Women of Inspiration and Hope
This months’ reviews include two missionaries and a Queen.
Lettie B. Cowman has been called the “apostle of consolation” through her many devotional books. We all have struggles in our lives. If you are going through a struggle or know someone who is, I highly recommend these books.
There is a vibrant church in Korea now thanks to missionaries like Lillias Underwood.
The memoirs that she wrote will keep you glued to your chair.
This year our friends in the U.K. are celebrating the 90th birthday of Queen Elizabeth II. Though her actual birthday was April 21, the official celebration is June 10-12, 2016.
— Erny, Edward and Esther, No Guarantee But God: The Story of the Founders of OMS International, (OMS International, Greenwood, Indiana, 2000).
This book is actually the story of the founders of the Oriental Missionary Society, now called the One Mission Society. God blessed the efforts of Charles and Lettie Burd Cowman, Ernest Kilbourne, and Juji Nakada as they began a mission to the Japanese in 1901 that is still in existence today. The mission is active in over sixty countries all over the world.
After Charles Cowman died, Lettie ran the mission until 1949. She traveled far and wide and spoke at many conferences. She wrote a biography of her husband, Charles. She has also written many books that have comforted millions of hurting Christians worldwide. She wrote countless articles for periodicals. This indefatigable woman even wrote a book at the age of eighty entitled, Life Begins at Eighty. She presented copies of this book to all of her friends at a party that she gave! You will be blessed as you read about God’s work through the life of Lettie B. Cowman.
— Cowman, Mrs. Charles E., Streams in the Desert, (Zondervan Publishing House,
Grand Rapids, original 1925, this reprint 1976).
Millions of people have been comforted by the devotional works of Lettie B. Cowman. Lettie gained deep insights into the consoling mercy of God when she suffered through the loss of her own husband. She was used of God to comfort others.
After her husband Charles’ death Lettie put II Corinthians 1:3, 4 into practice:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort Who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.
Lettie nursed her husband Charles through his illness for six years before he died. She often wondered why God didn’t just heal Charles. Where was He? He had healed others. Lettie turned to the Bible for her help. God seemed to be asking her if she wanted her husband to be healed more than she wanted His will for her. Lettie spent hours reading the Bible and scouring the book stores for books on suffering and encouragement. She copied out many truths from books written by others who had trod the path that she had. Little did she know that she was doing this work for others and not just for herself. From the hundreds of words of wisdom that she gleaned from the books she read, Streams in the Desert was born. Everyone should have a copy of one of Lettie’s books for themselves or others.
— Cowman, Lettie B., Springs in the Valley, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, original 1939, this reprint 2016).
Lettie wrote this daily devotional for young people hoping that the insights into God’s Word would be like “springs into the valleys” (Psalm 104:10) bringing them hope and comfort. The opening passage, January 1, sets the stage for the rest of the book:
“We are entering upon a new Year – surely we cannot but believe, a new age. If we have rightly learned the lessons of the past, there lies before us a heritage of unspeakable blessing, which none of these vivid metaphors can too strongly describe; infinite sources of blessing, for the fountains and waterbrooks are but the figures of God’s illimitable grace. For with Him is the fountain of life. A fountain Fed by Eternal Springs!”
For the next twenty-five years after writing this book Lettie Cowman wrote seven more books and helped with the distribution of Scriptures and Biblical literature. Many of her books are easily available online at Amazon.com or other book sites.
— Underwood, Lillias H., Fifteen Years Among the Top-Knots or Life in Korea, (Kessinger Legacy Reprints, of American Tract Society, 1904).
Lillias Horton Underwood was one of the countless numbers of courageous women who went to serve on the mission field in spite of the dangers. Women who went to places like Africa or the Orient in the nineteenth century were warned that they would return in a coffin. Lillias trusted God and ventured into the interior of Korea as the first white woman ever to do so.
Lillias deemed it a privilege to serve God. In her book she said, “The wonder of it, which will grow, I think, more and more through the eternal ages, is that God should allow us, his poor creatures, to share with him in a work far greater than the creation of a universe, even the founding of an eternal and limitless kingdom of holiness, glory and peace.”
This book is as exciting to read as a novel. God gets the glory as the Underwood’s serve Him in Korea among the “top-knots”, so called because of the way they wore their hair in a knot on top of their heads. Besides the Kessinger Legacy reprint of this wonderful book, you can download it for free on the internet. Go get it; you’ll be really blessed.
— Greene, Mark & Butcher, Catherine, The Servant Queen and the King She Serves, (Published by the Bible Society, HOPE, and the London Institute in Great Britain as a tribute to Her Majesty’s 90th birthday, 2016).
At an annual Christmas speech, Queen Elizabeth said: “For me, the life of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, whose birth we celebrate today, is an inspiration and an anchor in my life. A role-model of reconciliation and forgiveness, he stretched out his hands in love, acceptance and healing. Christ’s example has taught me to seek to respect and value all people of whatever faith or none.” It is one of the many public references the Queen has made to her Christian faith.
The Servant Queen and the King She Serves uses the Queen’s own words to draw out the central role of her trust in Jesus Christ. This is a beautiful book with great photographs
published by Bible Society, HOPE and the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. It is not expensive; get more than one copy to pass out to friends and take to your church. Roy Crowne, HOPE’s executive director says, ‘The Queen describes Jesus as ‘an anchor’ and ‘role-model’ – as you read this book we hope you will consider how you can put your faith into words.”
This book is available for sale at:
http://www.hopetogether.org.uk/Groups/262514/Queens_Birthday.aspx
