It shouldn’t. For 2,000 years of church history men and women have been learning from each other.

Sacred Friendships

For example, in Sacred Friendships: Celebrating the Legacy of Women Heroes of the Faith, Susan Ellis and I document how the Church Fathers were mentored by their mothers, grandmothers, and older sisters. Our new book, which is now available for pre-order, shares captivating narratives of over 50 women spanning 2,000 years who have so much to teach men and women about life and ministry today.

Sample Chapter

For more examples, go here http://tinyurl.com/l34rag to read a sample chapter of Sacred Friendships showing the empowering ministries of Margaret Baxter and Susannah Wesley.

Endorsements

To hear how excited others are about what they are learning from Sacred Friendships go here: http://tinyurl.com/mmjf3w.

Pre-Order

I’d like to invite you to join the journey and to learn life and ministry lessons from these amazing women. Go here http://tinyurl.com/lf6rjp to pre-order your copy of Sacred Friendships at 40% off for only $12.99.

Professors

Sacred Friendships, with its built-in discussion and application guide, is ideal for classes on Christian biblical counseling, spiritual formation, women’s ministry, and church history.

If you would like to use Sacred Friendships as a required book in one of your classes, email us at rpm.ministries@gmail.com with the name of the class, and we will send you a complimentary professor’s copy.

Reviewers

If you write reviews for major publications or major blog sites, and you would like to review Sacred Friendships please email us at rpm.ministries@gmail.com. We’ll send you a complete “Review Kit.”

Bloggers

We will be launching a “Blog Tour” soon, interacting on blogs across the country as we celebrate the legacy of women heroes of the faith. If you have a regular blog and would like to join the excitement, email us at rpm.ministries@gmail.com.

Radio Interviewers

If you are involved in radio, or know those who are, and would like to engage your audience about women in ministry, please email us at rpm.ministries@gmail.com. We have a detailed “Media Kit” we would like to send you.

“Dr. Robert W. Kellemen and Susan M. Ellis have sketched clearly and powerfully the portraits of the forgotten history and vision of women. Their echo of sacred friendship in the lives of women is irresistible. A ‘must read’ for every women soul care-giver and spiritual director, and for all men who want to learn from these great women of the past.”
—Jayanthi Benjamin, Director of Field Education and Women Student Development, Moody Graduate School

“Sacred Friendships is a remarkable work! I invite you to come and be refreshed as you are enlightened by the many discoveries presented in this masterpiece. Every woman will see herself in this book and sometimes more than once. Every man will develop a deeper appreciation for the struggle, sacrifice and sensitivity for soul care of the women they have encountered. Bob and Susan take us on a journey of hope, help, and healing as they uncover the treasured stories of women who loved God and demonstrated their spirituality in numerous ways worth emulating. Through sustaining, healing, reconciling and guiding, the women of Sacred Friendships nurtured to maturity men and women of their day. And now we too can benefit from the graces they extended. The “Learn Together Lessons” at the end of each chapter are also very helpful as we hear their hunger and thirst for righteousness. You can share in the dialogue of lessons they have learned while implementing practical application strategies from the context of the culture in which they gave their clarion call for Christlikness. This text will help counselors, professors, pastors, ministry leaders, and care-givers move beyond ethics and skills to a place of compassion and mercy.
—Dr. Sabrina D. Black, Clinical Director, Abundant Life Counseling Center and A Healing Place Ministry

“In a time when much is being said about advocating for the voiceless, little has been done to memorialize the specific contributions of godly women who teach, challenge, and encourage us to live lives worthy of the God who calls us His. Sacred Friendships fills a much needed void by recording the imprint that known and unknown women have left throughout time on their families, their churches, their communities, and our history. I found myself hungry to read the stories of these women who made such a difference in their own unique and female way. Women whose strength and courage, wisdom and insight, leadership and followership challenged me as a woman to consider what my Father may be calling me to fulfill in the chapters of His story. Adding this important feminine element to our Christian heritage does not negate the powerful ways men have led, but rather gives a truer, more holistic, and richer perspective of the impact and modeling made by both genders. Women and men alike will be encouraged, inspired, surprised, transformed, and challenged by the stories and lessons found in the pages of Sacred Friendships.
—Deb Musser, MA, Assistant Professor, Department of Counseling and Interpersonal Relations, Grace College

“Great read! These are important stories to tell and vital stories to read—great men of God were influenced and encouraged by great women of God. Sacred Friendships retraces the lives and perspectives of many women who walked their lives in faith. The authors sketch the spiritual words and deeds of women whose relationships with God caused them to minister grace and truth to those around them. This ‘cloud of witnesses’ humbled and challenged me all at once, and inspired renewed commitment to live each day with an eternal perspective.”
—Lynelle Buchanan, MA, Chair, BA in Counseling, Baptist Bible College, Clarks Summit, PA

“The stories of guides on the path to God are an important part of the resources that God has given us to educate us in spiritual guidance. But most of the stories we have been told are stories of men, which means only half of the history of the Church is being recited, and this in an area where women have contributed so much. In such a context, Sacred Friendships must be counted a special treasure. Containing fifty-two stories of female travelers and guides to God, sampled from the breadth of church’s history and interpreted from a classical Christian perspective, this book does more than fill a void. It allows the lives of these women to educate us today, and by their example, to draw us into the holy love of God.”
—Dr. Eric Johnson, Professor of Christian Psychology, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; Founder and Director, Society of Christian Psychologists

“What a blessing to be exposed to Sacred Friendships. It came at a great time, because I had just been wondering if we had any strongly historical books on women in ministry. This will be a great aid to those of us teaching in the area of women’s ministry. I also see it guiding ministry approaches to both men and women in the area of spiritual formation. Sacred Friendships is a needed guide to understanding how the past can shape our theory and practice in the present-day conundrum of Christian counseling and ministry issues. Kellemen and Ellis have done a masterful job of interpreting the words and works of godly women from church history and have gleaned guiding principles for ministries concerned with spiritual formation in our day and age. Sacred Friendships is not just an anthology of these women’s voices, but a thoughtful reflection on what they uniquely add to the stream of Christian counsel flowing through the waves of human history. The insights gathered by the authors and the penetrating discussion questions posed in each chapter provide helpful guidance for those who are interested in equipping others in soul care professions and ministries. This book would be useful for training soul care workers in academic and church-type settings because it enlists a broad spectrum of scholarship, but also connects that scholarship to practical issues. Bravo!”
—Christy Hill, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Spiritual Formation and Women’s Ministry, Grace Theological Seminary

“Sacred Friendships is a heartwarming historical anthology of women whose conviction and pluck shaped history. Rarely have I picked up a book to read that has so encouraged me to use my gendered gifting as a means to promote the growth of others. The stories contained in this book elevate the role of sister, friend, daughter, mother, wife, counselor, and spiritual director as the means God will use to shape lives. I learned there are no ordinary women: like the women in Sacred Friendships we leave a story behind to be told no matter when we live, or who we live among. What historical story will others tell about how you used your gift? The women in Sacred Friendships shaped ancient history, stepped up to be martyred for their faith, spoke words of comfort to soothe those they served, fought for justice when prejudice was unbridled, used wise words to encourage depressed church fathers, mentored theologians, and rebuked authorities. Each woman chose to follow in the footsteps of the Maker of gender by using her mind and words to reflect Him in unique ways.
—Penny Freeman, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Graduate Counseling, Philadelphia Biblical University

Hebrews 12:1 speaks of a great cloud of spiritual witnesses. Ordinary people who lived extraordinary lives. For the past 2,000 years, that cloud has expanded exponentially. What we so often fail to hear is the incredible testimony of those extraordinary women in that great cloud, their godly lives, life lessons, and powerful ministries.

A Compelling Book for Men and Women

Dr. Bob Kellemen and Susan Ellis, in their compelling work, Sacred Friendships, provide a voice for the voiceless. Like never before, they tell “her story”—the story of our great female forbears in the faith. As they tell it, and as we listen, we do not simply learn historical facts; we are empowered and equipped to practice soul care and spiritual direction today.

By the way, please do not assume that Sacred Friendships is for women only! Nothing could be further from the truth. Sacred Friendships is a gift from women of the past to women and men of the present—a gift that teaches all of us how to use Christ’s changeless truth to change lives in our ever-changing times.

That said, Sacred Friendships is also a gift to women. It validates the twin truths of the spiritual equality of women and of the spiritual giftedness of women. I promise you, you can’t read this book without praising God for how He has and will continue to use women to advance His Kingdom purposes. As you read the previously untold stories of over fifty extraordinary women, if you are a woman, you will never look at yourself the same way again. If you are a man, you will never look at your wife, daughter, mother, or sister the same way again.

A Wealth of Life-Changing Principles

Lay people—male and female, students, professional Christian counselors, pastors, and spiritual directors will all glean a wealth of life-changing ministry principles from the unburied treasure of historic feminine soul care and spiritual direction. You will finish Sacred Friendships saying, “I never realized how fascinating church history is. I never fully appreciated the depth of the spiritual riches that arose through the previously unheard history of women’s ministry. I never understood how relevant it is to my life and ministry today.”

Sit back and enjoy this amazing gift.

Warmly,

Julie Clinton

President, Extraordinary Women

Our Passion: Giving Voice to the Voiceless

One resounding passion has motivated our writing of Sacred Friendships: to be a voice for the voiceless. For far too long, people have silenced the voices of women believers throughout church history. We address this imbalance by illuminating the forgotten history of over half of the Christian community.

G. K. Chesterton observes that history is democracy extended through time. History gives “votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to those who merely happen to be walking around.”

Sacred Friendships gives vote and voice to our female forebears in the faith. It listens to their voices communicating the unique shapes and textures of their practice of soul care and spiritual direction.

A Sacred Legacy: Uncovering Buried Treasure

Sacred Friendships uncovers the buried treasure of wisdom about soul care and spiritual direction as practiced by women throughout the history of Christianity. Christian women from all races and nationalities have always helped hurting and hardened people through the personal ministries of sustaining, healing, reconciling, and guiding. Sacred Friendships uncovers the great spiritual riches of this diverse feminine Christian tradition.

By listening to their historical narratives, we learn to speak to today’s world with relevance—sharing Christ’s changeless truth for our changing times. Sacred Friendships assists female and male lay spiritual friends, spiritual directors, pastoral care-givers, professional Christian counselors, and students of all races to become more spiritually aware and skillful by deriving modern implications from these recovered resources.

Sacred Friendships contributes to contemporary soul care and spiritual direction as seen through the eyes, experienced in the souls, and told from the lips of a multi-cultural rainbow of past female believers. As we drink at the well of these amazing women, they water our souls by helping us to develop contemporary models of lay spiritual friendship, spiritual direction, women’s ministry, pastoral care-giving, and professional Christian counseling that are distinctively grounded both in the Word of God and in the sacred legacy of women’s ministry.

A Spiritual Ministry: Telling the Untold Stories

To accomplish our goal, we tell the untold story of women’s soul care and spiritual direction from the early Church to the modern era. Sacred Friendships listens to the voices of these previously voiceless women—hearing the feminine story told by women of all races and nationalities for the benefit of all women and men.

We begin our narrative where the amazing journey began—with the records of the lives and ministries of the Church Mothers and martyrs. Many of them were the physical mothers and biological sisters of the great Church Fathers. By listening to the voices of these courageous women of the faith, we detect new textures from the halls of church history.

The story continues with the sayings of the Desert Mothers who boldly provided feminine soul care and spiritual direction, not only for women, but for men. Their unsilenced voices provide readers with a new melody in the ancient ministry of spiritual friendship.

Moving to the Medieval times, we hear the feminine words of lay women, wives, single women, writers, and poets. Here, for the first time, whole books of spirituality furnish comprehensive manuals for soul care and spiritual direction from a feminine perspective.

The story also visits women of the Reformation and post-Reformation era. We hear the thought-provoking insights of wives of Reformers, pastors’ wives, mothers of denominational leaders, and women who directed substantial ministries of their own.

We then trace the continued development and growth of women’s soul care and spiritual direction in the modern era. Letters of spiritual counsel and books about women’s ministry express the depth of individual and corporate mutual ministry.

Throughout each chapter, we weave together individual stories and highlight common themes. We invite you to enjoy the voices of diverse famous and not-so-famous women who tell their own stories. We pray that their stories will impact your life and ministry.

Listening to the Silenced Voices

Throughout Sacred Friendships we will listen to the previously silenced voices of over fifty godly Christian women spanning nearly two-thousand years, five continents, and a great diversity of nationalities and races. Centuries later, surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, we build upon the foundation they laid.

Our prayer as you read Sacred Friendships is that you will marvel at the depth of the spiritual riches that arose through the previously unheralded history of women’s soul care and spiritual direction. More than that, whether you are female or male, it is our desire that when you finish Sacred Friendships you will be empowered to sustain, heal, reconcile, and guide the people you love based upon the wisdom and practice of these female predecessors in the faith.