Devotedly: The Personal Letters and Love Story of Jim and Elisabeth Elliot

What would it look like to lay down your feelings, attractions, and desires to live a life wholly surrendered to God? Devotedly: The Personal Letters and Love Story of Jim and Elisabeth Elliot gives readers a beautiful image of the sacrifice and reward one can experience as a result of living this way. 

This book includes the personal journals and letters of Jim and Elisabeth Elliot. Their writings demonstrate how fervently they desired to follow hard after Christ and to not stray from His will for their lives. Further, their journals and letters demonstrate the struggle they encountered as they fell in love with one another. Since they both firmly believed that God had called them to singleness, they struggled to reconcile the feelings and attractions they developed with their desire to whole-heartedly follow God's call for their life.

He has given me direction and purpose. I shall not turn aside, even if it be for marriage, unless that is a part of His perfect will. God forbid that I should be satisfied with anything short of His highest. 

~ Elisabeth Howard (Elliot), March 7, 1948

(Devotedly, Pg. 8)

Oh, my heart. I cannot even begin to express how much I love this book. Elisabeth Elliot has been one of my favorite authors since I read her book Passion and Purity a few years ago. The truth that she speaks is raw and convicting, compelling and inspiring. Devotedly, which was so beautifully put together by her daughter, Valerie Elliot Shepard, provides a behind-the-scenes look to the truths written in Passion and Purity. 

As I read this book, I have been so incredibly challenged. This story is about two young people who were so deeply in love with Christ they prayed that they be removed from the other's mind so as to not come between the other and Christ. They were willing to lay down their desires in order to fully serve Christ. They shared with each other their feelings toward one another, but then agreed that they could not act on them because they believed they were called to live a single life serving God and others. 

Would I be so willing? 

Am I chasing after God the way I need to be? 

If I felt that God was calling me to singleness for the rest of my life and I met someone that I fell in love with, would I be willing to surrender that man and all of my feelings and desires so that I could obey God? 

Would I? Would you?

The beauty of this book is that we are able to see how God rewards those who choose to love and obey Him. God gave Jim and Elisabeth Elliot the desires of their heart because they had aligned their hearts with His. 

I absolutely recommend this book. In fact, I would strongly encourage young Christian adults to read this book and to take it to heart. Not everyone's story will look this way, but it is a beautiful, thought-provoking story that should be shared. The love story captured here is so much more than just between a man and a woman; it is the story of their love for Christ and for others. 

Their story never stops capturing my heart. The Lord took my father's personality, so brash and bold - a young man who told his fellow students on campus they needed a kick in the pants to get to the mission field - who admonished them for not swearing off dating, for not realizing they were in college to "study to show themselves approved unto God" - and somehow married his gospel zeal with a woman's love, without decreasing his passion for souls. The Lord also took my mother's personality and intellect, gave her love for such a man, challenged her to restrain it to the level of true Christian love between friends, yet crowned her willingness to absolutely trust Him by giving her not only more of Himself but also giving her my father, the other great desire of her heart.

~ Valerie Elliot Shepard, Devotedly pg. 275

* I received a copy of this book for free from B&H Publishers in exchange for my honest review.