The end of her husband’s life led to the beginning of mine
A tribute to Elisabeth Elliot.
It was an ordinary Monday when the news of Elisabeth Elliot’s passing reached me at my desk. Instantly, a wave of emotion filled me, and tears fell. I suddenly remembered feelings that have dulled in the everyday – feelings of a passion for God and of humility, knowing that a man would pour his entire life into the service of reaching the lost for Christ. That he would pray:
“God, I pray Thee, light these idle sticks of my life and may I burn for Thee. Consume my life, my God, for it is Thine. I seek not a long life, but a full one, like you, Lord Jesus."
The story of Jim Elliot and the missionaries who were martyred in Ecuador in 1956 was used decades later, in 1997, to reach a young mother in Southeastern Pennsylvania.
I had been on the outskirts of faith my whole life. I had been to church. I had memorized John 3:16. I had made good choices—most of the time. I was a hopeless romantic who refused to watch movies with sad endings. But sitting in an auditorium watching a play about Jim Elliot stirred me in an uncomfortable way. I was unhappy with the ending. I didn’t want everyone to die. I wanted to rewrite the story so they would be found safe and sitting around the campfire with the tribe. The play left me with questions and doubts.
Why was this story being told if they failed their mission?
When a woman at the church asked me what I thought about the play, I was honest. So she told me the rest of the story. She told me about the courageous Elisabeth Elliot, freshly widowed and grieving, who went back to the very people who killed her husband, and showed them God’s unconditional love and forgiveness. And then she sat down with me, opened her Bible, and took me on a miraculous journey from doubt to faith. I gave my heart to Jesus then and there.
I never knew Elisabeth Elliot personally, but her story is eternally entwined with mine and I am so grateful for her faithfulness. It is amazing how many lives were changed by her courageous faith and obedience to the Great Commission.
Glenda
Christian History Institute
Creative Design Team
For more on the story of the Auca martyrs and their lasting impact, read Ruth Tucker’s fascinating article Where The Gates of Splendor Led.