Listening to the Silenced Voices

For far too long, church history has been HIS-story. For far too long, the powerful, empowering voices of women have been silenced. It is a sad pattern that we can trace back all the way to Hagar!

Her Story of HIS Story

Fortunately, a fair and balanced study of church history shows that women have always been about the business of helping hurting and hardened people. Women have always spoken God’s truth in love to change lives with Christ’s changeless truth.

It’s time for church history once again also to be Her-story!

That’s why my co-author (Susan Ellis) and I have penned Sacred Friendships: Listening to the Voices of Women Soul Care-Givers and Spiritual Directors. In it you read about fifty-two amazing women. No longer are their voices silenced.

What Others Are Saying

Here’s what Professor Cathering Mueller-Bell of Grand Rapids Theological Seminary has to say about Sacred Friendships.

“Sacred Friendships is a refreshing portrayal and celebration of the impact that women have made in the lives of others that has reflected the image of God in the healing process for those who are suffering. At last we see a book that promotes the fusion of biblical truth and loving grace as the foundation for the complexities of the sanctification process. Sacred Friendships unveils the rich heritage of diverse women in Christian ministry from a global, developmental perspective which informs a model of soul care that is powerful by suggesting an approach that provides all of the elements necessary for authentic spiritual transformation.”

Listen to what Timothy George, dean of Beeson Divinity School and Senior Editor of Christianity Today says about Sacred Friendships.

“Robert Kellemen and Susan Ellis have done a masterful job bringing together here the stories and voices of Christian women throughout the history of the church. A wonderful anthology of women’s voices. They steer an amazing course between feminist misreadings on the one hand and irresponsible neglect on the other. A superb presentation! I am sending the table of contents to all our Beeson faculty members encouraging them to look for the book.”

Benefit Now

For a 50% off e-copy you can visit:

http://www.rpmbooks.org/credit_card_orders.html#sacred

Susanna Wesley: Spiritual Guide Par Excellence, Part III

Susanna Wesley: Spiritual Guide Par Excellence, Part III

We know of Susanna Wesley (1669-1742) because of her famous sons, John and Charles. Yet she is a spiritual guide in her own right.

Soul Care in Life and in Death: On the Borders of Eternity

We would be mistaken to assume that Susanna Wesley provided spiritual direction without commensurate soul care. True, in her humility and honesty, she felt at times unfit to offer sustaining and healing counsel. John Wesley wrote his mother concerning affliction and the best method of profiting from it. On July 26, 1727, she responds, “It is certainly true that I have had large experience of what the world calls adverse fortune. But I have not made those improvements in piety and virtue, under the discipline of Providence, that I ought to have done; therefore I humbly conceive myself to be unfit for an assistant to another in affliction, since I have so ill performed my own duty.”[i] Though perhaps overly self-depreciating, her words do remind us of the truth that the best
preparation for soul care is taking our own soul care issues to the great Soul Physicians.

That Susanna was overly deferential about her soul care abilities is easy to discern given the records we have of her care for hurting people. When an unnamed female friend was afflicted in body and depressed in spirit, Susanna describes to another female acquaintance how she empathized with her. “I heartily sympathize with the young lady in her affliction, and wish it was in my power to speak a word in season, that might alleviate the trouble of her mind, which has such an influence on the weakness of her body.”[ii]

Of course, Susanna realizes that human comfort only carries so much weight. So she points this sufferer to her caring Savior. “It is with relation to our manifold wants and weaknesses, and the discouragements and despondencies consequent thereupon, that the blessed Jesus hath undertaken to be our great high priest, physician, advocate, and Saviour. . . . His deep compassion supposes our misery; and his assistance, and the supplies of his grace, imply our wants, and the disadvantages we labor under.[iii]

After sustaining this hurting young women by helping her to see that her illness is normal and not due to her sin, Susanna then shares healing care by persuading her to see Christ goodness. “And here, madam, let me beseech you to join with me in admiring and adoring the infinite and incomprehensible love of God to fallen man, which he hath been pleased to manifest to us in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ.”[iv] Understanding that there are no spiritual quick fixes, including in spiritual conversations, she invites ongoing connection. “I shall be very glad to hear often from you.”[v] Given her many duties in the home and in her neighborhood ministry, it is remarkable what an open heart Susanna demonstrates.

To her son, Charles, who had been struggling with his faith, she writes empathetically on October 19, 1738, “It is with much pleasure I find your mind somewhat easier than formerly, and I heartily thank God for it. The spirit of man may sustain his infirmity,—but a wounded spirit who can bear? If this hath been your case, it has been sad indeed.”[vi]

Humble as she was, Susanna could receive soul care just as easily as she dispensed it. Writing to Charles on December 27, 1739, she shares about a recent visit from his brother, John. “You cannot more desire to see me, than I do to see you. You brother . . . has just been with me, and much revived my spirit. Indeed, I have often found that he never speaks in my hearing without my receiving some spiritual benefit.”[vii] She increases her vulnerable openness when she admits, “But, my dear Charles, still I want either him or you; for indeed, in the most literal sense, I am become a little child, and want continual succor. ‘As iron sharpeneth iron, so doth the countenance of a man his friend.’ I feel much comfort and support form religious conversation when I can obtain it.”[viii]

She could equally accept care from non-family members. “I have been prevented from finishing my letter. I complained I had none to converse with me on spiritual things; but for these several days I have had the conversation of many good Christians, who have refreshed in some measure my fainting spirits.”[ix]

Perhaps there is no life event where soul care is more necessary than the end of life. John gives the following account of his mother’s last moments as she began her ascent to heaven. “I left Bristol on the evening of Sunday, July 18, 1742, and on Tuesday came to London. I found my mother on the borders of eternity; but she had no doubts nor fear, nor any desire but as soon as God should call, ‘to depart and be with Christ.’”[x] How we live on the borders of eternity says much about how we have lived up to that point. It also speaks either comfort or despair to our loved ones.

On Sunday, August 1, 1742, John writes of his mother’s funeral and shares Susanna’s grave inscription.

Here lies the body of Mrs. Susannah Wesley,
the youngest and last surviving daughter of Dr. Samuel Annesley.

In sure and steadfast hope to rise
And claim her mansion in the skies,
A Christian here her flesh laid down
The cross exchanging for a crown.

True daughter of affliction, she,
Inured to pain and misery,
Mourn’d a long night of griefs and fears,
A legal night of seventy years:

The Father then reveal’d his Son,
Him in the broken bread made known;
She knew and felt her sins forgiven,
And found the earnest of her heaven.

Meet for the fellowship above,
She heard the call, ‘Arise, my love,’
‘I come,’ her dying looks replied,
And lamblike, as her Lord, she died.[xi]

Susanna Wesley could die “lamblike” and could die granting comfort to her mourning children because she believes that God is our supreme good. Seven years before her death, on November 27, 1735, a few months after her husband’s death, she shares that experiential truth with John. “God is Being itself! The I AM! And therefore must necessarily be the supreme Good. He is so infinitely blessed, that every perception of his blissful presence imparts a vital gladness to the heart. Every degree of approach toward him is, in the same proportion, a degree of happiness.”[xii] In this last letter she ever penned, she offers spiritual consolation based upon spiritual communion with God. Truly this was a fitting legacy to her life.




[i]Ibid., 337.
[ii]Ibid., 397.
[iii]Ibid., 397-398.
[iv]Ibid., 398.
[v]Ibid., 399.
[vi]Ibid., 406.
[vii]Ibid., 409.
[viii]Ibid., 408.
[ix]Ibid., 409.
[x]Ibid., 413.
[xi]Ibid., 414.
[xii]Ibid., 341-342.

Susanna Wesley: Spiritual Guide Par Excellence, Part I

Susanna Wesley: Spiritual Guide Par Excellence, Part I

We know of Susanna Wesley (1669-1742) because of her famous sons, John and Charles. Yet she is a spiritual guide in her own right. Susanna was the youngest daughter of twenty-five children of Dr. Samuel Annesley. A minister living in London, he trained his daughter in biblical and classical languages as well as other arts and sciences. A man ahead of his times, he notes that, “I have often thought it as one of the most barbarous of customs in the world, considering us a civilized and Christian Country, that we deny the advantages of learning to women.[i]

Susanna married Samuel Wesley, a minister in the Church of England, and moved to his rural parish at Epworth. She bore nineteen children, only nine of whom lived to adulthood. Her husband was known to be difficult to get along with because he ruled with an iron hand. As a result, parishioners and townspeople alike disliked the family. At one point he was sent to prison for failure to pay a debt owed to one of his parishioners.[ii]

Of her marriage, Susanna ruefully records, “Since I’m willing to let him quietly enjoy his opinions, he ought not to deprive me of my little liberty of conscience. . . . I think we are not likely to live happily together. . . . It is a misfortune peculiar to our family that he and I seldom think alike”[iii]

Motherly Spiritual Direction: Theological Depth and Relational Focus

Like many such marriages, their distance resulted in her focusing her feminine gifts on her children. John Wesley requested, in adulthood, a letter from his mother detailing her methodical system of child rearing. On July 24, 1732, she penned such a letter. In it she describes not only her method, but her theology behind her practice. “As self-will is the root of all sin and misery, so whatever cherishes this in children insures their after wretchedness and irreligion; whatever checks and modifies it promotes their future happiness and piety.”[iv]

Therefore, “in order to form the minds of children, the first thing to do is to conquer their will, and bring them to an obedient temper. To inform the understanding is a work of time, and must with children proceed by slow degrees, as they are able to bear it; but the subjecting the will is a thing which must be done at once, and the sooner the better; for by neglecting timely correction, they will contract a stubbornness and obstinacy which are hardly ever after conquered, and never without using such severity as would be as painful to me as to the child.”[v] According to Susanna, parental spiritual discipline eschews the world’s esteem which they grant for indulgence. To her, it is only the cruelest parents who permit their children to develop habits they know must be afterward broken.

Though strong in disciplining the will, Susanna equally offers forgiveness and encouragement. “If they amended, they should never be upbraided with it afterward. . . . Every single act of obedience . . . should always be commended, and frequently rewarded. . . . That if ever any child performed an act of obedience, or did anything with an intention to please, though the performance was not well, yet the obedience and intention should be kindly accepted, and the child with sweetness directed how to do better for the future.”[vi]

Additionally, her focus on the will in no way suggests that Susanna’s parental spiritual guidance minimized the life of the mind. She, rare in her era, taught all of her children to read by age five. More than that, in a letter to her daughter, Susan, Susanna produced a lengthy treatise on parental spiritual instruction. “My tenderest regard is for your immortal soul, and for its spiritual happiness; which regard I cannot better express, than by endeavoring to instill into your mind those principles of knowledge and virtue that are absolutely necessary in order to your leading a good life here, which is the only thing that can infallibly secure your happiness hereafter.”[vii]

For Susanna, we should never derive these principles from some amalgamation of self-help tenets. Instead, for her we base all spiritual training on the chief articles of the Christian faith, taking for her ground-work, the Apostles Creed. Having introduced the necessity of laying a solid theological foundation, Susanna then exegetes each phrase of the Creed. Page after page with theological precision, she models the depth of theological training, biblical teaching, and spiritual direction that every Christian mother ought to pass on to her children.[viii] When Christians today question the relevance of theological depth, they need to ask and answer the question, “What factors produced the two great church leaders John and Charles Wesley?”

While the first factor was theologically precise teaching, this should not cause us to think that Susanna was content with “head knowledge.” She taught her children that the Creed “briefly comprehended your duty to God, yourself, and your neighbor.”[ix] The purpose of biblical truth is to provide us with a renewed mind that leads to loving God and loving others. As a minister, John wrote to his mother about the definition of love. On May 14, 1727, she responds. “Suffer now a word of advice. However curious you may be in searching into the nature, or in distinguishing the properties, of the passions or virtues of human kind, for your own private satisfaction, be very cautious in giving nice distinctions in public assemblies; for it does not answer the true end of preaching, which is to mend men’s lives, and not fill their heads with unprofitable speculations.”[x] Clearly, we need truth—theological truth, but never truth for truth’s sake, but truth for love’s sake.

The first two factors that produced the two great church leaders John and Charles Wesley are theologically precise teaching and truth related to daily life relationships. To these, Susanna models two more parental discipleship methods: spiritual conversations and spiritual narratives. After a fire destroyed their home and dispersed the family until a new home could be found, Susanna wrote to her daughter Sukey on January 13, 1710. “Since our misfortunes have separated us from each other, and we can no longer enjoy the opportunities we once had of conversing together, I can no other way discharge the duty of a parent, or comply with my inclination of doing you all the good I can, but by writing. You know very well how I love you.”[xi] What is the duty of a mother? To do all the good for a child she can. How does a mother fulfill her duty? By lovingly conversing about life in light of God’s Word (the content of the rest of her letter).

To spiritual conversations Susanna adds spiritual narratives. On October 11, 1709, she wrote to her son Samuel, saying, “There is nothing I now desire to live for but to do some small service to my children; that as I have brought them into the world, I may, if it please God, be an instrument of doing good to their souls.” And how would she provide her soul care ministry? “I had been several years collecting from my little reading, but chiefly from my own observation and experience, some things which I hoped might be useful to you all. I had begun to collect and form all into a little manual, wherein I designed you should have seen what were the particular reasons which prevailed on me to believe the being of a God, and the grounds of natural religion, together with the motives that induced me to embrace the faith of Jesus Christ, under which was comprehended my own private reasons for the truth of revealed religion.”[xii]

What if every mother did the same? What if every mother maintained Susanna’s high view of her high calling? A mother can make a great difference if her confidence in God’s work in her life leads her to “dare” to produce for her family her “faith history,” her “spiritual narrative.”

[i]Wallace, “Susanna Wesley’s Spirituality,” 163.
[ii]Tucker, Private Lives of Pastors’ Wives, 53.
[iii]Peterson, 25 Surprising Marriages, 253.
[iv]Clarke, Memoirs of the Wesley Family, 327.
[v]Ibid., 326.
[vi]Ibid., 329.
[vii]Ibid., 347.
[viii]Ibid., 347-376
[ix]Ibid., 347.
[x]Ibid., 337.
[xi]Ibid., 347.
[xii]Ibid., 343.

The Hidden Tradition: The Women of the Reformation, Part IV

The Hidden Tradition:

The Women of the Reformation, Part IV

Reformation historian Roland Bainton proposed that the Reformation had a primary effect on the role of women in society. The dropping of monasticism in Protestant lands “made for the exaltation of the home, the especial domain of the wife, as the sphere for exercise of the gentler virtues of the Sermon on the Mount. In Catholic thought these have been called the counsels of perfection to be observed by monks. Protestantism made no distinction between the counsels to be observed by the few and the precepts binding upon all. The entire Christian ethic was held to be incumbent upon every believer.”[i]

Reformation Wives: Daughters of the King of Kings

Ruth Tucker explains the impact of this titanic change upon marital relationships. “For the first generation of Protestants, marriage was a far more significant decision than it was in the generations that followed. Renouncing celibacy was viewed by the Catholics as giving in to the sin of lust.”[ii] For the leading male Reformers, the decision whether or not to marry was thus mired in complexity, culture, and conflict. For the women who married them, the nature of their husband-wife relationship was equally multifaceted.

Katherine von Bora Luther: Sticking to Christ and Ministering to Christians

Katherine von Bora is the best known of all the women of the Reformation because she was Martin Luther’s wife. However, she was much more than that. Katherine was born in January 1499 in a little village near Leipzig. Her parents enjoyed a degree of financial security and unlike most girls her age she received an education, studying at a Benedictine school beginning at age six. At age ten, when her mother died and her father remarried, they sent Katherine to a Cistercian convent to prepare for solemn vows, eventually taking them when she was sixteen.[iii]

In the early 1520s, Luther’s writings began to infiltrate monastic houses. “The sisters at Nimschen, nine of them, disquieted in conscience, sought his counsel. Luther advised escape and undertook to make the arrangements.”[iv] Luther turned to a highly trusted layman, Leonard Kopp, who delivered barrels of smoked herrings to the nuns. Hidden in the covered wagon, they rumbled into Wittenberg. A student there wrote to a friend, “A wagon load of vestal virgins has just come to town all more eager for marriage than for life. May God give them husbands lest worse befall.”[v]

Luther felt responsible that worse should not befall. All were placed either in teaching posts, in homes, or in matrimony. Katherine spent two years working in a home while Luther sought a husband for her. Finding no match, and at her initial suggestion, Luther agreed to marry Katherine because his marriage “would please his father, rile the pope, make the angels laugh and the devils weep, and would seal his testimony.”[vi] She was twenty-six; he was forty-two.

Though initially a marriage of convenience, they grew to love and depend upon each other profoundly. In fact, Luther would say of her, “In domestic affairs, I defer to Katie. Otherwise I am led by the Holy Ghost.”[vii] When he thought her at the point of death, he pleaded, “Don’t die and leave me.”[viii] Thirteen years after their marriage, Martin would say of Katherine, “If I should lose my Katie I would not take another wife through I were offered a queen.”[ix]

What was it about Katherine’s character and ministry that so endeared her to Luther? She “ministered to her husband’s diseases, depressions, and eccentricities.”[x] Her son, later a physician, praised her as half a doctor. He could not have survived his depression, which he interpreted as satanic temptations to doubt God’s forgiveness, without her sustaining and healing ministry. At night he would turn over and plead with Katherine, “Forbid me to have such temptations.”[xi] Based upon Luther’s own methods of soul care for such depression, we can surmise that Katherine responded by ministering sustaining empathy and healing encouragement through spiritual conversations and scriptural explorations.[xii]

Luther’s own testimony further describes Katherine’s empathic care. Speaking from the experience of their marriage and parenting he writes, “Marriage offers the greatest sphere for good works, because it rest on love—love between the husband and the wife, love of the parents for the children, whom they nourish, clothe, rear, and nurse. If a child is sick, the parents are sick with worry. If the husband is sick, the wife is as concerned as if it were herself. If it be said that marriage entails concern, worry, and trouble, that is all true, but these the Christian is not to shun.”[xiii] Undoubtedly, Martin frequently experienced Katherine’s as if compassion numerous times in his battles with depression.

Katherine was unafraid to lovingly rebuke Martin. When his language was too foul, she would say, “Oh come now, that’s too raw.”[xiv] Luther’s Table Talks also disclose that Katherine at times prodded her husband to respond forcefully to unfair attacks and doctrinal error.[xv]

As with Idelette Calvin, Katherine’s ministry was not exclusively to her family. The Augustinian Cloister where Luther had lived as a monk was first loaned and then given to the couple by the Elector. It had on the first floor forty rooms with cells above. Eventually not a single room was unoccupied. A friend described the scene. “The home of Luther is occupied by a motley crowd of boys, students, girls, widows, old women, and youngsters.”[xvi] Katherine “came to be a mistress of a household, a hostel, and a hospital.”[xvii]

Luther recognized and appreciated her versatility and creativity. “To my dear wife Katherine von Bora, preacher, brewer, gardener, and whatsoever else she may be.”[xviii] On other occasions he referred to her as “my kind and dear lord and master, Katy, Lutheress, doctoress, and priestess of Wittenberg.” Yet again, ten years after they married, he had this description. “My lord Kate drives a team, farms, pastures, and sells cows . . . and between times reads the Bible.”[xix]

But for Katherine, reading the Bible was insufficient. She longed to apply it. “I’ve read enough. I’ve heard enough. I know enough. Would to God I lived it.”[xx] Such was her testimony to her dying day. Ill for three months after an accident landed her on her back in a ditch filled with icy water, Katherine died on December 20, 1550, at age fifty-one. The final words from her lips depict how she lived her entire life. “I will stick to Christ as a burr to a top coat.”[xxi] The last words of Idelette and Katherine each communicate that they were not simply wives of Reformers, but more so daughters of the King of King.


[i]Bainton, Women of the Reformation in Germany and Italy, 7.
[ii]Tucker, Private, 40.
[iii]Bainton, 23.
[iv]Ibid.
[v]Ibid., 24.
[vi]Ibid., 26.
[vii]Ibid., 27.
[viii]Ibid., 26.
[ix]Ibid.
[x]Ibid., 29.
[xi]Ibid., 29-30.
[xii]Kellemen, Spiritual Care in Historical Perspective, 45-56.
[xiii]Bainton, 42, emphasis added.
[xiv]Ibid., 37.
[xv]Ibid., 38.
[xvi]Schwiebert, Luther and His Times, 584.
[xvii]Bainton, 30.
[xviii]Ibid., 39.
[xix]Tucker, Private, 27.
[xx]Bainton, 37.
[xxi]Ibid., 42.

The Hidden Tradition: Women of the Reformation, Part III

The Hidden Tradition:
The Women of the Reformation, Part III

Reformation historian Roland Bainton proposed that the Reformation had a primary effect on the role of women in society. The dropping of monasticism in Protestant lands “made for the exaltation of the home, the especial domain of the wife, as the sphere for exercise of the gentler virtues of the Sermon on the Mount. In Catholic thought these have been called the counsels of perfection to be observed by monks. Protestantism made no distinction between the counsels to be observed by the few and the precepts binding upon all. The entire Christian ethic was held to be incumbent upon every believer.”[i]

Reformation Wives: Daughters of the King of Kings

Ruth Tucker explains the impact of this titanic change upon marital relationships. “For the first generation of Protestants, marriage was a far more significant decision than it was in the generations that followed. Renouncing celibacy was viewed by the Catholics as giving in to the sin of lust.”[ii] For the leading male Reformers, the decision whether or not to marry was thus mired in complexity, culture, and conflict. For the women who married them, the nature of their husband-wife relationship was equally multifaceted.

Idelette Calvin: The Unfading Beauty of a Gentle and Quiet Spirit

Idelette Calvin (1510-1549) met John Calvin when she and her first husband fled persecution in their native Holland. Coming to Strasbourg, they connected with Calvin’s church and converted to the Reformed faith. When Idellete’s husband died in a plague, Calvin conducted the funeral. He was impressed with how she had cared for her dying husband as well as for her two children. He also noted that she was an intelligent woman who was unafraid to speak her mind.[iii]

Calvin communicated his idea of the ideal wife in a letter written to his friend William Farel even before he met Idellete. “But always keep in mind what I seek to find in her; for I am none of those insane lovers who embrace also the vices of those with whom they are in love, where they are smitten at first sight with a fine figure. This only is the beauty which allures me, if she is chaste, if not too fussy or fastidious, if economical, if patient, if there is hope that she will be interested about my health.”[iv]

Though unlike the modern ideal of romantic love, Calvin saw in Idellete the unfading beauty of her gentle and quiet spirit. She ministered soul care to her husband through her patient love, and that was exactly what Calvin needed to counter his own “impatience and irritability.”[v]

Since Calvin’s mother died when he was three, and he had received little love from his stepmother, Calvin had modest experience of a loving home. His best model was Martin Bucer’s family life. “In his family during the entire time I saw not the least occasion of offense but only ground for edification. I never left the table without having learned something.”[vi]

Calvin saw Elizabeth Bucer as a good mother, a hospitable homemaker, and her husband’s best critic. Idelette played a similar role. Calvin called her “the faithful helper of my ministry” and “the best companion of my life.” Calvin’s biographers speak of her as a woman “of some force and individuality.”[vii]

From the beginning, Idelette’s marriage to John was filled with complications and frustrations. In addition to his pastoral ministry, Calvin was a teacher and houseparent at his own boarding house, governed by a domineering housekeeper with a sharp tongue. To make matters worse, sickness would plague them both throughout their marriage.[viii]

External circumstances improved when Calvin was called back to Geneva. Idelette had become “first lady” of the parish, and she could have enjoyed a lavish lifestyle. Instead, she chose to extend her soul care ministry beyond her home. “Idelette, if she had chosen, might have passed her time in presiding over brilliant social gatherings. But like her unostentatious husband, she devoted her time and energy for the most part to the performance of charitable duties. She often visited the sick, the poor, and the humble folk. On many occasions she entertained visitors from communities who sought inspiration from her husband.”[ix] Like so many feminine soul care-givers before her, Idelette cared for the body as well as the soul, living out Christ’s call to care for the least of these (Matthew 25:35-40).

John and Idelette endured traumatic personal grief together. Idelette became pregnant three times, but none of the children lived beyond infancy. Soon after coming to Geneva, Idelette gave birth to a boy, but baby Jacques lived only two weeks. At his birth, Idelette became quite ill. His death piled sorrow on top of her physical anguish. The next month, Calvin wrote a friend, sending greetings from his wife, who was unable even to dictate a letter due to her heartache. Calvin added, “The Lord has certainly inflicted a severe and bitter wound in the death of our infant son.”[x] Coming from a man like Calvin, known more for his head than his heart, these words are vital reminders of the normalcy of grief for all Christians.

Working through her grief, over time Idelette became known throughout the first-generation Protestant world. “Your hospitality in the name of Christ is not unknown to anybody in Europe,” wrote an acquaintance.[xi]

After only nine years of marriage, Idelette succumbed to her frequent illnesses. On her deathbed, she and her husband prayed together. He witnessed and wrote of her peaceful composure, and recorded her final words of tribute to God. “She suddenly cried out in such a way that all could see that her spirit had risen far above this world. These were her words, ‘O glorious resurrection! O God of Abraham and of all our fathers, the believers of all the ages have trusted on Thee and none of them have hoped in vain. And now I fix my hope on Thee.’ These short statements were cried out rather than distinctly spoken. These were not lines suggested by someone else but came from her own thoughts.”[xii] As Idelette lived, so she died—choosing to exalt God by encouraging others.

After her death, Calvin shared his profound sorrow, offering insight into what Idelette had meant to him. “I have been bereaved of the best companion of my life, who, if our lot had been harsher, would have been not only the willing sharer of exile and poverty, but even of death. While she lived she was the faithful helper of my ministry. From her I never experienced the slightest hindrance.”[xiii]

Soul care historically and currently takes many forms. Idelette Calvin epitomizes soul care in the home through loving, caring, patient empathy and encouragement, as well as soul care outside the home through holistic ministry to “the least of these.”


[i]Bainton, Women of the Reformation in Germany and Italy, 7.
[ii]Tucker, Private, 40.
[iii]Peterson, 25 Surprising Marriages, p 73.
[iv]Van Halsema, This Was John Calvin, 113.
[v]Peterson, “Idelette: John Calvin’s Search for the Right Wife,” 13.
[vi]Peterson, 25 Surprising Marriages, p 77.
[vii]Ibid.
[viii]Tucker, Private, 40-41.
[ix]Hyma, Life of John Calvin, 85.
[x]Van Halsema, 147
[xi]Ibid., 148.
[xii]Peterson, “Idelette,” 15.
[xiii]Walker, John Calvin: The Organizer of Reformed Protestantism, 1509-1564, 236.

The Hidden Tradition: Women of the Reformation, Part II

The Hidden Tradition:
The Women of the Reformation, Part II

Many readers are familiar with the names associated with the male leaders of the Reformation era. Few, however, recognize the unheralded names of the women of the Reformation. By unveiling their hidden tradition, we gain insight not only into Protestant feminine soul care and spiritual direction, but also into the roles, self-concept, value, and worth of women in the early Protestant tradition.

Many of the women of the Reformation had a share in the public controversies it unleashed. Given the dynamic tensions of the day, they were not only accused of doctrinal heresy, but also of behavioral and relational sin for usurping their supposed proper role. They did not stand silently by when so indicted.

Katherine Zell: Afflicting the Comfortable and Comforting the Afflicted

Katherine Zell (1497-1562) likewise defended her right to minister in Christ’s name, though always doing so in a spirit of humility. Speaking of her relationship to her husband, she describes herself as “a splinter from the rib of that blessed man Matthew Zell.”[i]

Matthew Zell was a celibate Catholic priest turned married Lutheran pastor. Marrying Katherine Schult, he found a life partner with courage and conviction. As she portrays herself, “Ever since I was ten years old I have been a student and sort of church mother, much given to attending sermons. I have loved and frequented the company of learned men, and I conversed much with them, not about dancing, masquerades, and worldly pleasures but about the kingdom of God.”[ii]

Protestant leaders concurred with her self-assessment. Church historian Philip Schaff noted that the well-known Reformers of her day who frequented her home said that she “conversed with them on theology so intelligently that they ranked her above many doctors.”[iii] The admiration and the ministry were mutual. “I honored, cherished and sheltered many great, learned men, with care, work and expense. . . . I listened to their conversations and preaching, I read their books and their letters and they were glad to receive mine.”[iv]

To her ministry in her home, Katherine added a public ministry—often in defense of her husband and their ministry. When Matthew was excommunicated for marrying her, opponents of the Reformation circulated the tale that she had caught him with their maid and that, when she protested, he had thrashed her. She published a refutation, saying, “I have never had a maid. . . . And as for thrashing me, my husband and I have never had an unpleasant 15 minutes. We could have no greater honor than to die rejected of men and from two crosses to speak to each other words of comfort.”[v] Katherine exemplifies a rare and worthy-to-be-followed balance of confronting enemies while comforting loved ones.

In the same tract, she not only refutes this particular slander, but provides a vigorous defense of her ministry. “You remind me that the Apostle Paul told women to be silent in the church. I would remind you of the word of this same apostle that in Christ there is no longer male nor female and of the prophecy of Joel: ‘I will pour my spirit upon all flesh and your sons and your daughters will prophesy.’ I do not pretend to be John the Baptist rebuking the Pharisees. I do not claim to be Nathan upbraiding David. I aspire only to be Balaam’s ass, castigating his master.”[vi] Thus with wit and wisdom she offers shrewd biblical confrontation based upon the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers—male and female.

At her husband’s funeral, Katherine assures her listeners that she did not seek to become “Doctor Katrina” as rumor had it. “I am not usurping the office of preacher or apostle. I am like the dear Mary Magdalene, who with no thought of being an apostle, came to tell the disciples that she had encountered the risen Lord.”[vii]

Such courageous boldness might mistakenly cause us to think that Katherine was above suffering and grieving. However, the ceaseless criticism along with her overwhelming grief after Matthew’s death exposed her human neediness. Friends arranged for her to stay in the home of a pastor in Switzerland, and the renowned Reformer Martin Bucer sent a letter of introduction. “The widow of our Zell, a godly and saintly woman, comes to you that perchance she may find some solace for her grief. She is human. How does the heavenly Father humble those endowed with great gifts!”[viii] It truly is normal, human to hurt.

Even in her ongoing grief, Katherine ministers to others. In less than a year she was back in the parsonage in Strasbourg. To one of the displaced Protestant leaders she wrote, “I have been allowed to keep the parsonage which belongs to the parish. I take any one who comes. It is always full.”[ix]

Yet she was able to candidly admit that she still struggled. In a letter to two Protestant Reformers, whom she helped to hide from authorities, she apologizes for what she perceived as a lack of hospitality. “I wish I could have done better for you but my Matthew has taken all my gaiety with him.”[x]

Out of Katherine’s grief, she was able to comfort other grieving wives, offering them both sustaining empathy and healing encouragement. At Kensingen in Breisgau, the minister was forced to leave by those enforcing the Edict of Worms against Luther and his followers. They evicted one-hundred-fifty men of the parish along with the pastor. One man was executed. The rest fled to Strasbourg where Katherine housed eighty in the parsonage and fed sixty for three weeks, while finding shelter and provisions for the rest.[xi]

Katherine pens a letter of scriptural exploration to the wives left behind. “To my fellow sisters in Christ, day and night I pray God that he may increase your faith that you forget not his invincible Word. ‘My thoughts are not your thoughts, saith the Lord’ (Isa. 55:8). ‘Whom I make alive I kill’ (Deut. 32:39). The Lord would wean you from the world that you may rely only on him. Has he not told us that we must ‘forsake father and mother, wife and child’? (Luke 14:26). ‘He who denies me him will I deny in the presence of my father,’ (Matt. 10:33). ‘Those who would reign with me must also suffer with me’ (2 Tim. 2:12).

Katherine continues with healing words of spiritual conversation. “Had I been chosen to suffer as you women I would account myself happier than all the magistrates of Strasbourg at the fair with their necklaces and golden chains. Remember the word of the Lord in the prophet Isaiah (54:8) ‘In overflowing love I will have compassion on you.’ ‘Can a woman forget her suckling child? Even these may forget, but I will not forget you’ (Isa. 49:15). Are not these golden words? Faith is not faith which is not tried. ‘Blessed are those that mourn.’ Pray, then, for those who persecute you that you ‘may be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect’ (Matt. 5:4, 44, 48).”[xii]

Katherine did not limit her soul care ministry to other women. In 1558, though ill herself, she ministers to Felix Ambrosiaster, the chief magistrate of Strasbourg who had been diagnosed with leprosy and quarantined. Her letter to Felix depicts a sensitive awareness of his level one external suffering. “My dear Lord Felix, since we have known each other for a full 30 years I am moved to visit you in your long and frightful illness. . . . We have often talked of how you have been stricken, cut off from rank, office, from your wife and friends, from all dealings with the world which recoils from your loathsome disease and leaves you in utter loneliness.”[xiii]

Not stopping there, Katherine’s words also represent brilliant insight into his level two internal suffering—and how to face it with faith. “At first you were bitter and utterly cast down till God gave you strength and patience, and now you are able to thank him that out of love he has taught you to bear the cross. Because I know that your illness weighs upon you daily and may easily cause you again to fall into despair and rebelliousness, I have gathered some passages which may make your yoke light in the spirit, though not in the flesh. I have written mediations on the 51st Psalm: ‘Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness,’ and the 130th: ‘Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord,” and then on the Lord’s Prayer and the Creed.”[xiv]

One would hope that such ministry to others would always lead to ministry from others. However, Katherine’s last days were filled with strife and betrayal. Ludwig Rabus, a former resident in her home and indebted to her for spiritual counsel, preached against her, calling her a “disturber of the church.”[xv]

Bold to the end, Katherine responds with the light of truth. “A disturber of the peace am I? Yes indeed, of my own peace. Do you call this disturbing the peace that instead of spending my time in frivolous amusements I have visited the plague infested and carried out the dead? I have visited those in prison and under sentence of death. Often for three days and three nights I have neither eaten nor slept. I have never mounted the pulpit, but I have done more than any minister in visiting those in misery. Is this disturbing the peace of the church?”[xvi] Like the Apostle Paul throughout 2 Corinthians, false accusations forced her to “the foolishness of self-defense,” but always for the purpose of defending a woman’s right to biblical ministry.

Her own words best summarize the nature of her lifelong ministry. In 1534, she issued a collection of hymns that she had compiled, publishing them in four pamphlets that sold for a penny each. Her ministry goal was to inspire lay people of all ages, all walks of life, and both genders toward greater spirituality. “When I read these hymns I felt that the writer had the whole Bible in his heart. This is not just a hymn book but a lesson book of prayer and praise. When so many filthy songs are on the lips of men and women and even children I think it well that folk should with lusty zeal and clear voice sing the songs of their salvation. God is glad when the craftsman at his bench, the maid at the sink, the farmer at the plough, the dresser at the vines, the mother at the cradle break forth in hymns of prayer, praise and instruction.”[xvii] In all her ministry endeavors, spiritual equality in Christ motivated Katherine Zell.


[i]Bainton, 55.
[ii]Tucker, Daughters of the Church, 182.
[iii]Schaff, History of the Christian Church, Vol. 7, 633.
[iv]MacHaffie, 92, emphasis added.
[v]Bainton, 55.
[vi]Ibid.
[vii]Tucker, Private Lives of Pastor’s Wives, 33
[viii]Ibid.
[ix]Ibid., 34.
[x]Ibid.
[xi]Bainton, 61.
[xii]Ibid., 62-63.
[xiii]Ibid., 69.
[xiv]Ibid.
[xv]Ibid., 72.
[xvi]Ibid.
[xvii]Ibid.

The Hidden Tradition: The Women of the Reformation, Part I

The Hidden Tradition:

The Women of the Reformation, Part I

Many readers are familiar with the names associated with the male leaders of the Reformation era. Few, however, recognize the unheralded names of the women of the Reformation. By unveiling their hidden tradition, we gain insight not only into Protestant feminine soul care and spiritual direction, but also into the roles, self-concept, value, and worth of women in the early Protestant tradition.

Many of the women of the Reformation had a share in the public controversies it unleashed. Given the dynamic tensions of the day, they were not only accused of doctrinal heresy, but also of behavioral and relational sin for usurping their supposed proper role. They did not stand silently by when so indicted.

Argula von Grumbach: Refusing to Bury Her Talent

Argula von Grumbach (1490-1564) was a Bavarian noblewoman from the house of Hohenstaufen. Following in their tradition of dissent and scholarship, in the early 1520s she became a serious student of the Bible and Lutheran doctrine. In 1523, the University of Ingolstadt tried a student, Arcasius Seehofer, for his Lutheran sympathies and extracted a humiliating recantation from him. Von Grumbach took up pen on his behalf, arguing with university and secular officials in a series of letters in which she insisted that the Bible was on his side and that she would prove it.[i]

In her letters, Argula proclaims the importance of Scripture and her right to determine faith and practice thereby. “I beseech you for the sake of God, and exhort you by God’s judgment and righteousness, to tell me in writing which of the articles written by Martin or Melanchthon you consider heretical. In German not a single one seems heretical to me.”[ii] She continues by quoting Luke 7, 1 Corinthians 9, Psalm 36, John 2, 8, 9, 10, 14, 16, Matthew 24, and Isaiah 40 highlighting the Word of God and illumination.

Argula then defends her source of authority and commitment to it. “I have always wanted to find out the truth. Although of late I have not been reading any [information published by the Reformers], for I have been occupied with the Bible, to which all of Luther’s work is directed anyway. . . Ah, but what a joy it is when the spirit of God teaches us and gives us understanding, flitting from one text to the next—God be praised—so that I came to see the true, genuine light shining out. I don’t intend to bury my talent, if the Lord gives me grace.”[iii]

She certainly was tempted and confronted to bury her talent. Argula’s husband was fired because of her and he mistreated her as a result. Her family reviled her, others wrote against her. In a letter to her cousin, Adam von Torring, she explains, “I hear you have heard that my husband has locked me up. Not that, but he does much to persecute Christ in me. At this point I cannot obey him. We are bound to forsake father, mother, brother, sister, child, body, and life. I am distressed that our princes take the Word of God no more seriously than a cow does a game of chess.”[iv] Bury her talent she did not!

Responding to rebuke for not remaining silent, she retorts, “I am not unacquainted with the word of Paul that women should be silent in the church (1 Tim. 1:2) but, when no man will or can speak, I am driven by the word of the Lord when he said, ‘He who confesses me on earth, him will I confess and he who denies me, him will I deny,’ (Matt. 10, Luke 9), and I take comfort in the words of the prophet Isaiah (3:12), ‘I will send you children to be your princes and women to be your rulers.’”[v]

And speak she did. “When I heard what you had done to Arsacius Seehofer under terror of imprisonment and the stake, my heart trembled and my bones quaked. What have Luther and Melanchthon taught save the Word of God? You have condemned them. You have not refuted them. Where do you read in the Bible that Christ, the apostles, and the prophets imprisoned, banished, burned, or murdered anyone?”[vi]

As was typical of the women of the Reformation, Argula based her confidence upon Christ and His grace, not upon herself. “I do not flinch from appearing before you, from listening to you, from discussing with you. For by the grace of God I, too, can ask questions, hear answers and read in German.”[vii] Here we detect Argula boldly applying to her life as a woman the Lutheran doctrine of the priesthood of all believers.

Of her, Martin Luther reported to Spalatin, “I am sending you the letters of Argula von Grumbach, Christ’s disciple, that you may see how the angels rejoice over a single daughter of Adam, converted and made into a daughter of God.”[viii] To another friend, Luther wrote of Argula, “The Duke of Bavaria rages above measure, killing, crushing and persecuting the gospel with all his might. That most noble woman, Argula von Stauffer, is there making a valiant fight with great spirit, boldness of speech and knowledge of Christ. She deserves that all pray for Christ’s victory in her . . . . She alone, among these monsters, carries on with firm faith, though, she admits, not without inner trembling. She is a singular instrument of Christ. I commend her to you, that Christ through this infirm vessel may confound the mighty and those who glory in their strength.”[ix]

Since her confidence was neither in herself nor in Luther, but in Christ, Argula adds these final words. “And even if it came to pass—which God forbid—that Luther were to revoke his views, that would not worry me. I do not build on his, mine, or any person’s understanding, but on the true rock, Christ himself, which the builders have rejected.”[x] Thus Argula von Grumbach offers all women, and men, the biblical reminder that we base our ministry upon Jesus, the ultimate Soul Physician and Spiritual Friend.


[i]MacHaffie, Her Story, 99-100.
[ii]Ibid., 119.
[iii]Ibid, emphasis added.
[iv]Bainton, 105-106, emphasis added.
[v]Ibid., 97-98.
[vi]Ibid., 97.
[vii]MacHaffie, 120.
[viii]Bainton, 106.
[ix]Ibid.
[x]MacHaffie, 120.

Ammas: Spiritual Mothers

Ammas: Spiritual Mothers

Admittedly, hearing the word “Amma” can be puzzling. We’re more familiar with the word “Abba” from Romans 8:15 where we learn that through the Spirit of sonship we cry, “Abba, Father.” “Amma” comes from the same cultural context. Both Abba and Amma were terms of family endearment conveying honor and closeness. Calling a woman “Amma” communicated that she was a spiritual mother loved and respected by all her spiritual children.

Desert Spirituality: Experiencing the Geography of the Heart

Hearing the phrase “Desert Mother” or “desert spirituality” can also sound odd, ancient, foreign, and irrelevant to anything we experience today. And for some, these terms can even seem “unbiblical.” Yet, we will find that the desert spirituality of these Desert Mothers was scriptural and is relevant.

“Desert” did not necessarily mean a barren wasteland. Some of the Desert Mothers that we learn from in this chapter simply moved away from the city to rural, less-inhabited areas. Others did not move at all, instead selling most of their possessions in order to acquire enough land and lodgings to house a spiritual community of women and to accommodate the frequent spiritual pilgrims who sought them.

Regardless of location, the motivation remained the same. The Desert Mothers believed that the greatest enemies of the inner journey were hurry, crowds, and noise. They sought to create an environment that quieted the inner noise which kept them from hearing God’s Spirit speaking to their spirit through God’s inspired Word.[i] Desert Mothers like Amma Syncletica focused on the geography of the heart. “There are many who live in the mountains and behave as if they were in the town, and they are wasting their time. It is possible to be a solitary in one’s mind while living in a crowd, and it is possible for one who is a solitary to live in the crowd of his own thoughts.”[ii]

To further understand and relate to their movement toward desert spirituality, we have to understand two characteristics of the early Church—it was a city-centered faith and a home-centered faith. The book of Acts tells us that the Apostles shared the message of Jesus in the urban centers of the day. The Apostles targeted the mass of hungry, hurting people in thriving cities like Jerusalem, Antioch, Philippi, Thessalonica, Athens, and Rome.

The destruction of the temple in 70 AD and the persecution of the church in ensuing years resulted in domestic dwellings becoming the place for community meetings. Local believers gathered in homes for the Lord’s Supper, baptism, worship, and teaching. Lay men and women were involved in personal evangelism and works of mercy to the poor, the orphaned, and to prisoners.[iii]

Desert spirituality sprung from this city-centered and home-centered culture. The movement away from urban centers was motivated by the belief that the church in the city was compromising with the culture of the secular world. The Desert Mothers and Fathers believed that the church was losing its prophetic voice as it yielded to cultural and political pressures and became organized more like the government than like a living organism.[iv] Sound familiar? Sound relevant?

As patriarchs and matriarchs of extended families became more and more disenchanted with the political correctness of the church and the spiritual expediency of its leaders, they left the cities (or at least the secular attitude of the city), but rarely did they leave alone. The first “desert communities” usually included relatives, dependents, and household slaves (then considered family members). This inclusiveness had a deep impact upon desert spirituality. Life was centered around times of communal prayer, the group study and application of Scripture, joint ministry to the poor, and the collaborative application of the writings of the leaders of the movement.[v]

The Desert Mothers based their decision to leave the worldliness of the secular city upon Christ’s model. They read and desired to apply passages like Luke 4:1, “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert” (see also Matthew 4:1). “At daybreak Jesus went out to a solitary place.” (Luke 4:42). “Very early in the morning while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed” (Mark 1:35). “Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, ‘Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.’ So they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place” (Mark 6:31-32). “After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone” (Matthew 14:23).

The Desert Mothers noticed and applied at least two major lessons from passages such as these. They saw the need for God’s people to find a respite from the worldliness of the world. Reading the verses that followed the ones quoted above, they also recognized the call for God’s people to return from their rest refreshed and renewed to be Christ’s servants in the world. The Desert Mothers that we study in this chapter were not secluded hermits. They were remembered as much for their public ministry to the poor and hurting as they were for their private spirituality. Their communal retreat away from secular urban centers was for the purpose of growing closer to Christ so that they could be empowered to share Christ’s truth in love to a lost and lonely world. While we might respond to our increasingly secular culture differently, while we might apply these passages differently, at least we can relate to their social motivation and biblical conviction.

[i]Swan, The Forgotten Desert Mothers, 15.
[ii]Kraemer, Maenads, Martyrs, Matrons, Monastics, 121.
[iii]Swan, 6-9.
[iv]Ibid., 9.
[v]Ibid., 8-9.

An Amazing Sister in an Amazing Family

An Amazing Sister in an Amazing Family

Macrina the Younger (327-379 AD) came from one of the most amazing families in all of Church history. Her paternal grandmother was Macrina the Elder, her mother was Emmelia, and her brothers were Peter, Basil and Gregory of Nyssa. It is from Gregory’s work The Life of St. Macrina that we learn of her skill as a soul physician.

Spiritual Friend to Her Physical Family: Drawing Her Family to Christ

Although Macrina had no desire for marriage, she acceded to her father’s wishes, who arranged for her to marry a noted lawyer. But before the wedding ceremony, her fiancé died unexpectedly. Soon thereafter, her father also died, leaving her mother Emmelia with ten children. Macrina, as the eldest, took over the care of the youngest, the infant Peter. Even more, she became her mother’s soul care-giver and spiritual director. “In all these matters she shared her mother’s toil, dividing the cares with her, and lightening her heavy load of sorrow. . . . By her own life she instructed her mother greatly, leading her to the same mark, that of philosophy [Christian theology] I mean, and gradually drawing her on to the immaterial and more perfect life.”[i]

Macrina’s brother, Basil, returned to the family home after a long period of education, already a practiced rhetorician. “He was puffed up beyond measure with the pride of oratory and looked down on the local dignitaries, excelling in his own estimation all the men of leading and position.”[ii] Macrina would have none of that. “Nevertheless Macrina took him in hand, and with such speed did she draw him also toward the mark of philosophy [Christian theology] that he forsook the glories of this world and despised fame gained by speaking.”[iii] With deft guiding, Macrina changed the course of Basil’s entire life, swaying him from the torrents of self to the current of Christ.

Sustaining and healing care were also a major focus of Macrina’s ministry to her family. The second of her four brothers, Naucratius, died unexpectedly in an accident. Grieving herself because her “natural affection was making her suffer as well. For it was a brother, and a favorite brother, who had been snatched away.” Yet now Macrina displayed her selflessness. Facing the disaster, “she both preserved herself from collapse and becoming the prop of her mother’s weakness, raised her up from the abyss of grief, and by her own steadfastness . . . taught her mother’s soul to be brave. . . . She so sustained her mother by her arguments that she, too, rose superior to her sorrow.”[iv]

Here we view Macrina practicing classic historical Christian sustaining. She allowed grief, and even embraced it. However, her sustaining drew a line in the sand of retreat. Through it, she forestalls despair by the infusion of hope and by the sharing of sorrow.

An Invincible Athlete: Coaching Others in the Spiritual Olympics

Approximately a decade later, Macrina’s brother Basil also “departed from men to live with God.” When Macrina heard the news of the calamity in her distant retreat, “she was distressed indeed in soul at so great a loss—for how could she not be distressed at a calamity, which was felt even by the enemies of the truth?” Though grieving greatly, she never surrendered hope. “So she remained, like an invincible athlete in no wise broken by the assaults of troubles.”[v]

Her brother Gregory, pained by his own sorrows, traveled to Annesi where Macrina led a spiritual community of women. Upon his arrival, he discovered that Macrina herself is on her deathbed. Yet once again, her focus is on the pain of others. “I journeyed to her yearning for an interchange of sympathy over the loss of her brother. My soul was right sorrow-stricken by this grievous blow, and I sought for one who could feel it equally, to mingle my tears with. . . . Well, she gave in to me for a little while, like a skillful driver, in the ungovernable violence of my grief.”[vi]

After engaging in sustaining through this skillful interchange of sympathy, Macrina slowly shifted their focus to healing hope. “And in every way she tried to be cheerful, both taking the lead herself in friendly talk, and giving us an opportunity by asking questions. When in the course of conversation mention was made of the great Basil, my soul was saddened and my face fell dejectedly. But so far was she from sharing in my affliction that, treating the mention of the saint as an occasion for yet loftier philosophy, she discussed various subjects, inquiring into human affairs and revealing in her conversation the divine purpose concealed in disasters. Besides this, she discussed the future life, as if inspired by the Holy spirit, so that it almost seemed as if my soul were lifted by the help of her words away from mortal nature and placed within the heavenly sanctuary.”[vii]

Macrina is dying, yet she is consoling her brother. How? She seamlessly moved from sustaining empathy to healing encouragement. She drew him out by giving him a chance to talk, and then used his human emotions as a starting point for erecting a biblical way of thinking about loss. In classic healing fashion, she unfolded God’s eternal plan in the midst of sad human events, focusing on heavenly hope. The result? Gregory’s spirit soared because he now could view this life through the lens of the life to come.

Returning the next day, Gregory opened up about his troubles. “First there was my exile at the hands of the Emperor Valens on account of the faith, and then the confusion in the Church that summoned me to conflicts and trials.” Perhaps expecting sympathy, he instead received reconciling confrontation. “Will you not cease to be insensible to the divine blessings? Will you not remedy the ingratitude of your soul? . . . Churches summon you as an ally and director, and do you not see the grace of God in it all? Do you fail to recognize the cause of such great blessings, that it is your parents, prayers that are lifting you up on high, you that have little or no equipment within yourself for such success?” Rather than being floored by her chastisement, he “longed for the length of the day to be further extended, that she might never cease delighting our ears with sweetness.”[viii] Her capacity to exude love while speaking truth enabled Gregory to hear her words as the faithful wounds of a friend.

The next day would be her last . . . on earth. She had her couch turned toward the East, facing the sun and symbolically facing the Son. She then prayed her own benediction. “Thou, O Lord, hast freed us from the fear of death. Thou hast made the end of this life the beginning to us of true life. . . . Thou hast shown us the way of resurrection, having broken the gates of hell, and brought to naught him who had the power of death—the devil. . . . But when she had finished the thanksgiving, and her hand brought to her face to make the sign had signified the end of the prayer, she drew a great deep breath and closed her life and her prayer together.”[ix] As with Gorgonia, even in death, Macrina speaks words of life to those yet living.


[i]Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Saint Macrina, paragraph 966b.
[ii]Ibid., paragraph 966c.
[iii]Ibid.
[iv]Ibid., paragraph 970b.
[v]Ibid., paragraph 974c.
[vi]Oden, In Her Own Words, 48.
[vii]Gregory of Nyssa, paragraphs 978a-c.
[viii]Ibid., paragraphs 982a-c
[ix]Ibid., paragraphs 984c-986b.

A Spiritual Friend to Her Physical Family: Gorgonia

Spiritual Friend to Her Physical Family: Gorgonia

Nonna and her husband Gregory the Elder were the parents of Gregory of Nazianzus and Gorgonia (325-375 AD). Gorgonia and her husband Alypius lived in Iconium where they raised two sons who became bishops and three godly daughters.

All that we known of Gorgonia we derive from her brother Gregory of Nazianzus’ funeral oration on her life. Gregory went to great extremes to convey the historical accuracy of his eulogy of Gorgonia. “In praising my sister, I shall pay honour to one of my own family; yet my praise will not be false, because it is given to a relation, but, because it is true, will be worthy of commendation, and its truth is based not only upon its justice, but upon well-known facts. For, even if I wished, I should not be permitted to be partial; since everyone who hears me stands, like a skilful critic, between my oration and the truth, to discountenance exaggeration”[i]

An Empowering Heroic Narrative: Applying the Life Lessons of the Great Cloud of Witnesses

Gregory is practiced in the soul physician art of producing a heroic narrative for the purpose of empowering others. “Come, let me proceed with my eulogy . . . performing, as a most indispensable debt, all those funeral rites which are her due, and further instructing everyone in a zealous imitation of the same virtue, since it is my object in every word and action to promote the perfection of those committed to my charge.”[ii] Like the author of Hebrews in chapters 11 and 12, Gregory shepherds his living flock by reminding them of the faithfulness of the great cloud of witnesses who have gone before them. Though dead, their lives still speak.

Gorgonia’s life spoke from heaven because while on earth she was so heavenly minded that she was of great earthly good. “Gorgonia’s native land was Jerusalem above, the object, not of sight but of contemplation, wherein is our commonwealth, and whereto we are pressing on: whose citizen Christ is, and whose fellow-citizens are the assembly and church of the first born who are written in heaven, and feast around its great Founder in contemplation of His glory, and take part in the endless festival . . . which is produced by reason and virtue and pure desire, ever more and more conforming, in things pertaining to God, to those truly initiated into the heavenly mysteries; and in knowing whence, and of what character, and for what end we came into being.”[iii]

Gorgonia lived with spiritual eyes focused on her native land—heaven. Her life teaches us how to find our where, what, who, and why. By focusing on eternity, we learn our origin, our identity, and our purpose. We do not find the answers to the great philosophical, existential questions of life by focusing exclusively on this life, but rather by focusing intensely on the next life.

Godly Character Leading to Godly Counsel

Her godly character provided the firm foundation necessary for her godly counsel. In fact, Gregory directly links her “prudence and piety” when speaking of her fame as a wise counselor. “What could be keener than the intellect of her who was recognized as a common adviser not only by those of her family, those of the same people and of the one fold, but even by all men round about, who treated her counsels and advice as a law not to be broken? What more sagacious than her words? What more prudent than her silence? . . . Who had a fuller knowledge of the things of God, both from the Divine oracles, and from her own understanding? . . . Who so presented herself to God as a living temple?”[iv]

Gorgonia, like all biblical counselors, based her counsel upon the Word of God filtered through the discernment that develops from a lifelong commitment to God. She practiced the competency of using her human reason redeemed by grace to prudently listen to the specific situations of each unique individual in order to provide a timely, insightful word fit seamlessly for the exact occasion.

Gorgonia’s soul care was not of the “professional/office variety,” but earthly, real, and practical. “Who opened her house to those who live according to God with a more graceful and bountiful welcome? . . . Whose soul was more sympathetic to those in trouble? Whose hand more liberal to those in want? I should not hesitate to honour her with the words of Job: Her door was opened to all comers; the stranger did not lodge in the street. She was eyes to the blind, feet to the lame, a mother to the orphan. Why should I say more of her compassion to widows, than that its fruit which she obtained was, never to be called a widow herself? Her house was a common abode to all the needy of her family; and her goods no less common to all in need than their own belonged to each.”[v]

In the spirit of 1 Thessalonians 5:14, Gorgonia practiced holistic ministry. “And we urge you, brothers, warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone.” In the spirit of James 1:27, she practiced true spirituality. “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” In the spirit of Acts 2:44-45, she practiced sacrificial giving. “All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need.”

Her counsel and care rang true and pure because she walked the talk. Her maddened mules ran away with her carriage, overturning it, and dragging her along, causing serious injuries to her bones and limbs. Gregory records her response to her suffering, a response that teaches us much about biblical sufferology. “. . . the suffering being human, the recovery superhuman, and giving a lesson to those who come after, exhibiting in a high degree faith in the midst of suffering, and patience under calamity, but in a still higher degree the kindness of God to them that are such as she. For to the beautiful promise to the righteous ‘though he fall, he shall not be utterly broken,’ has been added one more recent, ‘though he be utterly broken, he shall speedily be raised up and glorified.’[vi] Reflecting back upon her silence during the recovery period, Gregory concludes, “. . that was the time to be silent, this is the time to manifest it, not only for the glory of God, but also for the consolation of those in affliction.”[vii]

Gregonia’s sufferology provides a lasting lesson for all to learn: we must mingle enduring patience with deep faith in the goodness of God during the badness of life. Such faith not only brings God glory, it also offers comfort to those now facing hardships.

As she lived; she died. On her deathbed, she offered words of healing hope and guiding direction as she spoke God’s truth in love. “After many injunctions to her husband, her children, and her friends, as was to be expected from one who was full of conjugal, maternal, and brotherly love, and after making her last day a day of solemn festival with brilliant discourse upon the things above, she fell asleep, full not of the days of man, for which she had no desire, knowing them to be evil for her, and mainly occupied with our dust and wanderings, but more exceedingly full of the days of God.”[viii] In serene calmness she whispered her final benediction, “I will lay me down in peace, and take my rest.”[ix]

[i]Gregory of Nazianzus, Select Orations, Sermons, Letters; Dogmatic Treatises, translated in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 2nd Series, ed. P. Schaff and H. Wace. Reprint ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1955, Vol. 7, p. 238.
[ii]Ibid, p. 239.
[iii]Ibid., pp. 239-240.
[iv]Ibid., p. 241.
[v]Ibid.
[vi]Ibid., p. 242.
[vii]Ibid., p. 243.
[viii]Ibid., p. 244.
[ix]Ibid.

The Legacy of Macrina the Elder

The Legacy of Macrina the Elder

Macrina the Elder learned the Christian life in the school of suffering. She was born sometime before 270 AD in Neocaesarea in Pontus (Asia Minor). During the persecution of Diocletian, Macrina fled the city with her husband and they lived in hiding in a forest near Pontus for seven years, nearly starving several times.

The family of Macrina is a fitting place to study women soul care-givers and spiritual directors. They are unique in the history of Christianity. Her grandsons, Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa, both Church Fathers, are the most well known of her lineage. However, they are not the sole reason why posterity has long revered Macrina’s family. She nourished three generations of Christian leaders passing the torch of faith from herself to her daughter Emmelia, and then to Emmelia’s children Macrina the Younger, Peter, Basil, and Gregory, all of whom history has honored as saints. Most importantly, “what is pertinent here is the fact that the family recognized the women to be the guides directing them all to their spiritual ends.”[i]

Truth and Life

Her grandson, Basil wrote admiringly of his grandmother’s mentoring. “What clearer proof of our faith could there be than that we were brought up by our grandmother, a blessed woman. I am speaking of the illustrious Macrina, by whom we were taught the words of the most blessed Gregory (Thaumaturgus), which, having preserved until her time by uninterrupted tradition, she also guarded, and she formed and molded me, still a child, to the doctrines of piety.”[ii]

What a fascinating concluding phrase, “formed and molded me . . . to the doctrines of piety.” Macrina’s discipleship model focused not just on doctrine, not just on piety, but on both—truth and life. In this, she followed in the heritage of the Apostle Paul who passed on the faith to Timothy with these words: “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them . . .” (1 Timothy 4:16a, emphasis added).

Like Macrina the Elder, her daughter Emmelia took an active role in the spiritual formation of her children, particularly her firstborn, Macrina the Younger. Gregory of Nyssa tells us in his vita of his sister: “The education of the child was her mother’s task; she did not, however, employ the usual worldly method of education . . . but such parts of inspired Scripture as you would think were incomprehensible to young children were the subject of the girl’s studies; in particular the Wisdom of Solomon, and those parts of it especially which have an ethical bearing. Nor was she ignorant of any part of the Psalter, but at stated times she recited every part of it.” Indeed, “When she rose from bed, or engaged in household duties, or rested, or partook of food, or retired from table, when she went to bed or rose in the night for prayer, the Psalter was her constant companion, like a good fellow-traveler that never deserted her.”[iii]

Like mother, like daughter. Emmelia’s guiding emphasized truth and life by inculcating the “ethical bearing” of Proverbs. She also followed the pedagogical insight and teaching methodology of Deuteronomy 6:7, “Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home, and when you walk along the road, when you lied down and when you get up.”

From Generation to Generation

Her life lessons stuck. Macrina the Younger discipled her younger brother, Peter. She “took him soon after birth from the nurse’s breast and reared him herself and educated him on a lofty system of training, practicing him from infancy in his holy studies” and eventually became “all things to the lad—father, teacher, tutor, mother, giver of all good advice.”[iv]

In turn, Peter applied well his sister’s life lessons. “Scorning to occupy his time with worldly studies, and having in nature a sufficient instructor in all good knowledge, and always looking to his sister as the model of all good, he advanced to such a height of virtue that in his subsequent life he seemed in no whit inferior to the great Basil. But at this time he was all in all to his sister and mother, co-operating with them in the pursuit of the angelic life.”[v] In later years, Peter and Macrina the Younger administered the double monastery at Annesi, discipling yet another generation of young believers.

Again, Macrina’s family followed the discipleship model of the Apostle Paul who exhorted Timothy, “And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others” (2 Timothy 2:2). Macrina the Elder’s family mentored four generations and beyond. Macrina the Elder provided guidance to Emmelia; Emmelia provided spiritual direction to Macrina the Younger; Macrina the Younger discipled Peter; Peter mentored those at the double monastery; and those at the monasteries passed the torch of truth to still others.

[i]Ranft, p. 26.
[ii]Ibid.
[iii]Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Saint Macrina, paragraphs 962c-964a.
[iv]Ibid., paragraph 972c.
[v]Ibid., paragraph 972d.

"If"

"If"

Amy Carmichael (1868-1951) ministered as a missionary in India for over fifty years, writing thirty-five books. Perhaps her most "famous" and powerful book was the concise "If." In "If," Amy asks brief questions about our spiritual life and personal relationships, then asks whether our lives are reflecting Calvary love.

In studying "If" for my book on the history of women's soul care, I saw a number of striking examples of sustaining, healing, reconciling, and guiding. I share just a few snippets and samplers with you to whet your appetite.

Sustaining Ifs

"If I have not compassion on my fellow-servant, even as my Lord had pity on me, then I know nothing of Calvary love."

"If I sympathize weakly with weakness, and say to one who is turning back from the cross, 'Pity thyself'; if I refuse such a one the sympathy that braces and the brave heartening word of comradeship, then I know nothing of Calvary love."

These are powerful challenges. I am asking myself, "Do I sympathize weakly with the weaknesses of others, or do I weep deeply with those who weep?" "Do I empower others to have a brave heart through spiritual comradeship, or do I shrink away from them and their struggles?"

Healing Ifs

"There are times when something comes into our lives which is charged with love in such a way that it seems to open the Eternal to us for a moment, or at least some of the Eternal Things, and the greatest of these is love."

"If the care of a soul (or a community) be entrusted to me, and I consent to subject it to weakening influences, because the voice of the world--my immediate Christian world--fills my ears, then I know nothing of Calvary love."

I am asking myself, "Am I listening to and speaking the voice of the Eternal Word, or am I listening to and speaking the voice of earthly things?"

Reconciling Ifs

"If I am perturbed by the reproach and misundertanding that may follow action taken taken for the good of souls for whom I must give an account; if I cannot commit the matter and go on in peace and in silence, remembering Gethsemane and the cross, then I know noting of Calvary love."

"If I am afraid to speak the truth, lest I lose affection, or lest the one concerned should say, 'You do not understand,' or because I fear to lose my reputation for kindness; if I put my own good name before the other's highest good, then I know nothing of Calvary love."

I am asking myself, "Do I have the courage to confront my brother or sister in love or am I blunting the truth out of selfish fear and thus refusing to speak the truth in love?"

Guiding Ifs

"If I do not look with eyes of hope on all in whom there is even a faint beginning, as our Lord did, when, just after His disciples had wrangled about which of them should be accounted the greatest, He softened His rebuke with those heart-melting words, 'Ye are they which have continued with Me in My temptations,' then I know nothing of Calvary love."

"If I have not the patience of my Saviour with souls who grow slowly; if I know little of travail (a sharp and painful thing) till Christ be formed fully in them, then I know nothing of Calvary love."

I am asking myself, "Do I see the buried image of God in my spiritual friends and patiently fan into flame the gifts of God in them, or do I impatiently believe the worse about my spiritual friends?"

Counsels of Perfection

Some have "accused" Amy Carmichael of being guilty of "counsels of perfection" with these "if/then" statements. That is, they think that she was being too hard on herself and her readers; driving them to perfectionistic Christianity.

I disagree. I would call them counsel of perfections in the same sense that the Apostle Paul used the word "perfection" to mean "the pursuit of Christ-like maturity."

Amy was passionate about pursuing Christ-like maturity personally and about helping those to whom she ministered to do the same. Am I?

If not, then I know nothing of Calvary love.