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Michelle DeRusha

Every Day Faith. Faith Every Day.

#MyFaithHeroine

When Faith Looks Like Endurance {#MyFaithHeroine}

November 7, 2014 By Michelle

I am thrilled to introduce the third and final winner of the #MyFaithHeroine contest: Elizabeth Stewart. Elizabeth writes at Just Following Jesus, and she’s a pastor’s wife, a mama, a nana, a Bible teacher and a mentor. She describes herself as quirky, creative, methodical and contemplative, and she loves to whistle – as well as write, photograph and paint. Join me in welcoming the multi-talented Elizabeth Stewart to the blog today, and be sure to stop by her place to say hi and introduce yourself. [A note: The #MyFaithHeroine series will continue here every Friday with a line-up of guest posts written in honor of the women in our lives who have led us, loved us, mentored us and impacted our faith. Join me here every Friday for My Faith Heroine and be inspired.]

MyFaithHeroineI was a daydream-y type kid so sometimes I’d daydream I had a different sort of mama than the one God had given me.  I’d daydream she was more like the young and perky housewife with the fashionable capri pants who lived next door,  or like my friend’s mama with the beauty shop hair and ever-present pearl earrings.  I’d daydream she was the type of mama that I could confide all of my secrets to, a mama/best friend, like a friend had told me her mama was to her.  I daydreamed that Mama was less no-nonsense, and more the type to fuss and fawn over me.

But Mama wasn’t fancy and she wasn’t very emotionally expressive. Mama was hardworking, enduring and faithful.  I know sometimes the death of a loved one can cause us to forget their faults and idealize them. I don’t think I’ve done that with Mama.  I still remember her shortcomings.  What I do think about, still so often even four years after her death, is how much I miss her. Because Mama was one very important thing to me.

Mama was always there.  Mama was my home.

…Please hop over to Just Following Jesus to read the rest of Elizabeth’s story about her faith heroine – her beloved mama. 

This post is part of the My Faith Heroine Series in conjunction with the release of
50 Women Every Christian Should Know: Learning from Heroines of the Faith. Click here to read other posts in the #MyFaithHeroine series. 

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Filed Under: #MyFaithHeroine, guest posts Tagged With: #MyFaithHeroine, Elizabeth Stewart

Her Story is My Story {#MyFaithHeroine}

November 5, 2014 By Michelle

Today I am delighted to welcome the second winner of the #MyFaithHeroine contest, Abby Alleman. I first met Abby three years ago at the Allume conference and was immediately taken with her grace-full spirit, her sweet demeanor and her heart for loving everyone around her. Oh, and did I mention Abby’s smile? It lights up a room! Abby is now serving as a missionary in Hungary with her husband and their three kids, and she’s writing a memoir (like she doesn’t have enough to do!). Today Abby writes about her faith heroine, her beloved Swedish grandmother Mor Mor. Join me in welcoming Abby to the blog.

MyFaithHeroineShe taught me how to scrub clean with old toothbrushes the grimy places of farmhouse windowsills and doors whose crisscross panes carried dirt, manure and the sweat of five kids running back and forth between indoor play, feeding calves, milking cows and hayloft frolicking.

She also taught me how to pray without pretense or pause.

Her lessons span as wide as work thoroughly done or not at all and a God whose eye is on the sparrow and bids us ‘come’.  One of her favorite phrases from her own mother was ‘you have to be a little crazy to stay sane.’ Her life sprinkled across mine is a lot like yeast that works through dough and gives rise to the kingdom of God.

She birthed eleven children whose raising began in the height of the Great Depression. Need was a gift that brought forth great inventions. So she sewed and taught her daughters the same. Her sons learned how to cook and each child knew that a morsel of bread should never be eaten without profound gratitude.

Her eleven children would rise to call her blessed and her husband too. So would forty-four grandchildren through six decades. And many of the hundred and more great grandchildren would learn at her knee or at those of who she gave herself for their bending.

…Please hop over to Abby’s place to finish the rest of her story – you will be glad you did, I promise! {I read this story aloud to members of the 50 Women class I recently taught at my church, and there were more than a few Kleenex used by the end}.

Abby Alleman2Abigail (Abby) is a math geek who loves the ordered rhyme. She is a mix of the odd and even living in Budapest, Hungary with her husband and three young children. She has spent twenty years in various forms of ministry as a youth leader, high school teacher, Spanish translator and, for the last nine years, with her husband as a missionary with CRU. Her story is finding her in the people and language of her new home. So she is sewing together her life through memoir beginning on a farm in Pennsylvania and threading through continents and languages into a city of millions. She has big dreams but rests all of her hopes on the Love that reaches down and draws her Home. She blogs regularly at Abigail Alleman and can be found on Facebook and Twitter.

This post is part of the My Faith Heroine Series in conjunction with the release of
50 Women Every Christian Should Know: Learning from Heroines of the Faith.

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Filed Under: #50Women, #MyFaithHeroine Tagged With: #50Women, #MyFaithHeroine, Abby Alleman

What a Friend {#MyFaithHeroine}

November 3, 2014 By Michelle

 It’s fitting indeed that yesterday we celebrated All Saint’s day, and today we launch the My Faith Heroine series, celebrating the faith heroines who have blessed us, touched our lives and guided us along our spiritual journeys.

A few weeks ago I put out a call for entries for the My Faith Heroine Contest – stories about the women who have influenced you along your spiritual journey. Twenty-five entries later my Baker Books publicist Brianna and I chose three finalists – and believe you me, it was a challenge to narrow it down to just three! Many of the stories I read moved me to tears, and every last one of them was a beautiful testament to a faithful, cherished woman.

Today I welcome Lynn Morrissey, who writes about an unlikely friendship with a woman who graced her in endless ways and left an enduring legacy she’ll never forget. Join me in congratulating Lynn for writing one of the three winning #MyFaithHeroine entries!

MyFaithHeroineMyrtle was dead. The shriveled brown body encasing her generous spirit let go at God’s command. Like autumn’s last leaf, thin and brittle as parchment, it drifted effortlessly to its final resting place.

I met Myrtle years ago. She was my heroine. What an unlikely pair we were, our backgrounds and temperaments as variegated as fall’s foliage. Myrtle was a venerable octogenarian of African-American descent—gracious, humble, and gentle. Yet her soft-spokenness was peppered with crisp humor and laughter that tinkled like a flurry of wind chimes. Her diminutive ninety-pound frame housed a prayer warrior who regularly conferred with her Captain and best friend, Jesus, whom she claimed could fix anything. And He did!

I was a thirty-something Caucasian with an impetuous nature. I loved God and His Word, but was frustrated by my faith that seemed to fluctuate like a round of Simon Says—two baby steps forward, three giant steps back. Solidly standing with feet firmly fixed on her Rock, Jesus Christ, Myrtle’s faith simplywas.

I stuck close to Myrtle, hoping to absorb her faith secrets, and she was only too willing to share them. Every Sunday, we met in our church’s tiny chapel. Myrtle always left the doors open so people could join us for prayer, but few ever did. Myrtle, whose arthritis might have dictated otherwise, insisted we kneel at the altar rail. Inch by inch, she pleated like a weathered accordion, and with one heavy sigh—shooo—finally dropped to her knees. I preferred my comfortable pew seat, but knelt out of respect for Myrtle. She knelt out of respect for God.

Myrtle (1)

Myrtle prayed like she talked, simply and sincerely. I, who had struggled with prayer for nearly ten years as a Christian, was amazed at the effortlessness of her petitions, as if she were chatting over the breakfast table with an intimate friend. One knew that when Myrtle prayed, Jesus knelt alongside us, His presence palpable.

Myrtle didn’t just pray to Jesus, she sang to Him, too. Her favorite hymn was What a Friend We Have in Jesus, and that was no surprise. She sang to her friend Jesus while she baked, washed, dusted, or tended the generational dozens of children entrusted to her care over the years. She told me that singing gave her spiritual strength. Myrtle sang most heartily in church, where she shone like polished piano ebony among mostly white keys.

Sometimes it disturbed me that Myrtle demonstrated what I considered to be a subservient attitude towards her Caucasian counterparts, calling each lady by Miss or Mrs. and her surname. Myrtle is just as good as they, I thought, and knows her Bible better and can pray rings around them!

In retrospect, although I believe Myrtle hailed from a generation plagued with societally imposed racial distinctions, I learned that her personality was characterized by subservience to Christ. His humble servant, she showed deference to others. Her humility humbled me, and I longed to be more like her.

What a friend I had in Myrtle. I called her day or night, asking endless questions or relaying uncontrolled fears. She patiently listened, never criticizing, never minimizing my wrestling. She’d offer a Bible passage to enlighten, a prayer to uplift. “Jesus will fix it, Lynn,” she assured and I was soothed, though not always persuaded. My faith needed to grow.

Sometimes trials loomed larger than life, seemingly insurmountable. One morning at work, I made a desperate call to Myrtle, explaining that some board directors thought I was negligent in raising critical funds for the agency for which I was executive director. Some wanted me fired. “Jesus will fix it,” she insisted. “Let’s pray.” We did, and He did! I had never been one to toot my own horn, but at the next board meeting, I had an opportunity to explain that I had personally been responsible for generating a large percentage of support in both cash and in-kind donations. A naive young woman, I had done my job without reporting it. In response to Myrtle’s prayer, the Lord gave me courage to speak, and He gave me favor with the board.

Another call to Myrtle was even more desperate. I was forty and pregnant. This was a circumstance that couldn’t be fixed or altered by any amount of praying. And yet, in the ensuing months, as I confessed my anguish to my faithful, non-judgmental friend Myrtle, Jesus answered our prayers by fixingmy attitude. When our daughter was born, how proud I was to be her mother. And how proud Myrtle was to be included at Sheridan’s christening as her great-godmother.

Certainly arrogant pride was not one of Myrtle’s characteristics. “Why would you, a college graduate, ask advice from me?” she sometimes queried. I thought the answer was obvious. Myrtle possessed the God-given wisdom that I needed.

Yet near the end of her life, Myrtle’s wisdom was harder to discover. Her quick mind and quicker wit were overshadowed by the ravages of Alzheimer’s disease, scrambling her language into a kind of verbal Morse-Code gibberish. She could no longer talk to others or to Jesus.

One afternoon, in what was to be our last visit, I pulled her dusty hymnal from the piano bench, asking her daughter-in-law for permission to play for Myrtle. As I played the old familiar hymn, with tears streaming down her cheeks, Myrtle began to sing, “What a friend we have in Jesus …” Although she could no longer talk to Jesus, she was singing to Him just as she had throughout the years. While Myrtle couldn’t tell Him, she knew He was still her best friend.

Several days later, Jesus fixed Myrtle good as new. And now she’ll never stop singing.

Lynn Photo new bio 1-3-03 mediumLynn D. Morrissey possesses the rare ability to probe beneath the surface, striking the heart of a subject, while sharing transparently from her own heart. She is passionate about journaling, through which God healed her of suicidal depression, alcoholism, and guilt from an abortion. She empathizes greatly with those who endure pain. A poetic word-stylist, Lynn sculpts beautiful language with her pen, and is the author of Love Letters to God: Deeper Intimacy through Written Prayer, and other books, contributor to numerous bestsellers, a Certified Journal Facilitator (CJF) for her ministry, Heartsight Journaling, AWSA speaker, and professional soloist. She lives with her husband Michael and college-age daughter Sheridan in St. Louis, Missouri. Connect with Lynn on Facebook or email her at: words@brick.net.

This post is part of the My Faith Heroine Series in conjunction with the release of
50 Women Every Christian Should Know: Learning from Heroines of the Faith.

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Filed Under: #MyFaithHeroine Tagged With: #50Women, #MyFaithHeroine, 50 Women Every Christian Should Know, Lynn Morrissey

Tell Us Your Story: Enter the #MyFaithHeroine Contest!

September 30, 2014 By Michelle

SusannaWesley

My mom hasn’t dedicated her life to missionary work like Amy Carmichael.

She’s never wrestled her way through social or gender barriers like Catherine Booth or Antoinette Brown Blackwell.

She’s not a mystic or a visionary like Teresa of Avila, nor a political leader like Fannie Lou Hamer.

She didn’t found a college like Mary Lyon or Mary McLeod Bethune.

She didn’t save thousands of lives as a nurse like Florence Nightingale or a doctor like Ida Scudder.

She never moved to India or Africa or Argentina; in fact, she’s lived all her life within the same ten-mile radius.

My mom’s name won’t go down in history. She won’t be remembered for any one “great thing.” Hers was, and is, a quiet faith, lived out in small, humble, almost unnoticeable acts of love and service.

And yet, my mom is my faith heroine – and the person to whom I dedicated 50 Women Every Christian Should Know. Because her faith and those hundreds of small, humble acts of love and service she’s performed day after day, decade after decade? They haven’t gone unnoticed by me.

I wrote in my memoir,  Spiritual Misfit,that my mom has always had a childlike faith, what’s sometimes called a “blind faith” — a pure, unwavering belief in the existence of God.

I sometimes joke that I must have been painting my toenails the day the Holy Spirit dished out faith, because I seemed to have missed the boat on that fruit of the Spirit.

But not my mom. She has been generously blessed with the fruit of faith, among her many other gifts.

Even though I can’t always relate to that kind of steadfast faith, I have admired my mom’s quiet commitment to God for a long, long time. Though I didn’t share it, and at times questioned the possibility of its existence (at least for myself), my mom’s deep, unwavering faith somehow steadied me along my own spiritually fraught journey.

My mom’s belief in God and in his ever-present goodness offered me both stability and hope — hope that I might someday believe in God too.

MotherTeresaquote

I’m willing to bet that you have a faith heroine in your life – someone who has influenced your faith journey, offered you spiritual wisdom or guidance, helped you to grow closer to God or inspired your faith in some way.

We want to hear your story! Tell us about your personal faith heroine. She can be a person from the past or present; a famous figure or someone with whom you have a personal relationship (like the story I wrote about my mom, above); a person still living or someone long-deceased. Tell us how she influenced you; how she helped shape your faith life; the kind of role model she was or is.

Enter the #MyFaithHeroine Contest!

1. Blog about your own personal faith heroine anytime between October 1 and October 22.

2. Include this statement anywhere in your blog post: This blog post is part of Michelle DeRusha’s #MyFaithHeroine contest, in connection with the release of the book 50 Women Every Christian Should Know. Find out how to participate here. 

3. Share your post on Twitter and/or Facebook and tag it with #MyFaithHeroine.

4. After you post your blog and share it via social media, officially sign up for the contest using this short form. You MUST fill out the form to participate in the contest – but it’ll only take you like seven seconds, I promise!

5.  The week of October 27, members of the marketing team at Baker Books and I will announce three winners. These three winners’ blog posts will be featured on my blog. They will also receive a signed copy of 50 Women Every Christian Should Know, a set of eight note cards, and a $25 VISA gift card.

Note: You do not need to purchase 50 Women Every Christian Should Know to enter the #MyFaithHeroine contest.

Filed Under: #50Women, #MyFaithHeroine, 50 Women Every Christian Should Know Tagged With: #50Women, #MyFaithHeroine

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For as long as I can remember, I’ve been a Triple Type A, “make it happen” (my dad’s favorite mantra) striver and achiever (I’m a 3 on the Enneagram, which tells you everything you need to know), but these days my striving looks more like sitting in silence on a park bench, my dog at my feet, as I slowly learn to let go of the false selves that have formed my identity for decades and lean toward uncovering who God created me to be.

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