The Calling of Emily Evans

The first of eight standalone novels in Janette Oke's Women of the West collection. Emily Evans is going to Bible school and feels called to Christian ministry. The book doesn't give a date for the story, but it is a time when there are automobiles and horse & buggies at the same time. Apparently, Emily's denomination has no problem with women being preachers or leading a mission (though they are not allowed to marry, bury, or baptize), so she is sent out alone to a small prairie town to start a church. The story was ok, not great (not as good as the Love Comes Softly or When Calls the Heart series). I don't have an issue with women missionaries and teachers, but the New Testament doesn't allow for women pastors. In this book, there are show more several young women who become "preachers." Not one of my favorites by this author. show less

Prairie settlements are in need of mission workers for local churches, and in Bible school, Emily responds to the call. Desiring to be a wife and mother someday, she imagines she'll be ministering alongside a preaching husband. However, with no potential husband in sight, Emily decides what's nearly unthinkable: she'll head out to open a church on her own in The Calling of Emily Evans, a novel by author Janette Oke.

This is at least the third time I've read this novel. It's the first in one of my all-time favorite series, Women of the West, by one of my all-time favorite authors. The book spoke to me on a number of levels when I read it years ago, witnessing the obstacles a young woman faces when she takes a different path than people show more expect.

Sure, the book has got some of the common things I've never been fond of in these novels. Sentences with too many dashes as the heroine frequently stammers over her words. Tears in her eyes so often that they lose their effect and cease to be interesting.

Yet, even with the overused stammers and tears, Emily is a strong heroine. Not because she feels strong or because she's out to prove herself to everybody. No, she's out to be of service. She doesn't back away from hard work. Her determination springs from caring about people, and she continues to care even when she doesn't have all the answers.

Even as my perspective shifts and expands over the years, this is still the kind of novel I could read over again. show less

Emily feels called to be a Bible teacher. She goes to Bible college, and although she is quite frail and not as intelligent as some of her classmates, she eventually graduates and is sent to look after a small, dilapidated church in a village where there has been no pastor for many years.

So far so good, and it was, in general terms, a fascinating account of a period of American history which I knew little about. I was quite surprised to learn that girls were sent out to look after churches, even though they were expected, sooner or later, to get married in order that their husbands could be the ‘real’ pastors.

Unfortunately, there really wasn’t much story. It was obvious from that start that she was going to succeed in her duties show more eventually, and probably marry one of the young men who appeared in her life. The majority of the book charts her day-to-day life, with a large number of people whom she gets to know, but whose personalities were too thinly described to be of much interest. I could barely remember from day to day who each person was.

It wasn’t a bad book, and it was free for my Kindle - but it wasn’t very well written, and there was nobody I really cared about. The ‘religious’ parts were a little over-done, and the ending too sudden (albeit not unexpected).

So, not really recommended, unless you like this writer and are interested in this kind of situation. show less

Emily Evans feels God nudging her toward ministry, but what options are there for a young single woman? She enjoys her studies at the Bible school she is attending, but has a hard time figuring out God's will for her life. She hopes the Lord will also provide her with a companion to share her life and ministry, but Emily but there is a lack of available young men. So she decides she will accept the task of opening a new church in a pioneer community--alone.

When Emily arrives at her new assignment, she is disappointed to find the church building in disrepair. After many days of hard work fixing it up, she has her first service and is disappointed, by the size of her congregation. Is her faith strong enough to stand against the many show more challenges that will test her calling?

This was an easy book to read, but it was hard to imagine young women being sent out to begin a church in the pioneer communities of their day. I appreciated how the author brought the book to a close and found Emily someone she could work alongside of for her Lord. show less

Really worth reading since it details what it must have been like for the Sister Workers who set up churches in the Canadian West.

Emily is assigned to the small community of Wesson Creek and goes through many trials setting up her missionary church. As she becomes involved in the lives of those around her, she begins to understand the truth of the Bible in a very real way.

The romance was a bit contrived at the end, but satisfying nonetheless. Emily is a wonderful character!

This was a hard book for me to review… I loved the characters.. The story line. I did expected a bit more in depth concerning the history. This was a book about the early ladies of religious ministry, especially one woman in particular. The happenings were fine and the little conflicts along the way BUT where was the emotion? As I read.. it was like a text book or something matter factly and lack that which pulls at one’s heart strings or emotions… It was a good read but needed to be a bit longer and more real life emotions… The author told me the story but I didn’t feel it or see it… I prefer books that show me as to simply write a story in a basic conversation form.
I bought this book via Amazon.

This was a second time through for me. Read it YEARS ago. It is an easy read but very simplistic. Easy to breeze through.