Elisabeth Elliot: A Mentor and Guide

On Monday, June 15, I scrolled down my facebook home page and found that Elisabeth Elliot Gren had passed away earlier that morning.  I paused with a sense of sadness.  But my sadness quickly turned to joy as I considered that she was now in the loving arms of the Lord she so faithfully served.  In His presence is fullness of joy.  Her struggles with dementia and old age were now gone and she dwelt securely in His right hand with pleasures forever more.  I am sure that she heard the words that we all long to hear, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

I never knew Elisabeth Elliot personally but she was my mentor.  For more than ten years, most every day, at one-o-clock in the afternoon, I turned on the radio and heard the familiar words, “You are loved with an everlasting love and underneath are the everlasting arms.”  Sometimes I listened alone while my children rested.  Sometimes I listened with a baby in my arms.  Sometimes my children and I listened together, especially when she read stories aloud at Christmas time.  I listened and I learned and I grew in my walk with the Lord. 

Elisabeth Elliot inspired me during those early years of my motherhood.  She taught me that we all have “too much stuff – more than enough” and to “just do the next thing.”  She taught me to love my husband and my children.  She taught me to fear, honor, and reverence God even in the most mundane and ordinary tasks, tasks like doing dishes and folding clothes.  She imparted in me a willing spirit to do what God called me to do as a Christian woman, wife, and mother.  She encouraged me to be committed to Him and His ways even when they went against the ways of this world. 

Along the way, Elisabeth Elliot introduced me to other mentors, women like Amy Carmichael and Elizabeth Prentiss.   She guided me through her spoken words on her radio program.  She directed me through her written words in her books and newsletters.  But most of all, Elisabeth Elliot inspired me by her own example:  her trust when Jim Elliot died; her faithfulness to minister to the very people who killed him; her commitment to encourage other women with the truths she had learned. 

The back of my Gateway to Joy book states that “Elisabeth Elliot has modelled courageous faith for more than forty years of public life.  Her wisdom has been gleaned from her experiences as a twice-widowed wife, mother, grandmother, missionary, Bible translator, radio broadcaster, public speaker, and best-selling author.”  She continued to model that courageous faith even when she learned of her memory loss.  Her husband Lars Gren shares that she handled it as she handled all else in her life, with acceptance.  In acceptance lieth peace.  Once again she taught by her own example.

I am thankful for Elisabeth Elliot and for her ministry on Gateway to Joy.  She made a difference in my life.  I am thankful also for the many other women who have led and guided me along my life journey.  I thank God that He calls women to teach and encourage other women and I pray that I will be as faithful and willing in that calling as women like Elisabeth Elliot have been.