Handfuls of Purpose: Gleanings from the Inner Life of Ruth Bryan

Many have been blessed by the letters of Ruth Bryan, for she continually pointed people back to Christ. Here in her diary, one sees that same dedication as she continually points her own heart back to Jesus. Scattered throughout her entries, she likens herself to her biblical namesake, Ruth the Moabitess. Ruth Bryan reckons herself a meager gleaner in the fields of the gracious, loving, and greater Boaz, Jesus Christ. Observing the inner life of Ruth Bryan is a reminder to all believers of the boundless mercies of Christ, for what are we that such "handfuls of purpose" should be dropped for us?

These nineteenth-century letters are a rich treasury of mature, experiential, and practical divinity that still meets the needs of believers today. Would you like guidance in learning how to live more closely to Christ, how to walk more by faith in adversity, and how to lay hold of God in prayer? Read this book prayerfully, preferably as a daily devotional, and let Ruth Bryan be your spiritual mentor.

Ruth Bryan (d. 1680) stands in a class of great female devotional writers, such as Anne Dutton and Mary Winslow, whose Christ-centered correspondence has helped hundreds of God's people drink more deeply of the wells of salvation.