About the Book
"When Mothers Pray" by Nicholas Duncan-Williams explores the power of a mother's prayers in shaping the spiritual and physical well-being of their children. The author shares personal anecdotes and biblical teachings to demonstrate the effectiveness and importance of a mother's prayers in influencing the lives of their loved ones. The book highlights the transformative impact of prayer and encourages mothers to trust in God's faithfulness and promises.
Aimee Semple McPherson
Aimee Semple McPherson was born on Oct. 9, 1890, on a farm in Salford Ontario, Canada. Her father, James Kennedy, was a farmer and came from a Methodist background. Her mother, Mildred, known as “Millie,” came from a Salvation Army background.
Although she was raised in a Christian home, she began to question the Bible during her teen years.
When she was 17, she attended a revival Pentecostal meeting presented by evangelist Robert Semple, where she heard the message of repentance. He also spoke of baptism in the Holy Spirit, an experience for which she hungered. After receiving the infilling of the Holy Spirit, she also was filled with a great love and compassion for souls and a fervent passion to serve the Lord throughout her whole life.
The meeting Aimee attended changed her life not only spiritually but also romantically. The evangelist Robert Semple later become Aimee’s husband. They were married when she was 18. Their ministry desires were compatible. After their ministry trips in Chicago and the Ingersoll area, they headed to China as missionaries.
In 1910 while in China, Robert and Aimee contracted Malaria within months of arriving in Hong Kong. Robert didn’t survive, leaving Aimee pregnant and a widow at 19. When her daughter, Roberta Star, was a month old, Aimee returned to United States to raise her. Aimee and Roberta lived in New York with Aimee’s mother.
She assisted her mother raising money for the Salvation Army. It was there she met and married a Christian businessman named Harold McPherson. They had a son, Rolf Kennedy McPherson. After a decline in health, two major surgeries and a near-death experience, God asked her one last time, “Now, will you go?” She answered yes to God’s call and almost immediately was healed. She never again questioned the call to preach the gospel.
Aimee is known for founding the Foursquare Gospel Church in 1918. She also was a woman ahead of her time, possessing boldness in her speaking ability and creative ways to communicate the gospel.
The name Foursquare Gospel originated from the Book of Ezekiel. It represents the four phases of the gospel of Jesus Christ. In the face of the Man, she saw Jesus our Saviour. In the face of the lion, she saw Jesus the mighty Baptiser with the Holy Spirit and fire. In the face of the ox, she saw Jesus the Great Burden Bearer. In the face of an eagle, she saw Jesus the coming King, who will return in power and glory. It was, in Aimee’s opinion, “a perfect gospel. A complete gospel for body, for spirit and for eternity.”
Her ministry was dynamic. She witnessed thousands saved and healed during her evangelistic meetings. Being creative and theatrical, Aimee used drama, music and opera to appeal to the audience. Bands, choirs and other crowd-pleasing touches enhanced her dynamic preaching. Though she was well-versed in the Bible, Aimee’s success wasn’t based on her knowledge, but rather the delivery of her messages.
She also was known as a faith healer, with claims of physical healing occurring during her meetings. Her faith healing demonstrations were written about extensively in the media, as they were a large focus of her early ministry. Aimee was an evangelistic pioneer, determined to spread the message of the Pentecostal faith, and used her fervour and flamboyance to win a huge following.
She had achieved what no one had yet done in ministry, which was to build a 5,000-seat auditorium in an influential area of Los Angeles. This paved the way for other female evangelists during a time when women were not accepted in the pulpit. She also launched the first Christian radio station and established a Bible college. By 1917, she had started her own magazine The Bridal Call, for which she wrote many articles about women’s roles in religion; she portrayed the link between Christians and Jesus as a marriage bond.
Jan. 1, 1923, the new Angelus Temple was opened in a flamboyant style. Aimee was seated on a red velvet throne dressed in a nurse’s uniform and cape. Accompanying her were 200 singers, three bands, two orchestras and six quartets. The Angelus Temple was featured on a float in Pasadena’s Tournament of Roses parade, while the extravagant dedication service was given full coverage in The New York Times. What became the home of The Church of the Foursquare Gospel filled four times each Sunday and twice weekly. Aimee also ministered at highly sought-after healing services during the week.
Reporters marveled at her oral skills, saying, “Never did I hear such language from a human being. Without one moment’s intermission, she would talk from an hour to an hour and a half, holding her audience spellbound.” Rather than using fire-and-brimstone preaching, Aimee resorted to a style of joyous celebration, representing the loving face of God.
She also brought old-time religion into the modern age, using illustrated sermons to help people understand the gospel better. Also, stage productions were incorporated, drawing people who usual didn’t attend church. In an era prior to television, these services proved entertaining, and she used this method to present the message of salvation through faith in Jesus.
Aimee welcomed all walks of life. She preached to the high class of society, as well as the poor and disadvantaged. She treated everyone equally regardless of race, gender or status.
In the 1920s, Aimee became a well-known voice among civic leaders, politicians, actors and actresses, and pastors from various denominations. Her sermons were reprinted in hundreds of newspapers in Canada, the United States and Mexico and were read by millions. In 1927, she opened a commissary to feed the marginalized and supply them with clothing and other necessities. Aimee set up a 24/7 soup kitchen at her temple in 1936 to help families through the Great Depression .She also became involved with war bond rallies and linked religion to patriotism in her sermons when America joined the Second World War in 1941.
Aimee’s legacy is threefold. Using the dramatic arts to reach the lost (an innovative tool) and the latest technology to spread the gospel. She reached out to the poor, helping thousands in the Los Angeles area who were starving. She taught a full-gospel message and regularly saw thousands of healings and miracles in her meetings.
Aimee passed away due to an accidental overdose in 1944 and was buried in Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in California. Her son, Rolf, has kept her memory and ministry alive by carrying the ministry for 40 four years. The Foursquare church is still standing strong with 8 million members worldwide.
The Silent Marriage-Killer
Most Christian couples would not list shame  as one of the top struggles in their marriage. However, in almost a decade of counseling, I’ve seen very few marriages that aren’t hampered by shame on some level. It’s just not often the first thing that’s identified, but it underlies so many other common struggles, especially communication and sex. How can you know if this silent marriage-killer is present in your relationship? Consider the following self-evaluative questions: Are there topics that have become off-limits because you or your spouse get too prickly, defensive, or embarrassed? Can you share embarrassing stories or painful struggles with your spouse and expect empathy, or would you be more likely to receive further ridicule or condemnation? Do you talk openly about your failures, past and present? Is your spouse the first person you turn to for support, comfort, or celebration? And does your spouse do the same to you? When you confront sin in your spouse, do you do so with gentleness and humility as a fellow struggler, or with the posture of one who would never sin in that way ? How comfortable are you in your sexual relationship? Do you share your emotions with your spouse and vice versa? When conflicts arise between you, are you able to resolve them, or do you seem to stall out frequently when one of you withdraws indefinitely? Do you regularly share with each other what God is teaching you through his word, church, and your personal devotional life? Do you pray together? Do you confess your sins to one another as needed, as often as sin arises? Would you prefer not to talk about sin at all, because it’s just too uncomfortable for both of you? None of us have a perfect marriage, or should expect it, but what holds us back too often is the presence of shame — the fear that I will be rejected if I am vulnerable with you. The way to fight shame, and be part of shame’s healing for one another, is to risk openness in these areas where we want to hide from one another. Help Your Spouse Heal We may have been hiding like Adam and Eve since the garden of Eden, but the hope is that God covers our shame and enables us to help cover one another’s shame. If redeemed marital intimacy is to be naked and unashamed (Genesis 2:25), the way to move towards this goal is to become part of healing shame for each other. We have the opportunity to do this in a more powerful way for our spouse than anyone else. We have the unique chance to see them at their most vulnerable, and to bestow grace and compassion instead of judgment and rejection. And the only way we can do this for one another is as we experience this grace from God to us in Jesus Christ. In Christ, we realize that on our own we stand unclothed before God — that our best attempts at righteousness, with the help of his Spirit, are like filthy rags — but that he has clothed us with the perfect righteousness of his own Son, the God-man, so that there is no condemnation nor any threat of separation from God’s love (Romans 8:1, 38–39). Name the Shame Emboldened by the gospel, and empowered by the Spirit, we then can be a reflection of this covering and healing grace for our spouse. We can begin by acknowledging (naming) the areas where shame has held us back from unashamed intimacy in our marriage. Start with yourself. Where have you unwittingly shamed your spouse? Name this, and express that you want to be a place of refuge and safety for your spouse from  the shame instead of a contributor to it. Then with gentleness and love, speak about ways you’ve felt shame from your spouse, and offer a few practical ways that he or she could grow in becoming a safe place for you. For example, you might start with, “I have realized how much I tend to offer advice before I listen when you’re discussing a problem from work or home with me. I bet this contributes to a sense that I’m not always a safe person for you to go to when you’re struggling. I want to do better — will you help me?” You Are a Team Then, you could say something like the following to address the ways you’ve experienced shame from your spouse: “When you criticize [the meal I cooked/or my appearance/or how I haven’t been a spiritual leader in our relationship], it makes me doubt my value and your love. I know this isn’t what you mean, but it’s how my own struggle with shame twists your words. It would be great for you to help me fight against shame by refraining from such criticism and affirming your love for me. I’m well aware of the problem, and I want to do better in this area, but what will help me the most is to know that you’re praying with me and for me and that you support me through the struggle.” Remember, you and your spouse are a team. God has joined you together closer than any other human relationship will or can be, and naked and unashamed intimacy is how he created marriage to be. Through the empowering grace of Jesus Christ, we can walk towards more of this created intention of unashamed intimacy together.
