Meek is not a dirty word

Leaning-in rainmakers and change-agents charged with spiritual ferocity, adopters of controversial social platforms…which century brought forth Christian women like this? If you’re thinking 21^st, think again. The female Bible-believing Temperance workers of the 19^th century could teach their contemporary sisters a few things about tenacity, courage, and determination. Isabella Alden celebrated such women, only a very few of whom made it into the history books. But Pansy’s lowly, unsung, Spirit-led female Christians only care that their names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.

For all their meekness, however, Isabella Alden’s heroines are constantly crossing invisible social barriers, led on by their unconventional Master. They pray aloud in coed meetings (gasp!). They kneel in prayer in filthy saloons, beseeching the Lord to close the doors of this den of vice and imploring angry, mocking men to go home to their wives, mothers, and children. They make themselves conspicuous by calling out sin where they saw it (a definite no-no in that age). They brave drunkards in full tide of violence, invading unspeakable slums to rescue destitute innocents within. They mop the fever-wet brows of dying urchins with their immaculate hankies. They rejoice when prodigals return, even if God uses terminal illnesses to foment delayed conversions.
 

Every time I read one of Pansy’s books, Temperance-centric or not, I get a humbling education on what it means to truly be a Christ-follower. Caroline Raynor in The Hall in the Grove is such a one. She, like all Pansy’s serious 19^th century sisters, walks out her Christian experience in the simplest, most sincere ways imaginable. For Jesus, Caroline joyfully sews patches or arranges dinner dishes neatly and attractively. For Him, she ignores hateful taunts from upper crust snobs, not ashamed to be thought meek. Why? Because Scripture tells her giving in to temper is a sin. Yes, a sin. When was the last time you heard THAT from the pulpit?

These women inhabit a spiritual world so far above our current self(ie)-promotional one that it’s barely recognizable. And save your stamps; her heroine’s attitudes are not cultural mandated just because she’s a Victorian. She’s deliberately taking God’s word for what it says—Biblical inerrancy was a hotly debated subject even in the 19^th century! These are concepts and convictions our generation of Christian women has all but forgotten in our quest for more “likes.”

Earnest believers in Pansy's books, rich or poor, follow Jesus to the Cross and there lay down their ambitions, their goals, their lives. Because Jesus laid down everything for Caroline, she rises above the petty torments and trials of this life. Caroline has been crucified with Christ.

This dedicated, wide-awake Christian life, even though lived out in fiction, inspires me to regard my obnoxious neighbor in a different way—I see a soul that is perishing. An opportunity, not just an annoyance. The straightforward, beautifully committed sisters in Isabella's works reroute me from self-satisfaction to the humility of the Cross. The view is pretty different from there.

 “Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart…” Matthew 11:28