By David and Marilynn Chadwick with Jenn Houston
The podcast currently has 339 episodes available.
by Marilynn Chadwick
While waiting for answers to my prayers for a baby, I found that simple daily disciplines were somehow connected to hope. Small habits often lead to big dreams. And big dreams can have a wider reach than we can possibly imagine.
Navy Admiral and former SEAL William H. McRaven challenged graduates at the University of Texas to realize how simple, daily habits can have world changing impact.
“Changing the world can happen anywhere and anyone can do it,” he said. “But change starts with small actions. Every morning, we were required to make our bed to perfection. It seemed a little ridiculous at the time, particularly in light of the fact that we were aspiring to be real warriors, tough battle-hardened SEALS—but the wisdom of this simple act has been proven to me many times over.
If you make your bed every morning you will have accomplished the first task of the day. It will give you a small sense of pride and it will encourage you to do another task and another and another. By the end of the day, that one task completed will have turned into many tasks completed. Making your bed will also reinforce the fact that little things in life matter.” His advice to the graduates? “If you want to change the world, start off by making your bed.”
During my years of infertility, I grappled with the long time spent “waiting.” I wonder how I would have responded if I could have fast-forwarded my life’s video for a glimpse of my three wonderful now-grown children? And ten grandchildren.
If I had known the outcome in advance, I might never have learned to draw meaning from the ordinary moments along the way. And I might have missed the life lessons and little habits I learned during my season of waiting.
Today, I have practically forgotten the pain of wondering if I’d ever be a mom. I walk around every day like these amazing miracles are, well, ordinary. And in his kindness, I think this is just how God intended it. The miracles are awesome, wonderful, corroborated by medical science. But they seem comfortable.
The daily adventure of taking my worries to God and watching for the answers has given a touch of wonder to my days. Ordinary? Yes, but with a bit of bling. I’ve come to believe seasons of waiting are not wasted. These and other lessons are still part of my days even now. I wait differently because I really do believe in miracles.
“Wait training” has taught me that hope counts. Faith works, and with love, anything is possible. Miracles are for real. And I really do believe I can change the world. But first, I think I’ll go make up my bed.
by Marilynn Chadwick
During my hardest days of waiting for a baby, there were certain friends who breathed fresh faith into my soul just when I wanted to quit. It’s humbling to realize how much you depend on others. I’ve never liked being the needy one, much preferring to be the rock that others lean on.
A Marine friend is one of those strong types. He saw lots of combat duty in Iraq and shared a lesson I’ll never forget. “When danger hits,” he explained, “I’m trained to run toward the danger. But my second response is to look around for my men.” “So that you can protect them?” I asked. “No,” he said firmly. “I look around for my men because I know I cannot do this mission by myself.”
Suffering humbled me. And so I let myself lean on and even into the strength of friends. They listened, cried, prayed, and waited with hope, daring to believe with me that God was greater than my prognosis. I knew I couldn’t do this by myself.
Marriages can dry up during a long trial like ours. Somehow, ours grew stronger. David and I learned the delicate dance of knowing when to be strong for the other and when it was ok to fall apart. Sometimes, falling apart together was all we could muster. I’m sure it was in those moments we forged our strongest bonds.
Months became years, and by the end of the fourth year, waiting had become a way of life. I hovered between my dream and the dailiness of living well in the moment. I wanted my life to count.
While working on my master’s in counseling, I spent time in vulnerable communities. My practical work and internship were mostly among the poor. Serving those hurting worse than I was turned out to be a surprising form of “self-help.” I spent months working with young women caught in crisis pregnancies. An infertile woman desperate for a baby working with women who didn’t want to be pregnant? An odd assignment, but it was strangely healing. I used to joke that I was like a recovering alcoholic serving drinks at a bar. I was surrounded by that which I could not have.
Some say we should live to give. I discovered that I could give to live. And the mysterious alchemy of serving always worked its magic on my soul. Again and again, I would say to God, “I’m entrusting my ‘business’ into your hands while I put my hands to work on your business.” Fighting forward turned out to be the healing, comforting “drug of choice” that brought relief, filling my empty places while I waited for my own dream.
by Marilynn Chadwick
“I’m sorry,” the nurse said gently, “you are not pregnant.” I sat stunned. All signs had pointed to pregnancy. It looked like our long wait was over. But once again, our hopes were dashed. Month after month of disappointment had left me raw. I couldn’t have imagined that waiting for something I desperately wanted would be so hard. Nor could I realize then that I would eventually come to find treasures in the dark place I called barrenness.
Maybe you’ve tasted a similar despair when gazing over the wreckage of broken dreams, wondering, “How can I possibly get back up and try again?” It’s easy to become battle-weary. Hard not to grow cynical.
Desperate. It’s the word I used to describe myself on hard days. Desperate. For. A. Baby. Now. Woodrow Wilson once said that men “grow great by their dreams.” I would learn that my life was shaped by the dream to have a baby and even more by the waiting. That would end up being a total of 96 combined months of waiting for our three beautiful children. Each one, something of a miracle. The struggle proved to be an expensive education in what I’ve come to refer to as my season of “wait training.”
For one thing, I learned to deal ruthlessly with worry, the most exhausting emotion of all. I was diligent to purge fear, or in Bible language, I took my thoughts captive. Guess you could also say I binged on faith. My hope soared in proportion to this lighter mental load.
Learning how to wait required a fight. It took spiritual muscle to guard my hope. I resisted discouragement and fear as I would an aggressive intruder. After our cutting-edge medical treatments fell short, I was left with two choices. I could obsess about the lack of a baby—and probably go crazy. Or I could find a way to have a meaningful life while I waited.
In the end, a good dose of grace and grit were forged into my character. Other rewards were won. I became more resilient. I gained greater compassion for the suffering. I learned to find hope in life’s barren places. And I discovered some surprising benefits of not getting what I wanted when I wanted it. Put simply, I learned how to wait well.
by Marilynn Chadwick
We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure (Hebrews 6:19 NIV).
God’s strength can help us keep our hope alive. Hope, in turn, makes us stronger—like an anchor for our soul. Perhaps you’re fighting to hold on to your hope. The mountain of obstacles facing you looks too big to overcome. It takes spiritual muscle to keep dreaming when circumstances look bleak. We need daily, supernatural strength to resist the aggressive intruders of discouragement and fear.
Years ago when I was walking through infertility, I experienced God’s strength in practical ways. The lessons are with me even today. But one thing’s for sure. Waiting is hard work! One day my husband David spoke words that helped me turn a corner. He looked at me and said quietly, “You know, we’ll never be happy with a baby unless we’re happy without one.” We were on vacation at the time. So I went for a walk to do business with God. Two hours—and a very long walk on the beach later—I returned. I had surrendered my dream to God. “Buried” my dream to have a baby in the sand. But I still held onto the hope that God had a plan for us that was good.
I felt strangely empty and free at the same time. There was a new fire for change. I wanted to begin again. And this time, I held my dream with a looser grip. I took stock of where I was. What I had. What I lacked. Where I could grow. In short, I began to clean house. This was part practical and part spiritual. I worked at redoing the fixer-upper we had purchased a few years earlier. Paint, wallpaper and yard work were doable. These, I could control.
I also took stock of my physical “house.” My health had suffered from all the infertility drugs and treatments. Plus, I had always been a junk food addict. So I found a good naturopath and began to eat organic and healthy, not easy or even embraced by most people forty years ago. I also found ways to discipline myself through exercise.
I discovered that structure and order kept me mentally healthy. There was some comfort in controlling what I could control. I could not control when I would get pregnant. But I could make a conscious choice to declutter both my soul and my surroundings.
Turns out our faith grows stronger when we lighten our load. The Bible encourages us to “throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us” (Hebrews 12:1).
Maybe there’s something in your life slowing you down. If so, I encourage you to pray this prayer: Lord, reveal any sins, habits, or circumstances I need to “throw off” so that I can grow stronger and wait well. Empower me anew to pursue the dream you have placed in my heart.
by Marilynn Chadwick
If we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience (Romans 8:25 ESV).
Are you waiting for something? Maybe it's the fulfillment of a dream or the resolution of a long-standing problem. You're waiting for a spouse, or a baby, or a wayward child to come home. Or you're anxiously awaiting a medical diagnosis, waiting for healing, waiting for hope. Whatever you're waiting for, I'm sure you'd agree that waiting is hard work.
When we wait, our hearts hope for something we can't see. There’s no earthly guarantee that what we hope for will ever come to pass. We risk disappointment. That’s why hope can be scary. It requires faith and courage. Many of us decide that hope is too dangerous, so we play it safe. Better to lower our expectations. Adjust to life without dreams. Be a good sport. The problem with playing it safe is that we close ourselves off to the life-giving beauty of hope and the rewards of patience.
The Bible encourages us to wait for hope “with patience” (Romans 8:25). Instead of patience, some translations use the word “endurance.” What does it mean to wait with endurance? We discover an interesting secret by looking at the Greek word for endure, hypomeno. It actually comes from two words: hypo or "under" and meno or "abide." Meno is the same word Jesus uses when he encourages us to abide in him (John 15:7). So hypomeno, or endure, is to "abide under" a time of trial as we wait for hope.
Bottom line? We learn to stand our ground as we abide under our circumstances and abide in Christ during our times of waiting. Abiding will help us hold onto hope as we wait with endurance.
Will you be able to stand your ground as you wait for hope? It's a muscular journey and you can't endure apart from Jesus. Resolve to abide in him daily. Rely on the Holy Spirit. Stay filled up with God's Word. Wait for hope with endurance.
Ponder this thought: Abiding in Jesus helps you endure as you wait for hope.
by Marilynn Chadwick
Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart (Psalm 37:4 ESV).
“But Mommy, all I want is what I want when I want it," howled my friend's three-year-old daughter in the middle of a tantrum. Like little Molly, all I want is "what I want when I want it." Who doesn’t? But life doesn't always work that way, does it? Truth is, I've had to wait for my most fervent prayers to be answered, sometimes for a very long time.
I'm not a patient person by nature. But I've discovered that not getting what I want when I want it is one way God gets me ready for whatever it is I most desire. Waiting gives my character a chance to mature as God prepares me for promotion.
When our character doesn't grow as fast as our calling, look out! Yet I'm sometimes tempted to walk away from my dream altogether than wait for it. Why? Because waiting is painful. Grinding. Frustrating. Boring. Out of my control. In short, waiting is hard work.
I became something of an expert in waiting when we wanted children. Each of our three babies required part medical strategy and part miracle to get here. Altogether, I endured about nine years of infertility treatments, surgeries, drugs, prayers and more prayers. That's about the length of time it takes to earn a PhD. By the time we finally had our three children, I felt like I'd earned a doctorate in "wait training."
Let's face it. Most of life is spent waiting for something. So, it makes sense to find ways to not just survive, but to thrive during our seasons of "wait training." Though my years of waiting were often painful, those years taught me to grow close to the Lord and depend on his strength.
The Psalmist got it right: “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him, and he will act...Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him…” (Psalm 37:4,5,7).
Jesus wants to be first among all our desires, not just because he is God, and he is good. But because he is enough. Even today, I continue to draw strength from lessons learned during my times of “wait training.” I've discovered that the words in the Bible are not just pious platitudes. It is possible to find contentment and joy even before we get the answers we so desperately desire.
Then, as a friend of mine so aptly puts it, the longing fulfilled becomes a lovely "add on." I love this quote from John Piper: "God is most glorified in us, when we are most satisfied in Him."
by David Chadwick
God has written the greatest story ever told. It has both bad guys and good guys. Heroes and villains. But he uses all of them to accomplish his purposes. Nothing is too hard for him (Jeremiah 32:17). Remember, God is always able to work out everything for his good (Romans 8:28). Yes, even with bad guys!
Pharaoh is today’s bad guy. Found in Exodus 7-11, he was the mighty leader of Egypt. He oversaw the slavery of the Israelites.
Moses heard from God to go to Pharaoh and demand that he let God’s people go. Pharaoh refused. So, God brought plagues upon the Egyptians. Pharaoh kept refusing and hardened his own heart. Finally, after consistently rejecting God, God hardened Pharaoh’s heart and his ability to repent was irrevocable.
It was Pharaoh who initially decided to have all of the firstborn male sons killed in order to stop the proliferation of around 2 to 3 million Jews who were being born during that time (Exodus 1-2). Interestingly, God’s final plague was the destruction of all firstborn Egyptian sons, including Pharoah’s. It is a sense of payback, of justice, that God initiated upon the one man and nation that tried to commit a holocaust against God’s people.
God is a perfect blend of mercy and justice. Too often, people focus on one extreme or the other. When that happens, they miss a significant part of God’s nature and character. While God is love (1 John 4:16), he also loves justice (Proverbs 21:15). God also operates from the law of reciprocity: you reap what you sow (Galatians 6:7). In the case of Pharaoh and the Egyptians, God’s wrath came out against those who destroyed his people. They reaped what they sowed.
Every choice that you make is important. You are the sum total of all of your life’s decisions. When you choose a path that opposes God, every choice thereafter will harden your heart a little more. And then a little more. Over time, if you continue to blaspheme the Holy Spirit, eventually, God will hand you over to your desires and harden your heart completely.
Dear friends, keep your hearts soft. Remain pliable and moldable.
Choose today to follow Jesus. Don’t wait another moment. Seek him with your whole heart.
by David Chadwick
We have taken some time to search out the bad guys and good guys of the Bible. The heroes and villains who God used to write out the greatest story ever told.
Have you heard of a Bible character named Shimei? There are actually 18 different characters in the Bible named Shimei. But the one I want to focus on is found in 2 Samuel 16:5-6. He is today’s bad guy of the Bible.
The Shimei of 2 Samuel 16 was the son of Gera and part of King Saul’s clan. His loyalty to Saul and his kingship was fierce.
When David was fleeing from Absalom after his son’s rebellion, he ran into Shimei who began to curse David. He believed David was stealing Saul’s throne. He blamed David for Saul’s death in battle against the Philistines. Shimei told David that Absalom’s rebellion was God’s judgment on him because of the way he had treated Saul.
As the accusations were hurling toward David, David’s men wanted to kill Shimei on the spot, but David refused to allow it to happen. David’s response showed true humility. He basically said, “Don’t kill him. How do I know that God isn’t speaking to me through him?”
Later on, after David defeated Absalom and his army, Shimei came back and apologized to David for what he had said. Upon showing his face, David’s men were ready to kill him once again, but David wouldn’t allow it. In fact, David promised to never kill Shimei, and he never did.
Interestingly, after David died, Solomon knew of Shimei and his despicable and chameleon-like character. Solomon wanted to keep a watchful eye on this potential traitor. After being instructed by Solomon never to leave Jerusalem, Shemei did so anyway, and Solomon had him seized and executed.
What is the message here? When faced with criticism, pause and listen to it. Ask God if there is any truth in it. If the accusation is found to be unjust and out of alignment with God’s voice over your life, never seek revenge. Let justice remain in God’s hands and leave room for his wrath (Romans 12:19).
Eventually, vengeance came to Shimei, but it came in God’s way and in his timing. Who knows who God may use to correct us? It could even come through a bad guy. If you remain humble, God can use even the most villainous people to refine you and propel you into greater holiness and purity.
by David Chadwick
Today’s hidden hero is the last one we will look at before wrapping up with two final bad guys of the Bible.
King Lemuel. Mentioned as the author of Proverbs 31, a chapter primarily focused on advice that was given to him by his mother. Under the supervision and inspiration of the Holy Spirit, this chapter is a significant part of God’s Word (2 Peter 1:21).
We don’t know very much about King Lemuel. His name means “for God” or “devoted to God” and it certainly seems that the meaning of his name accurately describes his character.
Some commentators think Lemuel was actually King Solomon, which means his mom would have been Bathsheba, and he was desiring to write down her teachings to him. Others believe he could have been the wise and good King Hezekiah, one of the best kings of Israel, thus making this chapter a reflection of his mom’s instructions to him. Still others believe Lemuel could have been a fictional character made up by Solomon as a depiction of the ideal king and queen mother.
Regardless of who King Lemuel really was, the truths of this chapter reflect wonderful and godly wisdom from a mother to her son. It also shows a great depiction of the power of a godly woman in a child’s life. A strong and God-fearing mother leaves an eternal imprint on her child.
My favorite verse is Proverbs 31:30, “Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.” She was a gracious woman, who excelled in homemaking, thrived in business, was a wonderful wife, and raised her kids with purpose. When she walked into a room, her husband and kids praised her with a standing ovation.
Whoever King Lemuel was, he wanted husbands and kids to make sure they modeled a deep honor for mothers.
Today, during Jewish shabbat, the husband of the home reads Proverbs 31 to his wife and family. They applaud her and honor her. The sayings of King Lemuel are still being recited today.
The next time you and your family are enjoying a Sabbath day off, take some time to honor the mother of the home, blessing her and encouraging her. What woman wouldn’t want to be a part of this kind of home and family!
The podcast currently has 339 episodes available.