WOAC On Air Episode 69
WOAC Inspiration is brought to your by our Air Crew Erika, Murdel Shinaaz and AngelinaMusic Inspiration by Samantha Pitso
Topic: Women you have Purpose
The Life of Maria Woodworth-Etter (A woman who lived life on purpose)
Ephesians 2.10 “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before time ordained that we would walk in them.” So many people lose their vision because of challenges.
Maria born in 1844 in Ohio, America. She was 1 of eight children born of Samuel and Mathilda Underwood. Maria was 5 years old when her parents were saved. Her dad died in 1850 from sun stroke because of farming activities, she was 6 years at the time. Maria’s family lived in poor conditions and the big family needs led her and her sisters to leave home to work, she desired to go to school and be educated but it was not possible. She loved God, couldn’t go to church due to work responsibilities, and resorted to reciting bible verses on in the kitchern from age 8. Maria got baptised in 1857 at the age of 13, and accepted the Lord as her personal saviour at church. When she got baptised in water she said “I asked the Lord to save me fully, trusting myself in His hands, and while going into the water, a light came over me, and I was converted. The people saw the change and said I had fainted.” [Maria-Woodworth -Etter quoted in the Pale Horse and His Rider: are you ready for the other world? Page 19-21]. From age 13 she felt the call of God to evangelise but she kept on resisting the call because women were not permitted to preach. There were cultural and religious barriers that did not allow woman to partake in front line ministry, they had the opportunity in the mission field as they serve in supporting role.
Delayed “resistance to the call”
a) “...You can’t do a ministry like this, if you’re afraid to take risk and if you’re afraid of what people might think about you.” Maria makes this statement in her later life, and it stems from her own personal failures, of opposing the call of God earlier in her life. [Antje, J. Revivalist Review: Maria Woodworth-Etter].b) She had “Opposing recurrences.” For 22 years Maria wrestled with the call to work in the ministry through human rationalisation namely:
I. She had fears related to gender constraints placed on Christian women in the ministerial activities. Religious culture in those times only allowed woman to provide hospitality support in missionary activities such as sewing, providing quilts and food etc. and women could only preach in the mission fields for her this meant she must travel to Africa or Asia;
II. III.
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Discouragement by society led Maria to settle for agrarian lifestyle, married to a war veteran who was incapacitated from war activities and had regular battlefields in his mind; Maira had 6 six, of which five passed away progressively one after the other in early childhood. During this tragic time of her life she continued to get visions from God to step out in the work of the ministry, and rejected the call due to logical reasoning (she is a woman and woman don’t have rights to minister unless in mission field);An answered prayer – Mr Woodworth gets saved and starts speaking in tongues, and Maria thought wow, this means she can now get active in the mission field because hubby has found a new found life in Christ. Great disappointment her elation, her husband was discouraged by the challenges of life, and fluctuated with few mountain top experiences and remained for most of his life in the low valley experiences due to the battlefield in the mind, which hindered all desire for the mission field.When Maria finally had the personal courage to step into ministry, her husband and her only surviving daughter Lizzie who was 16 years old at the time dissuaded her from ministry - it led to her seeing her self a “gazing-stock for the people” [Maria Woodworth. Life and experience of Maria Woo
