library/articles/women-in-chinas-protestant-church-and-missions, 2018-01-14.
Escobar SJ 1996. Mission studies past, present and future. Missiology 24(1):3-29.
Fanning D 2009. Brief history of methods and trends of missions. Trends and issues in missions. Paper 1. Online article. Accessed from http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1000&context=cgm_missions, 2017-05-01.
Grenz SJ and Kjesbo DM 1995. Women in the church: a biblical theology of women in ministry. Downers Grove, Il: IVP Academic.
Kraft M and Crossman M 1999. Women in mission. Mission Frontiers Jan-Mar. Online edition. Accessed from http://www.missionfrontiers.org/issue/article/women-in-mission, 2017-05-05.
Pierson P 2009. A history of transformation. In RD Winter and SC Hawthorne (eds.), Perspectives on the world Christian movement: a reader (4th ed.), 279-285. Pasadena CA: William Carey Library.