Faithful Women and Their Extraordinary God by Noël Piper
Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2005, pp. 44-47.
In her book shown above, John Piper’s wife, Noël, does a good job telling us about the lives of five outstanding Christian women, highlighting their courage, dedication, and determination in fulfilling their calling from God. (Used copies of book available on Amazon.com)
How many of their names do you recognize? Sarah Edwards, Lilias Trotter, Gladys Aylward, Esther Ahn Kim, and Helen Roseveare. I had only heard of Sarah and Gladys until my husband found Piper’s book on the shelf at the Baptist apartment where he stayed at a discounted rate when I was hospitalized last summer for an extended time. Allan brought me the book to read; it was very encouraging to read just after brain surgery. (He’s always looking out for me!!)
Here I am featuring some thoughts from Lilias Trotter’s life, but I recommend the entire book. She left England in the late 1800s to work with Muslim women in Algiers, Algeria. Some of the saddest words of all came from some of the women who told Lilias that God did not love them, just the men. She labored on for years to convince them otherwise.
Trotter’s soul searching before leaving speaks to all of us, especially people with outstanding talents. Victorian England’s famous art critic, John Ruskin, told Lilias she could be famous if she applied herself to her art. But she had a parallel passion in her life, her call to ministry.
“She knew it isn’t possible to be wholly consumed twice. It is not possible to give yourself totally to two different masters…it is possible that one of the passions could become servant to the other. Still, she had to decide which passion would become the master of the other.” (p. 45)
Her advice is worth quoting verbatim:
Never has it been so easy to live in half a dozen good harmless worlds at once–art, music, social science, games, motoring, the following of some profession, and so on. And between them we run the risk of drifting about, the “good” hiding the “best.”…
It is easy to find out whether our lives are focused, and if so, where the focus lies. Where do our thoughts settle when consciousness comes back in the morning? Where do they swing back when the pressure is off during the day?...Dare to have it out with God...and ask Him to show you whether or not all is focused on Christ and His glory… (emphasis mine)
How do we bring things to a focus in the world of optics? Not by looking at the things to be dropped, but by looking at the one point that is to be brought out. Turn your soul’s vision to Jesus, and look and look at Him, and a strange dimness will come over all that is apart from Him. (pp. 46-47)
Because she focused on women in need, she played a role in establishing a YWCA unit in England and a ministry to Muslim women that continues to this day. What if some modern celebrities with roots of devotion to the Lord had heard her advice and heeded it? Their lives would not have ended in tragedy. Does it matter that Lilias was “almost famous” for her art, as one biography says? She chose her Master well.
Matthew 6:24 “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.”
FURTHER RESEARCH: See Google and YouTube results of “Lilias Trotter.” Her art work can be seen online, and there are YouTube movies of her life available. (One YouTube rendition of “Turn Your Eyes upon Jesus” credit Trotter as the co-author of this well-known hymn, but my hymn books do not.)
Thank you, Noel Piper.
John & Noël Piper