Fashioned to Reign: Empowering Women to Fulfill Their Divine Destiny Hardcover – August 15, 2013

Fashioned to Reign is a powerful, truth-based read destined to set both men and women free all over the world.A little about my story: Since I was a young girl, I have been focused, driven, disciplined, and goal-oriented -- all traits that I felt were unwelcome and somehow sinful in a church environment. My ambitions felt limited by my gender, and I simply could not understand why God made me to be someone I should not. Instead of embracing who I was, I prayed for years that God would somehow make me more meek, submissive and quiet in the church.I struggled with the idea that all of who I am is somehow beneath the will of a husband. You see, I grew up with a mother who worked hard to support me. She was strong, courageous, and willing to deny herself so that her children could have more. All the while, my father cheated on her, stole from her family, and ultimately left her for my Sunday school teacher. Her second husband paraded himself as a leader in the church, putting on a charade in public that was very different at home. He never went to work, instead dressing up in nice clothes and driving a Lincoln he couldn't afford so that he could spend his days having lunches and hanging out with the church staff members. When he wasn't doing that, he was looking at pornography. Eventually, he was arrested and charged for child molestation.All of this left me with a very distorted view of men, fathers, and ultimately the role I as a wife should play in regard to my husband. God has been so graceful to me, giving me a husband that is loving, understanding, hard-working, and non-domineering. But I still felt so discomforted by some of the passages church leadership used to debase women in the church and home. It was as if somehow, God was saying men were more important than women and that he valued them in a higher regard than us. This teaching left a type of separation between the Lord and I in my personal relationship with Him.After reading this book, along with  Powerful and Free: Confronting the Glass Ceiling for Women in the Church. , I feel as though bondages have been broken off of my life. I feel liberated and more importantly...I feel as though God loves me the way I am. Knowing exactly who I am and how my Father God sees me has cured an identity crisis I didn't know I was suffering from. I am also now free to see my husband as a source of life and empowerment in my life rather than a kind 'master' who has simply been nice enough not to wield his 'power' against me.Women and men, don't pass up the chance to read the pages of Fashioned to Reign. Truth is powerful, and it can be found all through the pages of this book. Thank you, Kris, for putting pen to paper. Yet again, you are helping to change lives simply through your obedience to the Lord.

After reading chapter one, I jumped on Amazon to write this review. I could not stop crying. I cannot wait to read chapter one to my boys. It's a "fictional" depiction, based on historical and Biblical truths, of how Adam and Eve related to God and each other both before and after the fall. As a fellow author, I appreciate very much the depiction of God's Biblical truths in such a way that makes them come alive--makes them more relational, understandable, and approachable. Chapter one alone makes this book worth buying!I bought this book because I'm an author wrestling with the agonizing arguments regarding female ministers in the church, specifically the 2 main Scriptures which have prohibited women from pulpit ministry within the church: First Corinthians 14:34-35 and 1 Timothy 2:8-15. It's my belief that most female "oppression" comes from well-meaning Christians who have formed sincere doctrines based a sincere desire to obey God's Word. They have not intended malice or harm; rather the black and white nature of these Scriptures makes them very hard to interpret any other way.I am very well versed in the arguments from both sides. I have read nearly every book on this subject over the last few years! Yet I remain unsatisfied!! We have to hold the Word of God as our standard. First Corinthians 14:34-35 and 1 Timothy 2:8-15 are stated in such black and white language. It is intellectually dishonest to say, "God's Word only meant this for that culture." A SOLID ARGUMENT must be made to explain these Scriptures before true headway is made for women in the church. It cannot just be conjecture and opinion. As Christians we have the Truth, and do not EVER need to be intellectually dishonest!In my heart, I know God did not intend for these verses to subjugate women and deny 50% of the global Christians an opportunity to preach the good news!In my brain, however, I simply cannot explain away 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 and 1 Timothy 2:8-15!!!I know everyone says "follow your heart, follow the wind of the Spirit" but flowery-heart-following is NOT A REPLACEMENT for excellent Biblical exegeses!!!!As I prepare to read the rest of the book, I pray I will not be disappointed. I really trust and respect Kris' teachings (I listen to all his cutting-edge podcasts). That he is anointed, is undeniable. I pray that his book, Fashioned to Reign, is written with the understanding that women in mainstream churches will continue to be held to the black and white language of 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 and 1 Timothy 2:8-15 until these Scriptures are met with an equally black and white, intellectually honest rebuttal. I pray with great longing that this will happen in our day!Now with great anticipation I dive into the rest of his book...

I was so mad at Paul the profit until I read Kris's book. Now I understand why he told the Corinthians that women need to be silenced in the church

Thank you, Mr Vallatton for doing the digging and researching the passages in the bible which seem so contradictory for women in the New Testament to all that Jesus preached. I have seen a few glass ceilings that women have come up against in church and a lot of them have been placed there by other women. Thank you for insight, compassion and encouragement to all women excel in their own unique strength and to explain those few short verses written by Paul and Peter that have held so many women in church in bondage for so long.I loved the parts of the book with biographies about women of God between the chapters... Some of them often spoken about but others not so much. They were beautiful love letters to the women concerned from a brother in Christ, and the respect and admiration you have for these women (and so many others) comes through every page of this book loud and clear.Thanks also for your bride who is by your side, Mrs Kathy Vallaton, and the help she gave you with this book.The book has made me think about my own beliefs and how I view women, including myself.Thank you (and all at Bethel) for the opportunity to grow and learn and become who God wants me to be!

In the last 18 months to 2 years I have felt in my spirit that in this present move of the Holy Spirit ,that it is important for women to be appreciated for the unique role that they have alongside men .Equals but differentIn January this year Holy Spirit said to me " Celebrate being a woman! "" For much of my life I felt I had to prove I was just as good as a man .Now I am free to be me..As I read the first few chapters of this book ,with tears streaming down my face as I felt what I had been sensing was being validated AND by a man!! I'm not sure the churches in the UK are ready to embrace this theology but as I look at the way Jesus always had time for women ,I believe things will have to change.

Thank you for powerful truths interpreted in easy to read format, empowering women to have freedom to become all that God intended them to be. A must read for all teenage girls, college students, brides to be, business women, mothers, teachers, grandmas...all women of all ages, that we might encourage our next generations to take hold of God's truth and purpose for their lives that the bondage encountered by current generations might be broken. Thank you Kris for your insight and obedience to write such a powerful book, breaking the chains of generational bondage for all females to come.

I enjoyed this book very much because it dives into places I'd only dreamed of and exposes God's heart for women and the scriptural thread of divine man-woman partnership. I loved exploring all the viewpoints and have been unable to reconcile the judgement, limitations and rigidity of the complementarian arguments with the freedom that Christ came to give us. As for Kris's exposition, I agreed with the vast majority of it once I had checked it all out for myself and think Kris is really onto something that may blow the complementarian arguments out of the water - if only someone is brave enough to listen.

If you are a woman read this book. If you are a man read this book. If you don't know who you are read this book! Superb in every way. I haven't been this excited over a Christian piece of good literature since my lovely posthumous spiritual advisor wrote the Hot Line. READ THIS BOOK.