Joanne Gilchrist has worked with Youth With A Mission in New Zealand and is now involved in youth work in England, particularly mentoring young women.
Joanne clearly loves the Lord and has a high view of marriage. This book is written as a testimony to what God has done in her own life and as a guide for others. It is an honest and open account of her own obsession from her early teens with finding the ‘right man’ and of how God taught her that a relationship with him is more important than anything else. Even the best of Christian husbands cannot satisfy the deepest longings of our hearts — a lesson which many young women need to learn at some point.
Questions are included at the end of each chapter to help readers examine their own lives.
I have some reservations. It is a very personal account. I wondered if all the autobiographical details were strictly necessary and did feel a pang of sympathy for Joanne’s father when she laid so much blame at his door. I would hesitate to recommend this book to a woman who is single, because, although there is a big emphasis on patiently waiting and the relationship journey, Joanne was married at the age of 23! (To be fair, she did ask someone else to contribute on the specific subject of ‘singleness’.)
The book is full of biblical quotations, illustrations and applications. It would, however, only be fair to point out that Joanne’s theological viewpoint is probably somewhat different to that of most readers of Evangelical Times.
Ruth Burke
Belfast
