Sanctified Sisters by Jenny Wiley Legath;

Author:Jenny Wiley Legath; [Legath, Jenny Wiley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: REL000000 Religion / General
Publisher: New York University Press

The Call and Consecration

Deaconesses believed themselves to be called by God to their office, and this call was essential to establishing the diaconate as a divinely sanctioned occupation. Advocates insisted that only women who were called to the work should enter, and that to take on the deaconess life without the certainty of a call was dangerous. “God’s guidance and an inward call must lead you into the path upon which the half-hearted only too easily suffer ship-wreck,” intoned a German Lutheran pastor.34 But the call was defined very broadly and could manifest in myriad different ways. Lutheran Oberin Julie Mergner noted that the Lord called deaconesses both outwardly, through the church’s invitation, and inwardly, through the Holy Ghost.35 A German Methodist brochure urged women to listen closely for the beckoning of the spirit, sometimes mediated through other people: “The call may come through a great desire to do the work of a Deaconess, emphasized by a strong impression of the Spirit of God to enter this work; also through the conviction others may have received that you should give your life to this Cause. It would be a mistake for a young woman to look for any extraordinary divine demonstration urging her to accept this call. In most cases the call comes quietly.”36

In their application letters, deaconesses confirmed receiving this call to the diaconate. Rare was the woman like Louise Higlin who reported hearing her “name called in a loud sweet voice, . . . and knew that it was no human voice” but “God and Jesus calling.”37 More calls were experienced as answers to prayers for guidance, often manifesting in the timely arrival of a visitor or piece of literature.38 These human suggestions were interpreted as divine calls, such as the German Methodist woman whose minister suggested deaconess work to her. She prayed and concluded, “It is a call from God rather than man.”39 Some Methodist deaconesses linked their calls with their conversions. Clara Bay pointed to her conversion as sanctifying her previous call to nursing: “I have, always, intended to learn nursing when I became old enough but had not thought of entering a Home. Since my conversion, I feel that I must work for my Saviour. I feel that Jesus has called me to do this work.”40

For this woman and others, the conversion experience included a conversion to a new purpose in life. Other women experienced their call as suddenly and forcefully as if it were a conversion. Methodist Anna Neiderheiser described her experience during the worship service at a convention for young adults: “I was sitting by myself at the end of the seat, lost in meditation. A great inner compulsion moved me to consecrate my all to Christ. When the invitation for dedication to full-time Christian service was given I did not wait to see if others were going forward. I arose at once and went to the altar. It seemed to me that Christ himself stood before me, and I said to him, ‘Anything I have is yours.

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