Becoming Elisabeth Elliot: A Book Review

 

I thought I knew Elisabeth Elliot well. I’ve read many of her books and have listened to her talks, enough to think I had a handle on her life experiences, her personality, her struggles, and even quirks. But I could not put down Ellen Vaughn’s biography, Becoming Elisabeth Elliot. 

 

I know her so much better now! And she’s endeared herself to me even more. My favorite part, hands down is how real Betty Elliot is shown to be (I think she may be Betty to me now).

 

I cracked up just about as much as I teared up. What a character she was! 

 

Pieces of Joni Eareckson Tada’s foreword stirred me: 

 

“The timing of this book couldn’t be better. We may not know it, but in an age of anti-heroes, our souls crave an authentic witness. We long to see a follower of Christ square off against sin and stand firm against the winds of adversity; one whose ironclad character cannot be dismantled. We want to see someone in whom living for Christ and dying for Him is indistinguishable. We crave a visceral story that has meat on it. A story that rises above the average. That soars and inspires…what you’ll read here shows clearly Elisabeth’s ordinariness, how she was subject to the same temptations and distractions that plague us all, and what she embraced, through Christ, to become extraordinary. I hope you’ll be convinced that the same grace which sustained a young Betty Elliott to become a captain in God’s army will in fact whisper to your soul, “Be like her.”

 

I was reminded of what drew me to her as a young believer at 15 or 16: she was “committed to living her life flat-out for Christ, holding nothing back…She was curious, intellectually honest, and unafraid…unafraid of the quest for Truth that might lead her to an inconvenient conclusion.” 

 

She had an “unyielding passion to win souls for Christ.” “She was determined not to do what was easy, but to wait for God’s leading, whatever it was.”

 

As I read, I couldn’t help but hear echoes of myself in her journal entries, which is what led to the tears. I’m no Elisabeth Elliot, but she would tell you that she was no hero, either. “I suppose the general opinion of missionary work says that it is intended to bring [people] to Christ. Only God knows if anything in my ‘missionary career’ has ever contributed anything at all to this end. But much in that ‘career’ has brought me to Christ.”

 

She was a woman who wrestled. “Sometimes she got tangled up in her thoughts. Was all of this any use to God?”

 

“I could almost say I’ve had enough of these Waodani, and wish God would take me away…I feel this…but I will do His will, not my own.”

 

“After Jim died…she wanted to collapse into a heap on the bedroom floor. But, she made it through each arduous day, one at a time, with a simple mantra: do the next thing.”

 

She was a woman resolved. “We must look clearly and unflinchingly at what happens and seek to understand it through the revelation of God in Christ…To be a follower of the Crucified means, sooner or later, a personal encounter with the cross. And the cross always entails loss…In her own encounter with the cross, Betty determinedly sought the path of obedience, regardless of how she felt.”

 

“When pain, disappointment, lack of fulfillment, derision, suffering, and death came, she did not flee the dark waves, sucked backwards by their relentless undertow. She met them straight on, diving toward the cresting surge, sparing herself nothing, considering the bracing, salty shock of the cold waters just part of the big story.”

 

She was a passionate woman, though outwardly reserved. “If she was cautious in her relationship with Jim Elliot, or reserved with others, she was not so with God. She threw herself open to Him, wholeheartedly, without restraint.”

 

She was a woman who desired more than anything to yield her whole self to Christ. “Oh, how I pray for conforming to the acceptable will of God. I do not want to miss one lesson. Yet I find that events do not change souls. It is a response to them which finally affects us.”

 

“…the takeaway from their lives is a reckless abandon for God. A willingness to cast off any illusions of self-protection, in order to burn for Christ. An absolutely liberating, astonishing, radical freedom that comes only when you have, in fact, spiritually died to your own wants, ambitions, will, desires, reputation, and everything else.”

 

And she was hard on herself. “She tortured herself further by reading 1 Corinthians 13. Love is not jealous… boastful… arrogant… rude… irritable… resentful. She sighed. ” I was all these today.” 

 

“Oh, truly, I am an unimprovable, helpless case. Help, Lord!”

 

Her earnest heart’s desire to love and obey God put to the test every day: “I long to be Home. I long to put off this mortal body, to be occupied wholly with things unseen. What a weight things seen are to me now—meals, clothes, my body, house cleaning, etc…I feel frustrated and useless. Cleaning, feeding all these people, caring for Valerie, making bread, etc., etc. Lord—is this what I am here for? Oh, when shall I be free from the body of this death? Help me to be loving Thee in these hours of occupation with things seen.”

 

I was encouraged as a writer by her own struggles with writing—

“…and I am supposed to be writing a book. I am not writing one. I sit and look at the typewriter, read, shuffle papers, contemplate, and very nearly want to quite the whole thing. Why must it be so painful?”

 

“I feel utterly inarticulate, incapable of writing or speaking a single syllable which will convey my meaning. God! Father of Spirits! Give life.”

 

“She could not wait for “inspiration, ” whatever that was. She could not see the whole. Writing was like cutting a jungle path, One step at A time. By sheer discipline, she returned to the typewriter, day after day. She stared out the window, contemplated her fingernails, had another cup of tea, and wrote one sentence at a time.” 

 

“But, how, how to put this on paper so as to disarm people into contemplating it for once, seriously? I have not any great creative imagination or ability, but I do believe that if I worked hard I might produce a little which would set forth a moment of truth now and then. How well I know my limitations, but let it not be an excuse for throwing in the sponge.”

 

So, whether you think you know Elisabeth Elliot well or not, I highly recommend reading Vaughn’s biography. It’s one of my favorite books that I’ve read this year. My heart has been stirred and at 40, I still want to “be like her.”

 

 

Well done, Ellen Vaughn. I can’t wait for the next one.

 

 

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