Daring to Hope, by Katie Davis Majors

In Kisses from Katie, Katie Davis tells the story of moving to Uganda as a teenager, adopting a whole bunch of daughters, and starting a ministry to families and orphans in Uganda.  She has been in Uganda for a decade, adopted a few more children, and married another missionary.  Now Katie Davis Majors, she writes about her life and continued ministry in Daring to Hope: Finding God's Goodness in the Broken and the Beautiful.

Several things strike me about Daring to Hope.  First and foremost is her intimate relationship with God.  She talks about speaking with him and spending time with him in a personal, tangible way.  This is no great revelation, of course.  This is how God wants us to relate to him.  But I, and I suspect most Christians, fall short of this kind of intimacy.

Second is the apparent ease with which she serves her family and neighbors.  To read her account, having thirteen children, frequent house guests, huge dinner parties, and constantly serving her neighbors is no big deal.  I don't know about other families, but keeping up with my three kids and having dinner guests over a couple times a month seems like a challenge sometimes.  Yet she does so much with her family and in the community, and for much of the time she has been in Uganda, it has been as a single mom.

The book is full of heart-breaking stories about the painful lives of many of her neighbors.  Poverty and disease are a fact of life in Uganda, more so than in more developed countries.  She is privileged to have a ministry of service and a reputation for compassion, but that means that people come to her with their broken lives, giving her opportunities to love with the love of Jesus but also to share in their suffering.

I couldn't help but wonder what else she does away from home. . . . She started an organization, Anazima, to "educate and empower the people of Uganda with God's love," but she writes little about her day-to-day activities with the organization.  I suspect she is more involved than the narrative of the book lets on, but with all she has going on at home, she might be content to delegate the operation of the ministry to others.

In a broad sense, Daring to Hope led me to wonder, What might I be able to do if I was fully supported financially, freeing me to minster to my family, my neighbors, and my community full-time?  It seems like this is the case for Katie.  Many people would not live and intentionally and inspirationally as she has, were they given the opportunity.  But she does inspire me to live more outwardly and sacrificially for those around me.  I don't have to go to Uganda to love my neighbor.


Thanks to Edelweiss and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!