Lisa Barry: From time to time we hear of people who have dynamic, committed prayer lives. Not the kind that receive accolades from the public, but the private observations of family members. Elisabeth Elliot's father was that kind of person, a quiet man who left his prayer life as a legacy for his family.

Today, Elisabeth Elliot takes us back in time to her early childhood while growing up during the Depression. I often wonder when I find myself trying to make financial ends meet, what it must have been like to live during that time. I guess our necessity lists would differ greatly from then to now. I hope you'll be able to stay with us for the next 15 minutes as Elisabeth opens another chapter in The Shaping of a Christian Family. Here she is.

Elisabeth Elliot: "You are loved with an everlasting love." That's what the Bible says, "and underneath are the everlasting arms." This is your friend Elisabeth Elliot, continuing my talks on The Shaping of a Christian Family, the story of my parents and the home in which I grew up. I was talking yesterday about my father's prayer life, and I found a description in 1 Thessalonians 2:10-12, which really describes him.

Paul says, "You will remember how we dealt with each one of you personally, like a father with his own children; stimulating your faith and courage, and giving you instruction. Our only object was to help you to live lives worthy of the God who has called you to share the splendor of His own kingdom." That is exactly what my father did for us. He stimulated our faith and courage, and he certainly gave us instruction. His object? That we should live lives worthy of the God who has called us to share the splendor of His kingdom.

He got up very early in the morning and spent more than an hour, usually at least two hours, alone with His Bible and in prayer on his knees in his little study. And about one of those early morning times he wrote, "One of the loveliest of natural phenomena is the morning star. Often it has brought a sense of peace and renewed hope to the writer's heart as he has watched it just before dawn. Though he and all his associates work amidst the conglomerate din of street and factory all day long, yet, like many others, he has the blessing of a quiet suburban home at night.

"And so there was one morning when in the pre-dawn silence which is so conducive to meditation on the Word, he turned from the Word to the witness in the heavens and gazed in wonder at Venus, the morning star. Untouched by earth's hurricanes, untroubled by its political turmoils, undisturbed by its international crises, it recalls Him who said, 'I am the bright and morning star. Surely I come quickly.' The Christian who is saturated in the Word is likely to have a calm, wholesome outlook on life, to be kept steady in the path of God's will in either joy or sorrow, wealth or poverty. He is likely to be a pleasant companion, not voluble in aimless talk, and he will not be overly disturbed by worldly conditions."

My father's prayers were notably simple. The blessing he asked at meals hardly ever varied. "Our Father, we thank Thee for this good food, and with this we ask Thy blessing in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen." We children would smile at one another when Daddy began with "O God, our Heavenly Father." We kept track of things and noted that this opener was reserved--and I feel sure he was unaware of this--for more serious occasions, such as when we had company.

His petitions at family prayers were things like "Bless dear Mother. Give her strength for her work today. Bless Phil in his schoolwork. Help Betty with hers, especially her arithmetic," etc., ending with "in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, who taught us to pray," whereupon we joined in saying the Lord's Prayer.

It's not hard for me, having had a father like that, to imagine what is meant by the prophecy of Isaiah concerning the kingdom of righteousness. This is from Isaiah 32:2: "Each man will be like a shelter from the wind and a refuge from the storm, like streams of water in the desert and the shadow of a great rock in a thirsty land." The biggest decisions of my father's life--his salvation, his marriage, his life's work--were made on the basis of eternal, not temporal, values.

Our parents gave to each of us children a nicely bound Bible of our own before we were ten years old and encouraged us to read it for ourselves, underline and make marginal notes. We carried Bibles to Sunday school and church and looked up passages cited. We won the reference-finding competition. Mrs. Stevens would belt out like a military officer, for example, "Romans 10:9," and we would frantically whip through the pages and jerk triumphantly to our feet to read the verse aloud.

As we reached the age where dinner table discussions became more lively and serious, we found that the Bible was always the reference point. Did God have anything to say about this subject? If so, let's find it. "For these commands are a lamp," Proverbs 6:23 says, "and this teaching a light." Well, I'm grateful for that kind of a home. I am grateful that we were shaped by the Bible itself.

We were not what you would call rich, not by a long shot. I grew up during the Depression, as many of you also did. You can remember those days of abstemiousness in eating and having to wear hand-me-downs and only having one pair of shoes or maybe two that you put cardboard inside in order to make them last a little bit longer.

I remember when I was in the third grade, girls were required to take a sewing class. All that has gone by the board now, I guess. Boys can take sewing and girls can take shop, or whatever they call it. But we girls had to take a sewing class, and our first assignment was to bring in a yard of gingham to make a bag to hold our work. I shook in my shoes at the thought of having to ask my parents for money, all of 20 cents, for the fabric. It simply did not occur to us to ask for money beyond our allowance, which was a nickel a week. We knew our parents could not afford it, a phrase familiar to our ears then. Yet we didn't think we were poor, since there was always money to give away.

Our parents were strict tithers, always setting aside for God at least a tenth of all that came in. That was not their money; it belonged to God. Some of the tithe was in a box in the drawer of the living room table. Dimes, which we were instructed to give to the poor unemployed who rang our doorbell almost daily, sometimes to sell pins or shoelaces, sometimes to ask for a dime or a sandwich. We understood that giving to them was giving to God, as was putting our pennies in the box in Sunday school.

My father's diary entry for August 10, 1939 gives a glimpse of a child's tithing. "Ginny, 5 1/2, brought to breakfast her red barrel bank with pill box on top. She opened the pill box, took out a key, unlocked the bank and gave me 26 pennies to take to Miss Steffen for the Belgium Gospel Mission. This amount was saved, Katharine told me, out of an allowance of six cents a week."

We learned a strict frugality in the smallest things, but there was always money for God, money to buy books, enough to feed and clothe us very modestly. And my clothes, as my mother said, had been worn by somebody else. Some were very beautiful and expensive--too nice for school--from a family we thought of as rich.

How much might be saved by a family today if they were anxious to save money and the environment. If we didn't look on things like waxed paper and plastic bags and paper towels and foil and Saran wrap and baggies and Ziplock and Tupperware and Kleenex and paper napkins as necessities? We had pure linen napkins, which had been handed down through generations. And I know not very many people nowadays would have pure linen napkins that lasted that long. But we never missed paper products because we didn't have them. We managed, as most of the population of the world has always managed, without the Saran wrap and the Tupperware and all the rest of it.

Mother's rule was one her stepmother had taught her, and it is still the rule of my life. "Wicked waste makes woeful want." Maybe you should put that up over the sink, or over the bathroom sink so that people turn the water off while they're brushing their teeth. Or maybe you should put it on the refrigerator so that we don't go wasting food. There was always enough money for unpretentious hospitality. And that seems amazing to me, too, when I look back. But there's no mystery about it. God promises it.

The Philippian Christians had been generous in their giving to the Apostle Paul, and he likens their generosity to a lovely fragrance, a sacrifice that pleases the very heart of God. So it always is, and always the promise is fulfilled, "My God will supply all that you need from His glorious resources in Christ Jesus." My parents saw the entertaining of God's people as a great privilege and blessing to the family. So no matter what our economic condition, they contrived somehow to have a guestroom set apart and always ready. The door to that room was kept closed when there were no guests, so it had its own special smell--a clean one of wallpaper paste, old wood and furniture polish. There were a huge antique mahogany bed and a marble-topped bureau, a graceful oval table and a big rocking chair.

The menu for guests could not be much more than our usual family fare, but another place or two could always be set at the table. When visiting speakers came to our church, it was always assumed that the Howards would have them. And indeed, the Howards were glad to, believing it to be clearly enjoined upon Christians to do so. But my parents always felt that it was too bad that other people were missing out on this blessing of hospitality.

Lisa Barry: It's definitely a well managed home that can endure the setbacks of a depression and still find enough to share with others. I've been so challenged by the things that Elisabeth has shared about her family. Elisabeth Elliot has written a book entitled The Shaping of a Christian Family, and all this week she's sharing excerpts from that book and filling in with some personal insights.

As we say goodbye for this week, I just want to take an opportunity to thank those of you who support Gateway To Joy with your prayers and financial gifts. Even in good economic times like ours, we know that your funds are stretched to meet various obligations. That's why when we receive the gift from you in the mail, it's heart warming. There are many other places that you could invest in but you've chosen to invest here, and we thank you for that. Because when you support Gateway To Joy you're sending a vote of confidence, and that helps keep Elisabeth Elliot on in your area. Let us know we can count on you. Here's our address:

Gateway To Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, NE, 68501. Or, you can call toll-free 1-800-759-4JOY. That's 1-800-759-4569. On the Web you'll find us at gatewaytojoy.org. Today's program has been a production of Back to the Bible.

Monday, Elisabeth talks about her family's commitment to hospitality even in the midst of financial hardship. So join us then for the next Gateway To Joy.