God’s Battle Axe – Elisabeth Elliot

The feature story for the month centres on the life and ministry of Elisabeth Elliot, a Christian author and missionary. She was born on December 27, 1926 in Brussels, Belgium. Her parents were also missionaries. Before she was a year old, they moved to Germantown, Pennsylvania, United States of America. Her family grew when they came to America with additional five children born there. While they lived in Germantown, Elisabeth’s father was the editor of the Sunday School Times, a weekly journal that featured Sunday school lessons used in churches across the country.

Elisabeth attended Wheaton College where she studied Greek. This was to prepare her to translate the Bible for the remote regions of the world. While at the College, she met Jim Elliot, an aspiring missionary. After her graduation, she went on a missionary expedition to Ecuador along with Elliot and other students from the institution. In the first year of their missionary journey, Jim and Elisabeth worked in different regions of Ecuador.

         A year after entering the country, Jim joined Elisabeth to minister to the Quichua Indian tribe. In 1953, they married and continued to serve there. They had a daughter, Valerie before Auca tribesmen killed Elliot and four of his ministry partners.

Despite the tragedy, Elisabeth refused to give up on the people of that tribe. She continued to live in the region with her daughter and Rachel Saint, the sister of one of the missionaries killed by the Auca tribesmen. They however operated from neighbouring Quichua tribe. They also provided accommodation for two Auca women who were able to provide them with information on why Elliot and his partners were murdered. The women revealed that the tribesmen were afraid that the missionaries would take away their freedom.

     With that understanding, Elisabeth and Rachel were able to visit Auca people and build relationships with them. They eventually led some of them to the Lord. The tribesmen were impressed and disarmed by the forgiveness and grace that Elisabeth and Rachael extended to them.

Elisabeth wrote two books while in Ecuador in which she narrated her experiences with the natives, particularly Elliot’s death. In one of the books titled, Through the Gates of Splendour, she gave an account of her and Elliot’s encounters with the Auca tribe.

After spending two years with the Auca tribe, she returned to America with her daughter in 1963. She later met and married Addison Leitch, a professor at Gordon Conwell University in 1969. After their marriage, they toured the United States on speaking engagements, to inspire other Christians to live their lives with passion for Christ. Four years after they were married, Adison died of cancer in 1973. Thereafter, the widow took in two male lodgers. One of them, Lars Gren later married her, while his unnamed companion married her daughter Valerie. On June 15, 2015 at age 89, Elisabeth went home to be with her Lord.

What strikes me about her story is the depth of her forgiveness for the people who killed her husband. She proved to those who question the applicability of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount that believers could indeed turn the other cheek when they are mistreated. It takes a saint that is totally yielded to God and His will to extend that kind of mercy to murderers, especially those who killed her loved one. Her selflessness and sacrifice opened the door for many of the natives to surrender their lives to Jesus. May the Lord help us to give up this kind of fragrance in our relationship with people around us.

**** Culled from Elisabeth Elliot Biography, https://www.inspirationalchirstians.org.