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Free Church Women’s Ministry, Edited by Janet Wootton, published by Epworth Press pp 200 ISBN 978-0-7162-0606-4 £16.99
Rarely told and rarely heard, this is the story of Free Church Women’s Ministry. Through six informed articles and eleven personal stories, This is Our Story unfolds, offering with passion and rage, beauty and pain a profound insight into women’s ministry within our traditions. It is a celebration; but it pulls no punches, recognising how precarious the situation is still.
The hymn, ‘This is my story, this is my song, praising my Saviour all the day long,’ gives the title and indicates the faith found in the stories. The contributors offer a range of personal experience, from those with long service and those who are just setting out; and reflect too the richness of a multicultural church, by bringing a breadth of cultural and ethnic viewpoints.
There is something for everyone here. Articles revealing historical perspectives on how women’s ministry has been received or understood. Jane Craske examines the points at which debates occur and the factors disabling women seeking to minister.
There is profound theological reflection on the nature of women’s leadership. Kirsty Thorpe traces a line of women church leaders, stretching from women of the Bible to contemporary women, remarking: ‘If discipleship could be said to be the great adventure... then the lifetime of Jesus was truly a highpoint for women’s ministry.’
Preaching, at the heart of much Free Church worship, is discussed by John Drane and Olive M. Fleming Drane. They ask: ‘As we preach, should we begin with abstract ideas, or with human experience?’
Cham Kaur-Mann tells of women’s participation in Sikhism, actively alongside men; then as a Christian convert how her church experience in ‘a time-warp’ made her feel like an ‘observer’ in a Victorian drama. She asks, ‘Was my conversion a mistake?’
I was encouraged by honest, heart-felt story-telling; and inspired by the courage and determination of remarkable women living out God-called creative and far-reaching ministries. I felt anger and frustration too at the way women have often been treated.
This is a book to be read and returned to; a reference book that not only informs, but entices us to further reading and study. And it is a story book, with moments when I found myself uttering that deep-in-the-middle ‘Yes!’...for it made connections, resonated with my experience and gave new insight for approaching my own context.
This is Our story is for contemporary women in ministry, women in training and perhaps some elders and members. But it needs to be read by anyone concerned for who we are today as God’s people, women and men together.
Rosemary Tusting
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