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Biblical strategies to help the military spouse

The Warrior's Bride

The Lord told Kathy Barnett she would write a book for military women. Courtesy photo

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Carrie Daws and Kathy Barnett have walked different paths in their military lives. Although their personalities on the outside are quite different, the military spouses are nonetheless strikingly similar. Both are devout Christians, both home school their children, and both minister to military families. And last year, they authored a book together entitled Warriors Bride: Biblical Strategies to Help the Military Spouse.

The project began more than seven years ago when Barnett's husband, a career special operations forces soldier stationed at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, suggested that she write a book. As a busy home school mom (she now has nine children ages 4 to 22), she didn't have the time to write as much as she wanted.

"He said, ‘I think you should pray about it,'" recalled Barnett, an English Lit major who liked to dabble in poetry and fiction writing. "'I really think you're supposed to write a book.'

"I prayed about it," Barnett continued, "because I was walking in obedience to the things God was calling me to do, but I was doing it with so much complaint in my heart. I would do what He asked me to do and I thought that was good enough. I wasn't truly surrendered in the area of being a military wife. That's what it boils down to."

Her husband was deployed when she says God opened her eyes to what she was supposed to write about.

"The Lord told me I was going to write a book specifically for military women so they would not do what I had done," Barnett said. "The big thing that God revealed to me was that it wasn't just a job for my husband, but a calling. In that place as his wife, it is a calling for me. My whole perspective shifted, and my whole life shifted. Because it wasn't about what I had to do, but what I had been chosen to do."

So, when she found the time, she wrote.

Barnett was acquainted with Daws, a writer who had published several online devotions, through the church they both attended in North Carolina, but they weren't yet great friends. Nonetheless, Barnett said the Lord told her to give the book to Daws.

Though hesitant, "I pitched her the idea of what God had laid on my heart," Barnett said. "I said, ‘I really think this book needs to be written for military wives. It needs to touch on their surrender to almighty God his lordship, her call as a military bride, military stresses they'll face, and all the things that they deal with.'"

Daws' response? "We're going to write this book together."

"She presented it to me, and I knew it was perfect and that we needed to write it together," Daws remembered.

Five years ago, the two of them got together over one summer to sketch out an outline and draft an introduction. Then on their own time, they started to craft their own stories using that outline. "We wrote what we wanted to write," Barnett said. "And decided to see how much we would duplicate each other and go from there."

At about this time, the pair began running a ministry for military families together at their church, so the book project took a back seat. For several years, they ministered together to the very women that they wanted to write the book for, Barnett said.

"We had more that we needed to learn," said Daws. "God wanted to show us that before we finished the book."

Two years ago, Barnett said, "I heard the Lord say, ‘It's time to start writing again.'"

By April 2014, they had a book deal, and the book, which is geared toward not just military but all Christian wives, was published last October.

"The foundation, of course, has to be salvation and submission to Lordship," Daws explained. "If Jesus isn't Lord, then this isn't going to work at all. We stand on the foundation that we as wives were created to help our husbands. So if he was called to be a warrior, you were called to be his bride. Therefore, you are a warrior bride. That's God's calling on your life.

"We want these women to know that they are not alone," she continued. "They may feel alone, but not only is God there, but there are also thousands of women around the world who have been through this. We want them not just to survive the military, but thrive in it."

The book's 13 chapters use biblical principles to address common military life stressors such as living with the fear of divorce and death, and living with a wounded soul. Both Daws and Barnett offer personal glimpses of their lives with funny stories and anecdotes that offer encouragement.

"We are sharing what we've learned," said Daws. "And what Christ has taught us."

For more information, visit Facebook.com/TheWarriorsBride. The book is available on Amazon.com in both Kindle and paperback formats. 

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