My husband, Dana, and I welcomed our first child in our mid-20s. It was wonderful and rewarding, and we treasured our little son, gleefully watching his every move, showing him off to neighbors, and reading him the original “Winnie the Pooh” before he could sit up.

But it was lonely too. My family was far away. None of my friends had children, and I felt a little lost. Here I’d worked hard to earn an English degree and win writing awards, and now my greatest feat was getting our darling son to sleep for more than ten minutes.

While I’d once wanted to rescue orphans and write stories that changed the world, it now seemed that I could change very little. So it was with true delight that I picked up a copy of Minnesota pastor Jenny Rae Armstrong’s just-released book, “Don’t Hide Your Light Under a Laundry Basket: 150 Bright Ideas for Wannabe World Changers,” (Leafwood Publishers, 2016).

At last, a compassionate voice of wisdom offering empathy and advice for Christian women navigating the mommy years — a book I would eagerly buy for my own younger self. With down-to-earth advice and honest humor, the book consists of short, action-oriented essays by Armstrong — a mama of four boys and former missionary kid who grew up in West Africa — and numerous contributors.

“Can we just admit that those early years of childrearing are hard?” Armstrong asks in her introduction. “Sure, we wouldn’t trade those toothless baby grins for anything, and seeing our rough-and-tumble first grader suck his thumb in his sleep… but the isolation, exhaustion, and lost sense of purpose so many of us experience during those years can suck the life right out of us.”

Instead of taking sides in the Mommy Wars — about working inside or outside of the home — Armstrong writes, “There is no question that there’s great value in child-rearing… at the same time, there’s a big world beyond the wall of our homes, crying out for the healing and redemption we’re called to offer in the name of Christ. Who says we can’t do both?”

This is the gist of Armstrong’s message: how to live a life of influence and outreach in the middle of the busy, demanding days of motherhood. In 240, easy-to-read pages, she and her contributors cover everything from real hospitality in the age of Instagram and “loving your neighbor… like, your actual neighbor,” to organizing community clothing swaps and empowering women around the world.

Under one heading, “Eat Like the Rest of the World Once a Week,” to raise awareness about world hunger, she even throws in a kid-friendly recipe for rice-and-beans — something my own family has been eating a lot more of recently. Our oldest child may be 19, but there’s plenty of wisdom here for everyone — a great gift for new moms and those who are expecting.

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Meadow Rue Merrill writes and reflects on God’s presence in her ordinary life from a little house in the big woods of Mid-coast Maine. Her memoir, “Redeeming Ruth,” releases in May 2017. Find her at meadowrue.com.