Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Becoming Elisabeth Elliot by Ellen Vaughn Becoming Elisabeth Elliot. Elisabeth Elliot was a young missionary in Ecuador when members of a violent Amazonian tribe savagely speared her husband Jim and his four colleagues. Incredibly, prayerfully, Elisabeth took her toddler daughter, snakebite kit, Bible, and journal . . . and lived in the jungle with the Stone- Age people who killed her husband. Compelled by her friendship and forgiveness, many came to faith in Jesus. This courageous, no-nonsense Christian went on to write dozens of books, host a long-running radio show, and speak at conferences all over the world. She was a pillar of coherent, committed faith; a beloved and sometimes controversial icon. In this authorized biography, Becoming Elisabeth Elliot , bestselling author Ellen Vaughn uses Elisabeth’s private, unpublished journals, and candid interviews with her family and friends, to paint the adventures and misadventures God used to shape one of the most influential women in modern church history. It’s the story of a hilarious, sensual, brilliant, witty, self-deprecating, sensitive, radical, and surprisingly relatable person utterly submitted to doing God’s will, no matter how high the cost. For Elisabeth, the central question was not, “How does this make me feel?” but, simply, “is this true?” If so, then the next question was, “what do I need to do about it to obey God?” “My life is on Thy Altar, Lord—for Thee to consume. Set the fire, Father! Bind me with cords of love to the Altar. Hold me there. Let me remember the Cross.” –Elisabeth Elliot, age 21. B&H announces the second volume of the critically acclaimed and bestselling “Becoming Elisabeth Elliot” by Ellen Vaughn. [Nashville, Tenn., March 22, 2021—] B&H Publishing is proud to announce the forthcoming release of “Being Elisabeth Elliot” by Ellen Vaughn the fall of 2022, the second volume of the authorized biography of one of the most influential Christians of the 20th century, Elisabeth Elliot. The first volume, “Becoming Elisabeth Elliot,” also by Vaughn, released in September 2020. The late Elliot (1926-2015) was a prolific Christian author and speaker whose first husband, Jim Elliot (1927-1956), was one of five missionaries killed as they sought to make contact with the Waodani Indians (an unreached people in Ecuador known in that time for their violence). Soon after, Elisabeth and her then two-year-old daughter Valerie moved among the same people, spending two years sharing the Gospel with and befriending those who killed her husband. After her return to the U.S., Elisabeth began a speaking and writing ministry, writing over 25 books and eventually becoming the first female bestselling Christian author and one of the most influential Christians of the 20th century. “New York Times” bestselling author and speaker Vaughn, who has written or co-written 23 books, began working on these volumes over three years ago, doing extensive research to carefully detail Elliot’s life with accuracy. She used Elliot’s private, unpublished journals and conducted candid interviews with her family and friends. The first volume, “Becoming Elisabeth Elliot” debuted at No. 6 on the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association’s New Release Bestseller list and received hundreds of positive reviews within the first few months of its release from top media outlets, social media reviewers, book clubs and bloggers alike. Vaughn was featured on national programs such as “The Eric Metaxas Show” on TBN, “In the Market with Janet Parshall” on Moody Radio, and others, speaking about the book and her experience writing it. “I was so grateful for the overwhelming response to ‘Becoming Elisabeth Elliot: The Early Years,’” said Vaughn. “Happily, this second volume of the rest of the story has everything in it—and more—that evidently refreshed and intrigued readers of the first volume. I was surprised by new twists and turns in Elisabeth’s continuing story. I think readers who think they knew the older Elisabeth will be surprised as well. She was a rebel in the 1960s, for example…but not in the ways that you might think.” Readers of “Becoming Elisabeth Elliot” last saw the young, widowed Elisabeth poised to return from Ecuador to build a new life in the United States, at the end of Volume I. They watched the transition of a young woman who dealt in “certainties” to the more seasoned woman who dealt, far too often, in the realm of the unknown. “Now, being Elisabeth Elliot increasingly meant understanding how much she did not understand,” Vaughn said. “She was indeed certain of a very few things—the good and holy character of God, his redeeming love and merciful faithfulness. She sought her reference point beyond her own experiences, always pondering what she called the ‘impenetrable mystery’ of the interplay between God’s will and human choices.” “Publisher’s Weekly” said in a review of Volume 1, “Even those well-acquainted with Elliot’s works will find fresh perspective and revealing insights here.” “Thanks to Vaughn’s writing prowess, laborious legwork, and extensive use of Elliot’s personal journals, I felt as if I were shadowing Elliot from her birth to her early 30s (Vaughn is writing a second volume to tell the story of Elliot’s later years),” wrote Colleen Chao, on her review published at ERLC.com. “We could not be more thrilled to work with Ellen to share the rest of the story of one of the most influential Christian women in the twentieth century,” said Clarissa Dufresne, associate publisher. “In the first volume we got to show readers how Elisabeth became the woman so many revered. Now, once again through research, interviews, and Elisabeth’s unpublished personal journals, Ellen will weave the behind the scenes view of the rest of Elisabeth’s God-sustained path.” The book is currently slated for publication in September of 2022. For more information, visit bhpublishing.com. Ellen Vaughn is a “New York Times” bestselling author and speaker who has written or co-written 23 books. Former vice president of executive communications at Prison Fellowship, she collaborated with the late Chuck Colson on a number of his seminal works. She speaks at conferences, often travels to interview Christ-followers in hostile parts of the world and serves on the board of directors for ICM, the global church developer. With degrees from Georgetown University and the University of Richmond, Ellen lives in northern Virginia with husband Lee, a pastor of congregational care at McLean Bible Church, a daughter and two grandchildren, and two clueless dogs. She enjoys reading, hiking, drinking coffee and staring pensively at the ocean. B&H Publishing Group, an imprint of Lifeway Christian Resources, is a team of mission minded people with a passion for taking God’s Word to the world. Because we believe Every Word Matters® we seek to provide intentional, Bible-centered content that positively impacts the hearts and minds of people, inspiring them to build a lifelong relationship with Jesus Christ. Among our print and digital releases for the trade, church and academic markets, titles include “ The New York Times” No. 1 bestsellers “The Love Dare” and “The Vow,” No. 1 CBA bestseller “I Am a Church Member,” as well as the newly-revised Christian Standard Bible (CSB) version. Becoming Elisabeth Elliot by Ellen Vaughn–Book Review. Before reading this book, I knew very little about Elisabeth Elliot. Of course, everyone knows the basics of her story — her husband and a number of other missionaries were speared to death by members of a tribe in Ecuador that they hoped to evangelize. Elisabeth and her young daughter went on to meet and eventually live with this tribe for a time. This authorized biography covers only Elisabeth’s younger years — from her childhood until she leaves her missionary work in Ecuador to return to the United States. A second volume which will focus on her later life is forthcoming, and I will be interested in reading that one as well. Elisabeth, or Betty, as she was called by friends and family was a devoted Christian from her youth, but she does not come across as a cookie- cutter saint. She has her trials and struggles — including her own personality (she was a introvert and often came across as very stoic and aloof). Her marriage was also no fairy tale romance. She and Jim loved one another deeply, but endured an extended courtship as Jim struggled with the sense that he should remain single in order to follow God’s call as a missionary without family encumbrances. Of course, she grieved greatly over her young husband’s death, and her time with the Waodani tribe was marred by conflict with a fellow missionary, who refused to allow her to participate in translating the tribe’s language. This is a story of perseverance under great pressure. Elisabeth never gave up listening to God and following Him wherever she felt led. She remained hopeful and faithful amid difficult circumstances. She was both self-reflective and practical — an amazing role model for all Christians. I found myself well able to identify with her feelings and her struggles. Becoming Elisabeth Elliot by Ellen Vaughn. I had the great privilege to have an hour-long visit with Elisabeth Elliot as a young woman. I had read most of her books, with Passion and Purity and The Shadow of the Almighty being among the most influential books I had ever read at that point. I already held Elisabeth in high esteem as a modern-day spiritual giant from whom I had learned much. Ellen Vaughn's new biography of Elisabeth's early life was unputdownable. In reading it, I am even more amazed at the extraordinary Christian woman that she was. This book is one that I will read again and again. The best read of 2020, and I eagerly look forward to Ellen's continuation of Elisabeth's life story in 2021. My thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for an ARC for this, my honest review. Q&A with Ellen. The research process for this book was arduous and fascinating. First, I relied on EE’s own first-hand accounts of her life. The wonderful Valerie Elliot Shepard, Elisabeth’s daughter, loaned me her mom’s journals. I piled them, in order, on a big table in my office. There was her baby book from 1926, with vintage black-and-white photographs and Elisabeth’s mother’s careful notations about her little blond baby’s development. There was a stubby hardback diary from 1938, filled with penciled entries from the year Elisabeth was 11. On the front it declared, in all caps: THIS DIARY IS ABSOLUTELY PRIVATE TO ALL BOYS. WOMEN, GIRLS AND MEN CAN READ IT. There were leather-bound volumes from high school, college, EE’s early missionary life, her marriage to Jim Elliot, the birth of their daughter, the earnest outpouring of excitement about Jim’s plan to reach the Waodani with his friends . . . and then the discovery that he had been savagely speared to death. The journals roll on, recounting the unspooling of a life for decades and decades and decades. I felt like an archeologist, or a time traveler, reading, in real time, Elisabeth’s most private thoughts. She didn’t know what was coming next in her story—but I did. Through the pages of those beautifully-written journals, I carried her life around in my head all the time. It was surreal. The second research reservoir was my interviews with EE’s family and close friends. I was immeasurably enriched forever by getting to know these new friends. They were wise, funny, honest, and helped me know EE through their varied experiences with her over the years. Third, my research took me from my home near Washington, D.C. to the great eastern jungle of Ecuador’s Amazon rainforest. I was able to live among a Waodani clan for a few days. To get to them, I flew into Quito, took a bus to Shell, and then was blessed to buzz in a tiny plane over the thick, green jungle. From the air it looked like a vast sea of broccoli. Brown tributaries of the Amazon snaked through the green expanse. We landed on a soggy grass landing strip on a Band-Aid-sized clearing in the jungle. Mud flew in great gobs over the windshield as we rocked and sputtered to a stop. Wonderful Waodani hosts welcomed us, then took us on a trek through the jungle for several hours, then onto long, slender canoes, and then we arrived at the Waodani settlement. Grass huts, hammocks for sleeping, the most beautiful outhouse in the Amazon, no electricity, no connectivity, no devices: it was wonderful. Hunters would go out each day. One day they came back with a wild boar. The next day they got a Rodent of Unusual Size. The next day it was a big, furry, odiferous monkey. I became a vegetarian for the week. I can’t tell you how extraordinary it was to sit by the fire at night with Mincaye. He was young when he and other Waodani warriors killed Jim Elliot, Nate Saint, Ed McCully, Pete Fleming, and Roger Youderian. He knew nothing about Jesus on that bloody day in 1956. By the time I met him, Mincaye was in his early nineties. He came to know and love Jesus many years ago. He was one of the leaders among the Waodani believers. He made me a spear. Watching him carefully hone the knife-sharp tip of that eight-foot weapon, I thought of the day he and his fellow tribesmen sharpened their spears to kill the missionaries . . . and now, here he was, a brother in Christ. Mincaye died just a few months ago. So now he’s in Heaven with Jim and Elisabeth Elliot, and so many others we all love! What makes this book different from the many others that have been written on the Elliots? As I understand it, while there are lots of Jim Elliot bios, there is as yet no other biography of EE, except one that was written for juvenile readers. What makes this book unique from any other treatments before or after is the fact that this is the authorized biography designated by EE’s family and closest friends, so I was uniquely entrusted with EE’s private journals, which contain provocative, poignant, and surprising material. How has Elisabeth Elliot’s story affected your faith? How do you think her story can affect others today? You know, Michelangelo said that every block of stone has a statue within; the task of the sculptor is to discover it. As her biographer, my stone was the body of Betty’s writings and the testimonies of those who knew her. An immense monolith. I wasn’t chipping with a chisel. I was shaving away millions of words. As I did so, the shape of the woman began to emerge. To change the image, I’d gaze at the tiny, faded handwriting filling the thin pages of Betty’s old journals, steeping in her thoughts as if I was water and she was a teabag. As I absorbed her essence, I found I wasn’t just carrying around my own life, which was heavy enough at the time. In the strangest way, I was carrying around Elisabeth Elliot’s life, every day. I was not a biographer, but a steward, with a mundane but sacred task. Write the story. Turning the thin pages of her journals, I knew the end of that story. The young Elisabeth, writing, did not. I wanted to warn her, to shout across the decades to prepare for the storm. Get ready! The hurricane is coming! It’s a mercy that none of us knows what is coming. This was reinforced by my own experiences as I wrote this book. My own husband’s rare brain cancer had been quiet for years. Then, even as I worked away, peering with a magnifying glass, as if I was an archeologist, at Betty’s closely-written journals, Lee developed new, small tumors. He had Gamma Knife surgery. Several times. Months later, he began acting strangely. Pressure in his brain. Necrosis, from the proton radiation that had saved his life years earlier. Then a raging infection surged, promising to kill him. Massive emergency brain surgery, guarded condition. He almost died three times. So I found myself reading Betty Elliot’s journals and jotting notes about her life while in operating room waiting areas, intensive care units, rehab facilities, and by any number of hospital beds. I carried Betty’s loss of Jim even as my own loss of Lee was not only theoretical, but seemingly imminent. Yet it was good. By this I mean that the truths that carried Betty Elliot through her particular storms carried me through mine. I belong to God. He is faithful. His words are true. And transformation—the ultimate Springtime—already planted, is coming. So, in spite of our very different personalities, habits, or preferences, this sister’s story absolutely strengthened my own. And that is my hope for any reader, whatever his or her situation may be. What do you want the reader to take away from this book? I want the reader to have a great time. I want the reader to know he or she is not alone. I want the reader to laugh and weep and give this book to friends; there is something inherently helpful about identifying with the story of another human being on life’s strange and often rocky journey, seeking God right in the midst of the mess. A good book is a strengthening reminder, particularly in times of social distancing, that we’re not isolated from each other, and we are never isolated from God. This book focuses on the early years of Elisabeth’s life. Why split the biography into two volumes? Her life demanded it. Some people assume that EE was born middle-aged and twice widowed, because her public life emerged in that season of her life. But how did she become that person? Becoming Elisabeth Elliot tells the twisted tale of the events God used to shape an idealistic, rule-following young woman who was pretty performance-driven into a person who pursued Christ, not other people’s approval. We’re all in the process of becoming, all through life’s journey; this book about the young EE stands alone and tells about her beginnings. The next volume tells the rest of the story! What parts of Elisabeth’s story did you find yourself relating to the most? Most of us, if we’re honest, can laugh and identify with a fair amount of social awkwardness and the ridiculous things that pop into our brains beyond our control. I identified with Betty; like her, I’m both mystical and practical. In my current situation, in a very volatile world, like everyone else, and in my private situation that feels out of control, with my husband just diagnosed with “innumerable” tiny malignant brain tumors, the question is not, “how do I feel,” but what I am going to do? EE helped me simplify. I am going to trust God and throw myself on Him like when I had a day off in Ecuador and flew Superman style across a high mountain gorge on a zip line, a waterfall spilling tons of water below. And I am going to do the next right thing. God’s grace and love and presence give us enough sustenance and guidance needed, one step at a time, one day at a time. And somehow, in those two things, I have had absolute, supernatural peace. Oh, also, I think many of us can relate to EE’s upbringing. Many of us who grew up in Christian homes had to make the transition between an unquestioning sort of rule- oriented acceptance of our parents’ faith to our own intimate connection with Jesus. Some leave faith altogether. Betty Elliot had to see and reject legalism, glossy religiosity, platitudes, and “triumphal, victorious” missionary stories in favor of an authentic faith that was about Jesus, not churchianity. Elisabeth Elliot wrote multiple biographies herself. Did you find this to be a benefit or added challenge to your work? The biographies themselves were not particularly helpful, but what she had to say about how a writer approaches such a task was stellar. The process of writing a biography, of course, is much more than being granted permission to do so from your subject’s family, particularly with a story like Elisabeth Elliot’s that is well known by some and completely unknown to others. Some will disagree with what I omit about EE; others will not be happy with what I include. The earnest biographer is doomed. But in this, I take my marching orders from Elisabeth. Regarding her biography of a missionary named Kenneth Strachan, she said, “And so I began—trying to discover, not to construct, the truth about this man. The careless—apparently, at times, haphazard—shape of the life unfolded itself before my eyes through his own writings and the testimony of those who knew him….Again and again I found myself tempted to ask what my readers would want this man to be, or what I wanted him to be, or what he himself thought he was—and I had to ignore all such questions in favor of the one relevant consideration: Is this true? Is this how it really was? And of course this is the question that any writer, of any kind of literature, has to be asking all the time.” “I have tried to lay bare the facts of the case, answering the question, Is this what he was? with as much truthfulness, sympathy, and clarity, as I possess.” So, for me, as I tried to “lay bare the facts of the case,” I relied on EE’s journals, letters, books, friends, family, acquaintances, those who liked her, those who didn’t, to fill out a biographical picture of Elisabeth Elliot. A biography, particularly a narrative biography like this one, isn’t a series of photographs, which capture moments in time. It is more like a portrait, which captures enduring, recognizable truth about a human being. I sought the truth about a fellow pilgrim on life’s journey, one who has gone before us, and tried to paint a verbal portrait of Elisabeth Elliot in both her glories and her humanity. It’s not a hagiography, an “expose,” or an analysis of her theological or social views. It’s a story: one I tried to tell with as much truthfulness, sympathy, clarity—and charity—as I possess.