Jim Elliot
EARLY LIFE
Jim Elliot began his life in Portland, Oregon in the USA. His mother, Clara, was a chiropractor and his father, Fred, was a minister. They married and settled in Seattle, WA where they welcomed their first son, Robert in 1921.
Later they relocated the family to Portland where Herbert arrived in 1924, Jim in 1927, and Jane in 1932.
Jim knew Christ from an early age and was never afraid to speak about Him to his friends. At age six Jim told his mother, âNow, mama, the Lord Jesus can come whenever He wants. He could take our whole family because Iâm saved now, and Jane is too young to know Him yet.â
THE YEARS THAT CEMENTED HIS DESIRE TO SERVE THE LORD IN MISSIONS
Jim entered Benson Polytechnic High School in 1941. He carried a small Bible with him and, an excellent speaker; he was often found speaking out for Christ. He and his friends were not afraid to step out and find adventure. One thing Jim didnât have time for in those early years were girls. He was once quoted as telling a friend, âDomesticated males arenât much use for adventure.â
In 1945 Jim traveled to Wheaton, IL to attend Wheaton College. His main goal while there was to devote himself to God. He recognized the importance of discipline in pursuing this goal. He would start each morning with prayer and Bible study. In his journal he wrote, âNone of it gets to be âold stuffâ for it is Christ in print, the Living Word. We wouldnât think of rising in the morning without a face-wash, but we often neglect the purgative cleansing of the Word of the Lord. It wakes us up to our responsibility.â
Jimâs desire to serve God by taking His gospel to unreached people of the world began to grow while at Wheaton. The summer of 1947 found him in Mexico and that time influenced his decision to minister in Central America after he finished college.
Jim met Elisabeth Howard during his third year at Wheaton. He did ask her for a date which she accepted and then later cancelled. They spent the next years as friends and after she finished at Wheaton they continued to correspond. As they came to know each other there was an attraction, but Jim felt he needed to unencumbered by worldly concerns in order to devote himself completely to God.
In addition to his hope to one day travel to a foreign country to share Christ with the unchurched of the world, he also felt the need to share with people in the United States. On Sundays while at Wheaton he would often ride the train into Chicago and talk to people in the train station about Christ. He often felt ineffective in his work as the times of knowingly leading people to Christ were few. He once wrote, âNo fruit yet. Why is that Iâm so unproductive? I cannot recall leading more than one or two into the kingdom. Surely this is not the manifestation of the power of the Resurrection. I feel as Rachel, âGive me children, or else I die.ââ
After college with no clear answer as to working for the Lord in a foreign country, Jim returned home to Portland. He continued his disciplined Bible study as well as correspondence with Elisabeth Howard whom he called Betty.
They both felt a strong attraction to each other during this time, but also felt that the Lord may have been calling them to be unmarried as they served Him.
In June of 1950 he travelled to Oklahoma to attend the Summer Institute of Linguistics. There he learned how to study unwritten languages. He was able to work with a missionary to the Quichuas of the Ecuadorian jungle. Because of these lessons he began to pray for guidance about going to Ecuador and later felt compelled to answer the call there.
Elisabeth Elliot wrote in Shadow of the Almighty:
âThe breadth of Jimâs vision is suggested in this entry from the journal:
August 9. âGod just now gave me faith to ask for another young man to go, perhaps not this fall, but soon, to join the ranks in the lowlands of eastern Ecuador. There we must learn: 1) Spanish and Quichua, 2) each other, 3) the jungle and independence, and 4) God and Godâs way of approach to the highland Quichua. From thence, by His great hand, we must move to the Ecuadorian highlands with several young Indians each, and begin work among the 800,000 highlanders. If God tarries, the natives must be taught to spread southward with the message of the reigning Christ, establishing New Testament groups as they go. Thence the Word must go south into Peru and Bolivia. The Quichuas must be reached for God! Enough for policy. Now for prayer and practice.
THE ECUADOR YEARS
In February 1952 Jim finally left America to travel to Ecuador with Pete Fleming. In May Elisabeth moved to Quito and though they didnât feel the need to get engaged she and Jim did begin a courtship.
In August Jim left Elisabeth in Quito and travelled with Pete to Shell Mera. At the Mission Aviation Fellowship headquarters in Shell Mera, Jim and Pete learned more about the Acua Indians, a people group that was largely unreached and very savage.
Leaving Shell Mera, Pete and Jim moved on to Shandia where Jim was captivated by the Quichua. He felt very strongly that this was exactly where God intended for him to work to spread the Gospel.
While Jim was in Shandia, Elisabeth was working to learn more about the Colorado Indians near Santa Domingo. In January of 1953 he went to Quito and she met him there and they were finally engaged. They married in October of that year and their only child Valerie was born in 1955.
They settled in Shandia and continued their work with the Quichua Indians. It was Jimâs desire to be able to reach the Waodoni tribe that lived deep in the jungles and had little contact with the outside world. A Waodoni woman who had left the tribe was taken in by the missionaries and helped them to learn the language.
Jim, along with Pete, Ed McCully, Roger Youderian, and their pilot Nate Saint began to search by plane in hopes of finding a way to contact the Waodoni. The found a sandbar in the middle of the Curaray River that worked as a landing strip for the plane and it was there that they first made contact with the Waodoni. They were elated to be able to finally be able to attempt to share the love of Christ with this people group.
After their first meeting, one of the tribe, a man they called George lied to the tribe about the menâs intentions. This lie led the Waodoni warriors to plan an attack for when the missionaries returned. The men did return on January 8, 1956 and were surprised by ten members of the tribe who massacred the missionaries.
Jimâs short life that was filled with the desire to share Godâs love can be summed up by a quote that is attributed to him. âHe is no fool who gives that which he cannot keep, to gain what he cannot lose.â
When I (Still) Donât Desire God
Itâs been fifteen years since I wrote When I Donât Desire God: How to Fight for Joy . I wrote it because hundreds of people who hear the message of Christian Hedonism with hope drift into discouragement because they donât have the joy in God that they know they should. Christian Hedonism says that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him . Which makes matters worse if that satisfaction is missing. Thatâs why I wrote the book. I have been asked, What would I say now, with the accumulated wisdom of 72 years, to those still  struggling to âdelight yourself in the Lordâ (Psalm 37:4)? This is not theoretical for me. Not only do I share the struggle, but I have conversations with real people struggling like this. I followed up one such conversation recently with an email. Iâm going to share that with you below. But first a caution. Wisdom for the Darkness Whether we can help someone struggling with joylessness in the Christian life depends not primarily on the quantity of wisdom we have accumulated over the years, but on how we apply the truth we have, and whether the Spirit of God turns that truth into life and freedom and joy. âWhen the darkness of uncertainty and fear hangs over you, donât let go of the One you knew in the light.â I am not minimizing the value of accumulated wisdom. The Old Testament sage commands, â Get  wisdomâ (Proverbs 4:7). Jesus â increased  in wisdomâ (Luke 2:52). Paul prays that we would be â filled  with spiritual wisdomâ (Colossians 1:9). We know that in Christ âare hidden all the treasures of wisdomâ (Colossians 2:3). Paul calls us to admonish each other âin all wisdomâ (Colossians 3:16). James tells us that if we âlack wisdom,â we should ask for it from God (James 1:5). For there is a âwisdom that comes down from aboveâ (James 3:17). We can never get too much wisdom. But my point is that if you are 30 instead of 70, you should not be intimidated or paralyzed by the fact that you still have 40 years of wisdom accumulation in front of you. As you read your Bible tomorrow morning, praying for supernatural insight, God may grant you a glimpse of some precious truth that later in the day will be exactly the truth that your struggling friend needs. Am I Beyond Hope? After the conversation that I had recently with my friend, he followed up with an email. He was still in distress. What do you say when you feel you have said all you know to say â in the book and in conversation? One answer is this: Donât think that you need the  tailor-made answer to the presenting problem. Instead, realize that any  precious biblical truth that has ministered deeply to you, though it may seem irrelevant to your friendâs situation, may be more helpful than you realize. Just go ahead and overflow from your morning devotions. They will know the truth (which may seem random to us), and the truth may set them free. You also can give the sober counsel that struggling has hope of success, but forsaking the struggle does not. I think it is a mistake to give unqualified assurance to a struggler when you do not know if they are born again. You hope they are. They hope they are. But you are not God. And they are in a season of darkness. What you do know beyond doubt is: if they finally abandon Christ and hope, there is no hope. âStruggling has hope of success, but forsaking the struggle does not.â So I thought it might be helpful to share with you how I responded to my friendâs email. Keep in mind that his struggle has to do with patterns of repeated sin which make him feel hopeless about ever getting victory. These failures leave him feeling distant from God and, at times, wondering if he is a Christian, or perhaps whether he may even be an Esau who has spurned grace so often that true repentance is no longer possible (Hebrews 12:16â17). This is a terrifying position to be in. I donât think my friend is unusual. I think thousands of Christians, if they will pause to be painfully honest, will admit to the same struggles. It is hard to admit this, because it is so scary. Parts of the following letter are exact quotes. Other parts are altered enough so as not to betray any confidences. Letter to a Distressed Friend Dear brother, I totally empathize with the frustration and fears of possibly being an Esau because of sinning so deeply against Godâs mercy and light and patience. There is no comfortable answer to how one conquers such fears and escapes such a condition. From my own experience, what I would say is this: If you have the grace to hold on to Godâs mercy and not throw it away in apostasy, there is hope. This is not a comfortable answer. It doesnât speak in terms of simple certainties â namely, that you will definitely prove not to be an Esau. But it is the only way forward into light and hope and relief. I canât promise that you are  a child of God, but I can  promise that if you throw away hope, you will prove not  to be a child of God. Godâs word speaks often about âwaitingâ for the Lord, as in Psalm 40: I waited patiently for the Lord;      he inclined to me and heard my cry. He drew me up from the pit of destruction,      out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock,      making my steps secure. (Psalm 40:1â2) How long was David in the miry bog? It doesnât say. But what is clear from all the psalms is that the psalmists never forsake God when they feel like he has forsaken them. Something holds them. âI canât promise that youâre a child of God, but I can promise that if you abandon hope, you will prove not to be.â Not only does the Bible speak of waiting for God in the miry bog, but it also speaks of true believers walking in a kind of darkness. Perhaps you have considered this word from Isaiah: Who among you fears the Lord      and obeys the voice of his servant? Let him who walks in darkness      and has no light trust in the name of the Lord      and rely on his God. Behold, all you who kindle a fire,      who equip yourselves with burning torches! Walk by the light of your fire,      and by the torches that you have kindled! This you have from my hand:      you shall lie down in torment. (Isaiah 50:10â11) We may not be able to describe adequately what it means both  to walk in darkness and  to trust the Lord. They seem contradictory. And yet there it is. Iâm suggesting that it would mean this: When the darkness of uncertainty and fear hangs over you, inasmuch as by grace it remains in you, donât let go of the One you knew in the light . Keep holding on, if only, it may seem, by your fingernails. Know this: his hands are on his childrenâs fingernails â day and night. Pray for dawn and deliverance. From where I stand at age 72, I believe I can encourage you that it will come. Paul speaks in a way that captures some of the mystery of the ongoing battle with sin: Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. (Romans 7:24â25) Paul is ashamed of his inconsistency in these times of defeat. But he does not despair. He looks away from himself, confesses his divided self, and presses on in the battle. But he also tells us that the way he fights as an imperfect saint is by the hope that Christ has a firmer grip on him than he does on Christ. He may feel like only his fingernails grip the cliff. But he believes that Christ grips his fingernails: Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own . (Philippians 3:12) Or, to paraphrase, âI grasp for the hope for future perfection, because Christ has already grasped me and will not let me go.â Sometimes we feel his grasp more sweetly than at other times. It is a fearful thing when we are going through a season where we donât feel it at all. Iâm not going to give you a list of ways to fight for your joy. Those are all in the book that you already read. What I am doing in this letter is simply reminding you (1) that God is present in the darkness, (2) that he is holding on to his people when they feel barely able to hold on to him, and (3) that though you may feel unsure of your salvation in this struggle, you may be totally  sure you will not have salvation if you give up the struggle and walk away. âIf you have the grace to hold on to Godâs mercy and not throw it away in apostasy or suicide, there is hope.â May I recommend a song about Godâs precious keeping power? In the last several years, the song âHe Will Hold Me Fastâ has gone deep with me and become very sweet. I love the robust congregational affirmation of this recording of Capitol Hill Baptist Church singing it. I could never keep my hold Through lifeâs fearful path. For my love is often cold, He must hold me fast. May God give you the grace to sing it anew.
