As a mom of young children, many of your crisis times seem to hit during the middle of the night. Often the crisis is a sick child or a young one with bad dreams. Sometimes the crisis is only the anxiety that hits you once you finally have the time to lay still in a quiet, dark house. I was blessed to have relatives and strong Christian mentors nearby, some of whom accepted late calls. What about those times when I didn’t want to bother anyone? What about women who had no close Christian relatives or friends to turn to for godly advice? How would they get the mentoring they needed as quickly as they needed it?
Debbie Morris wrote The Blessed Woman with this woman in mind. At one point in her life, she was that woman who wanted godly mentoring, but had no resources. She turned to the women in scripture to answer the questions she had regarding living life as a woman of God.
Although Morris covers many of the same women studied in other similar books, she often takes a slightly unique perspective. As a mother of a child nearing college, I appreciated her thoughts on the “motherhood” aspect of being a woman. In several of the chapters, she equates how one approaches raising a child to how one should handle giving life to godly dreams and ministries. Ironically, many of the same principles apply to both.
The book covers twelve women and the mentoring she received from each of their stories. Many of the women are familiar, but a few were more obscure. Often I felt like the lessons she gained from each woman’s life were a little different than what you may normally hear. (For example, she used Moses’ sister Mariam as an example of needing to overcome insecurities instead of the normal stepping out on faith.)
I believe the author gives even the experienced Christian woman plenty of new ideas to ponder throughout the book. From her take on submission (“not just for women and definitely not for wimps”) to the idea that “insecure leaders make irrational decisions”, she provides mentoring that would encourage a Christian woman in any stage of her walk.
The book can be read alone and has additional study questions in the back which could be used for a small group study or class. My only criticism is that a couple of times I think she stretched Biblical examples just a little too far to make her point. In general though, the book was faithful to the Bible stories and although somewhat unique, not off base with her conclusions.
I encourage you to read through the book and then consider studying it with your daughters. It would make an excellent book for a mother daughter book club for teens and mature tweens. After your read the book, let me know which lesson made you think the most. I would love for you to share in a comment below how the new insights impacted your walk. In the meantime, which woman in the Bible would be your favorite role model and why?
I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. I have mentioned any concerns I have. I loved this book and will keep it as a reference book for future studies.