A review of Undaunted by Christine Caine. Published by Zondervan. Available for purchase at the Bible Society Bookshop.

I sat on the big sofa in the communal living area of the safe house, surrounded by young women from multiple countries, wishing I spoke three or four languages. I was visiting the overcrowded shelter for several days to help with staffing and manage culture and personality clashes. Three Muslim girls from Uzbekistan had arrived the previous day, adding to the mix of Eastern Europeans and Africans, and one of them sat opposite me now, retelling their journey of sex trafficking, exploitation and rescue.

Three days earlier, she and her sisters had been locked away in an apartment in another part of the city. When the steady stream of “clients” lulled, they cried out in desperation. “We had asked Allah to help us, but he did not,” she recalled. “So we said, ‘If there is a Jesus, let him free us!’”

Not two days later, they were rescued in a police raid and brought to this shelter where I now sat.

This is one of my own clearest memories from several years of ministry to victims of human trafficking in Greece, and one that is retold in Christine Caine’s book, Undaunted: Daring To Do What God Calls You To Do. As the founder of The A21 Campaign, the organisation behind the safe house I occasionally assisted in, Caine has written a book about overcoming obstacles and surrendering to God’s will. She has done this by retelling much of her own story, culminating in the establishment of A21. Having close ties to this field of ministry, I was looking forward to hearing more of how God worked to bring about the rescue and restoration of many women through Caine’s organisation.

The first and last chapters of Undaunted share dramatic, powerful, often heartbreaking stories about some of the women she’s met, and of the seemingly insurmountable conditions that God overcame in the founding of A21. I’ve met some of these women, and their stories are equally harrowing and inspiring. Throughout the obstacles and hardships, Caine demonstrates an unwavering faith underscored by biblical truths that have enabled her to be used by God to accomplish remarkable things.

But in the chapters sandwiched in between, making up the majority of the book, you’ll find that this is not a book about sex trafficking; the establishment of A21 isn’t mentioned until the final chapters. This is largely a book about Christine Caine.

This isn’t a bad thing. Caine is an inspiring example of what a life submitted to God looks like. She shares stories from her own life, including discovering that she is adopted, becoming lost in a jungle, experiencing a miscarriage, and alluding to childhood sexual abuse. These experiences give her credibility as she continually exhorts us to find God in his Word, to spend consistent time with him, and to find fullness, contentment and joy in him. The book is a testament to her decision to surrender to God and his will, allowing him to interrupt her plans and use the good and the difficult things for his good purposes.

Caine’s personal stories are heartfelt; she has overcome some incredibly difficult things, and she seeks to encourage readers of the goodness and faithfulness of God through sharing these portions of her life. However, I found the message and impact of her stories to be somewhat diminished by both a choppy structure and somewhat moralistic conclusions.

Each chapter relates a different hurdle or hardship through which Caine undoubtedly connects with many readers. But though she expresses the pain and confusion she experienced, she often glosses over these feelings a bit too quickly in order to neatly wrap up each section with pre-packaged messages of God’s hope and healing, inspirational quotes and Bible verses, and prescriptive how-to’s to effectively “get over” your troubles. On the whole, these tips and instructions are biblical and sound, and many may find them to be helpful. However, some may be left feeling discouraged when the simple path to recovery and healing doesn’t happen as she prescribes. The sheer multitude of unconnected stories and their teaching points detracts from Caine’s ability to address any of the topics properly, which may leave readers who are actually struggling with any of these situations with more questions and even possible setbacks.

The lack of cohesion in these chapters means that the impact of Caine’s message and stories suffers. The stories are not told in chronological order, lending to an awkward flow at times, and the number of subject matters and teaching points she tries to include ends up softening the impact of all of them. I’m also not convinced that bookending these chapters with the miraculous stories of The A21 Campaign helped this cause either. After the dramatic accounts of the women Caine met in in chapter 1, she shares about her own trauma of learning she was adopted. Moving from women who have been exploited and abused in the sex industry to personal circumstances—that are arguably still traumatic and life changing but not on the same level as sex trafficking— trivialises Caine’s own story. There are really two different books here; one on the founding of The A21 Campaign, and another a memoir or biography of the hardships and triumphs that Caine has experienced in her life.

I would be remiss if I didn’t note that the extraordinary stories relayed in Undaunted are not the common experience of every believer. We would be wise to not take the miraculous to be the “norm” of the Christian life, or of every believer who has a big dream. Most often believers are called to be faithful and “undaunted” with much less dramatic things: upholding integrity in our jobs, raising our kids to trust Jesus, or sharing our faith with our neighbour. For most of us, “daring to do what God calls” will simply mean that we faithfully face these day to day challenges with trust for God’s help. God won’t use most of his followers to establish international ministries or to rescue hundreds of victims of sex trafficking. This doesn’t make their lives any less remarkable as his followers.

Many will no doubt find Caine’s book to be helpful, inspiring, and encouraging. It is a great encouragement to hear about what God can do and does do in the world – the story of the Uzbek girls can attest to that – and Caine’s life and her ministry are exciting examples of and testimonies to God’s power and his heart for the lost, the hurting, and the enslaved. I hope this book encourages believers to pray and to be expectant for God to do extraordinary things, but also to live faithfully and contentedly with the ordinary things that we are called to in this life, and to “dare” to live fully for God whether it’s across the world or across the street.

Kelsey Wilson is the Women’s Minister at St Matthew’s Church, in Manly, Sydney.