Judith Lomax was born into a world of emerging Evangelical fervor and tightly prescribed gender roles. Her own unique vision of evangelical Christian faith and the strength it instilled shaped her life. A record of her experience as an independent Southern woman in a patriarchal religious and social culture survives in the form of a devotional journal covering her mature years, 1819–1827. Journal entries include reflections on sermons, accounts of worship rituals, tales of life among her circle of evangelical companions, theologically dense religious poetry, and intimate devotional meditations that sprang from her personal and communal religious experience. Witty, thoughtful, and persistent, she lived as an individual bereft of traditional earthly attachments and support, yet bolstered by her complete devotion to evangelical Christianity and to her “Heavenly Bridegroom.”
