Ode to Beth Moore
In response to Beth Moore’s memoir “All My Knotted-Up Life”:
If I was ever in danger of lifting a woman of faith onto a pedestal it would be for Beth Moore. She has stirred up my love and fire for Jesus more than any other Bible teacher/preacher/public figure. It was Beth who guided one of my very first women’s Bible studies from a video screen in a school sanctuary - her big blonde hair taking up half the frame. In my early twenties, Beth’s “Daniel” study blew my mind open and showed me just how exciting it is to read Scripture. She lit a fervor in me to study my Bible with careful detail. A practice that has never waned. A single line in one of her many studies (I wish I could remember which one) changed my entire love relationship with Jesus. She shared that if I wanted to love God more all I had to do was ask Him for it. I did, and nothing has been the same since. And her book on mothering is still the only parenting book I want to read again and again. Best of all, Beth does all of this with humor, humility, and grace that compels me to remember it’s never her that should be exalted, but Jesus.
In 2016 Beth Moore became a “controversial” figure with some tweets about Donald Trump and his treatment of women. After years of support, thousands of Christians turned their back on her. I just loved her more. For her courage, conviction, and for continually turning to the Bible for answers to all things. The controversy has only increased over the years, and I remain in awe of her grace as she navigates the ever-turning tides of public opinion. When she announced she was writing a memoir of her life I couldn’t get on the library wait list fast enough. I finished the 8-hour audiobook in less than two days, and while I don’t think it’s typical to cry throughout someone else’s memoir I just couldn’t stop weeping while her passionate voice echoed in my ears.
Surprisingly candid, Beth leads us into some of the darkest, hardest, most vulnerable parts of her life story. While she’s never shied away from sharing about her experience with sexual abuse growing up, she expanded on long-term effects of that pain, while maintaining compassion towards her abuser. She never once strips her family of origin of their dignity while still shedding light on the disfunction of her childhood home. A home that produced one of the nation’s leading Bible teachers despite the sin raging between the walls. Evidence, once again, that Jesus can use anything to draw us to himself.
She caps off her impressive vulnerability sharing the struggles her and Keith, her husband, have faced in their marriage. If I ever pen her a letter it’ll be to tell her how much that vulnerability encouraged me. Marriage can be so hard, especially when you mix marrying young, wedding your complete opposite, individual unresolved trauma, and mental illness. While RJ and I don’t check all those boxes we do check many, and our marriage has taken grit, work, and grace to maintain. To hear the stories of others who have long suffered and clung-in with their fingernails, and come out the other side, is what we need more of in the Christian church. Add Beth’s candid talk on raising kids in that environment and I felt tears stream down my face. Her words spread balm over my soul, as I was reminded that Jesus isn’t nearly as afraid of our broken bits as we are.
There were so many other moments throughout her book that I felt solidarity with this sister in Christ. Her frank discussion of trying to love a child out of trauma, and then realizing that is the work of the Lord, not the work of a mother. Her experiences with sexism and misogyny in the church that have led her on a journey - like my own- in relearning Biblical views towards gender roles. The careful process of studying what is traditional versus what is Biblical. The gut-wrenching path of loneliness away from extreme nationalism and die-hard political affinity, and towards personal Biblical conviction at the polls. The desire to love people fully, and the sticky messiness of doing just that. The pain in realizing that your beloved church body is silent on issues like racism, or worse yet, complicate in it. Struggling to find your place when you no longer fit into the same spaces you fit before. And woven throughout the book, and throughout her story, is a desperate, palpable, sincere love of Jesus.
Thank you, Beth Moore, for saying “yes” to Jesus when he put a calling on your life in a church camp bathroom. Your “yes” has reverberated throughout my life and continually brought me back to The One who paid it all.