Though young in age, Gloria Furman displays maturity beyond her years in her new book on the role of the pastor’s wife. Her forthright honesty, as well as the wisdom she’s gleaned from God’s Word and from serving as a pastor’s wife, is both convicting and encouraging.
“We wander around like poor lost sheep, bleating that nobody loves us,” the author and blogger writes, “all the while we are actually safe forever in the arms of our Savior.”
Throughout The Pastor’s Wife: Strengthened by Grace for a Life of Love, Furman continually reminds us of the gospel and who we are in Christ. She rightly and boldly affirms that our relationship with the Shepherd and his great love for us will see pastors’ wives through the hardships of ministry with their undershepherd husbands.
Aiming at the Heart
Furman lives in Dubai, where her husband serves as senior pastor of Redeemer Church of Dubai. It’s a hard area to serve and a place where one’s soul can become as dry as the surrounding desert. We ought to listen, then, to what this young woman has to say. She challenges us not to become bored with God’s love in Christ as a result of sitting under so much preaching and teaching. Furman enjoins us to wake up to the astonishing good news that invigorates ministry and to not “throw in the dish towel at the first potluck” because we fail to meet impossible expectations.
The Pastor's Wife: Strengthened by Grace for a Life of Love
Gloria Furman
Her bottom line is that pastors’ wives need to be encouraged and refreshed in the Lord through the hope and help of the gospel. I wholeheartedly agree. When we live in gratitude to God for his grace to us in Christ, we extend grace to our husbands, children, and churches. We will rest in the truth that God enables us to persevere no matter the circumstance. We cannot be encouraged enough to take our eyes off ourselves and put them on Jesus and his saving and sanctifying grace. This is Furman’s goal and exactly what she accomplishes.
The Pastor’s Wife hit close to my heart when dealing with the way ministry-related activities and accomplishments can become idols. Furman reveals how these can easily become more important than our relationship with Jesus. Further, she shows us how disturbing our reactions can be when these activities and accomplishments are removed or altered. These sinful reactions are symptoms of setting up our own little kingdoms where we claim sovereignty. Furman kindly directs us back to Jesus’s grace and his work on the cross. Only he can deliver us from our false gods. He must remain the number one love of our lives and the one who gets the glory. Even though this is our aim, the aspirations and demands of ministry can easily displace Christ in our hearts.
Aiming at Other Priorities
Furman encourages us to make helping our husbands our priority—a priority energized by the power and love of Christ. She reminds pastors’ wives that their husband’s work is a joint effort. The couple is one in Christ. Therefore, the pastor’s ministry is the wife’s as well. Pastor’s wives support their husbands in the roles to which God has called them. In tackling the sticky subject of submission—admittedly hard for us all—Furman confronts us with straightforward biblical teaching. Her words are poignant: “A wife’s submission to Jesus in submitting to her husband is a victory banner she waves as Jesus advances his kingdom.”
Not only are we called to love God and our husbands, we are called to love the bride of Christ. Jesus died to redeem his church and longs for her to worship and serve him until he returns. Remembering this point helps propel us to persevere day after day and week after week until we finish the task God has given us.
As a pastor’s wife in the Middle East, Furman also highlights the global outreach of the church. This perspective challenges the provincialism of many in the United States. Though loving others can seem mundane and trivial, the effect is eternal. God’s name advances globally—town by town and person by person—when his servants love others and step outside the comfort of their own regions.
The Pastor’s Wife gives many down-to-earth illustrations from Furman’s own life. For instance, she shows us how being a pastor’s wife can often feel like a social hindrance, especially when trying to get to know unbelievers. To her surprise, though, Furman discovered the Holy Spirit could actually use her role to create opportunities for sharing Christ. Such zeal to fulfill the Great Commission permeates the book and compels us to listen to Furman’s wisdom. She calls us to serve with the gifts and grace God supplies as we pass the baton of faith to the next generation of pastor’s wives who will minister in their homes, churches, and communities.
All We Need
Furman’s book reminds us God promises to strongly support us—even when we feel weakest. All we need has been provided in Jesus. We don’t need to be our husband’s public relations representative. We need to be strong in Christ and to serve with our husbands as humble servants of God. As we bask in our King’s love and await his return, we must love sacrifically until the Chief Shepherd calls us home.
The Pastor’s Wife encouraged me to trust God’s faithfulness both to equip me for service and to strengthen me by grace. Indeed, his grace is all we need.
