BEST OF Episode: God Does His Best Work With Empty with Nancy Guthrie

Unedited Transcript

Nancy. I am so excited to have you on the show today to talk about your new book. God does his best work with empty, and I love the title when it first came across my desk. I was just so excited to talk with you. And I'm excited about this conversation today, and I'd love for you to kick us off by just sharing a little bit about your heart behind the book.

Well, this book has been a long time coming actually. Uh, I guess it was birthed initially, uh, in seed for let's see maybe 10 or 11 years ago. Uh, my husband David and I host weekend retreats for couples. Who've lost children called respite retreat and it was at one of those retreats. And I was sitting in a circle looking into the eyes of 24 people who just, I said to them, I know there's a huge empty place.

There is an empty place in your home. There's an empty bedroom. There's an empty place at the table. There's an empty place in the family photo. There's an empty place in your future plans for your family. And, and, and I said, and I know that you look at this empty place in your life and that you tend to see it as your biggest problem, but I want you to know that that's not how God sees it, but that when he.

Looks and sees this empty place in your life. He infects sees it as his greatest opportunity because God does his best work with empty. Yeah, he always has. And then I just began to trace the Bible's story of emptiness and the way God has over and over again. Fill the emptiness in the world and the emptiness in his people.

And when I finished that morning, my husband David just said to me, you know, this 11 years ago, that's a book that's about, he just loved that line. You know, God does his best work with empty. And you know, as we've continued to do these retreats for couples over the last 11 years, I've seen again and again, how it connects with people and how it just provides a new perspective on this thing that we think is the ruin.

Of our lives to begin to see it as, oh no, no, wait, no, God, isn't in the seat. He can be, and I don't want to hinder his work. I want to cooperate with his work. I want to welcome his word that he might be actually able. And intending to do something good. Yeah, that's so good. And I can even think back over my own life and just trials.

Maybe not emptiness in the specific example you just shared, but just emptiness. Like my heart was empty in several seasons of my life. Like I can think about, um, when I, when I share a lot on the show is my mom is a breast cancer survivor. And several years ago she went through that journey and yeah.

Times and seasons like that. God has shown his faithfulness in such a special way. And I have come to know. Qualities about God in a new and a fresh way through suffering or through emptiness that I didn't know on the mountaintop, you know? Well, it's been so interesting to me, you know, then I began to work on the book and as I would interact with people and I would just say, I'm writing a book, what's the book.

I said, God does his best work with empty. And the most common response I got from people.

Yeah. You know, that sense of oh yeah. Emptiness. Yeah. I know that. I know that feeling. I know that reality. I have sensed that and I felt like they were also connecting with the hope offered in that. Yeah. That God is. At work in it and I've just, um, so that's been really fun to interact with people. And, you know, I just think in this season that we're in.

Yeah. Let's talk about that. Let's talk about how you started. Well, God put this seed on your heart 11 years ago and he knew. That this book was going to come out in 2020 as the entire world goes through a global pandemic. Isn't that amazing. And there's so much unrest in our country and there's all of these things going on and yeah.

I have had the same conversation with a lot of authors lately, just at how thankful they are, despite the challenges of releasing a book into the world during, you know, a season like this, how faithful God has been in the messages that he's put on author's hearts that have released this year. You know, what's kind of crazy is I actually have had two books come out this year.

So in April, uh, I had a book come out with Crossway called St and scoundrels in the storage. And then this one, God does his best work with empty here in September. Now, originally they were supposed to both came out, come out this fall. And so I was like, okay, worked that out. So there'd be at least a little bit of room between them.

But as I headed into the year, I just kicked myself numerous times. That I, you know, allow this to happen. That I'd have two books coming out so closely together just thinking that's just not good. Um, but then yeah, I come home the middle of March and April may, and I'm. Uh, as I begin to see, no, God was sovereign over this, over this season of life in which people would be seeing their lives emptying out.

I mean, I have, you know, emptying out of travel and you know, my husband's business, he creates kids musicals for the church called little big stuff, music. Yeah. That came to a screeching halt in March. I just know, you know, there's plenty of people are watching their savings empty out. Certainly their calendar emptied out their plans for what they thought this fall was going to look like for their kids or for themselves.

And, and just, you know, the book deals with the various forms of emptiness. We feel like loneliness. And boredom and fear about the future and dissatisfaction and disappointment. And I just. I just, I mean, I don't think I could be the only person in the world who is struggling with those things, right. That many of us are.

And so I've felt really grateful for the timing of it and been grateful to see. I actually did a video series with it this summer that I called backyard Bible study, and I made that available online. And it's been very sweet even before the book has come out. As people have been interacting with the content.

But they have a sense that it's meeting them where they are. And so I'm really grateful for that. That is so awesome. I love hearing that. And you know, emptiness, like you're saying, like you said, when you talk to people and you talked about the book, I don't think it's something that any of us wake up desiring.

Right? So many times when we sense that God is at work in our lives. Things are going well. Right. It's really easy to S to see God's faithfulness in that and to, to be thankful for that and those types of seasons. So talk to us a little more about how God does some of his best work out of our emptiness.

What we're told in the scripture. Over and over, I find it interesting. And like both James and first Peter, they both have these, like in this, you greatly rejoice when you encounter various trials or, you know, James says, uh, you know, we greatly rejoice that the testing of your faith is producing steadfastness.

And he goes on to say, it's going to have all of this good faith of work it's going to accomplish its work of making you a fully equipped and spiritually mature. The thing is you. And I want those things, right? We want to glorify God with our lives. We want to become spiritually mature, but we want to do it painfully painlessly and comfortably and manageably.

I mean, right. Like we, we, we want God to work in our lives in the way that we choose and in the timing that we choose. I think for most of us, for most of us, we think, okay, here's the way I want to grow spiritually. I want to go to this fabulous conference. Yep. And take really good notes and you know, different, I'm going to learn a lot and I'm going to become somehow more spiritual.

And it just isn't the wit that's not God's chosen method. Yeah, generally for the way he works in our lives to refine us, to grow us, to insure us, to use us. He unequally uses weak things and he uniquely works in the midst of honestly, the worst things that we can imagine. And. And he delights to do so. And that's how he produces these things in our lives, like steadfastness and character and hope and perseverance.

And you know, those things just don't come out of a life of ease. They don't come out of a life of, we just, gosh, our lives are full and we're so happy and you know, everything's clicking. Um, you know, similarly I think part of it kind of corresponds to that is some of the best things God does in our lives come about because we become desperate, you know?

Yeah. And let's face it. I mean, when everything's going good here in the world, um, and in our personal worlds, pretty hard to be desperate, you know, we, we tend to, uh, Be very self-sufficient and, uh, there's a beautiful thing that happens when we become desperate for God. And he begins to work out when we're more desperate for him.

We're more prayerful or we're more welcoming him to work. And so these are the ways and the times in which he tends to work in our lives, even though it might not be the way or the timing or the method that we would choose. Yeah, that's so powerful. I love it. And it's in those times that we become more like Jesus, because we go to him out of that desperation.

We know a lot of these truths, but we're in the, when we are in the middle of the battle or in the middle of emptiness in the middle of suffering, it's when we need those reminders. And so if I were to ask you, who is this book for? You know, in terms of maybe somebody is listening and I think, you know, maybe, maybe it's not, maybe that's not me today, but you know, maybe I know somebody in my life.

How would you answer that question about who is the book for? Well, it's interesting. I'm working right now, uh, today on a, on a message, kind of a. One message on emptiness and just even being in the scriptures, looking at it more, I'm seeing things that I think, wow, I should have done this study before I wrote the book and then Clinton.

But one thing I am seeing is that God is full. He is there's this thing called divine fullness. He is full and complete in himself. In this Trinitarian love relationship that he has. He is rich. Think about Paul when he comes to Romans 11, he says, how deep is the, you know, oh, the depths of the riches, the wisdom, the knowledge of God.

And so there is this divine fullness out of which God made the world. And. Out of which he fills our lives. And so if the question is, you know, who's it for, um, first of all, none of us know when the hard things are going to hit. And so we need in our lives, this foundational understanding of who God is and how he works in the world.

And so I think to just develop this greater understanding of the fullness of God and the way he works in his people's lives, the way he has in biblical history, because throughout the book, I trace how God has worked in the emptiness of his people's lives throughout the biblical story. And that w w when we, when we get to the end of the Bible, especially like in the epistles, Paul's giving us a prayer that we would pray that God would fill us.

And what is it we're praying he would fill us with. He says he fills all things with himself. And, um, the thing is if we're, if we don't have an understanding of the fullness of God and the way he is at work in the world and in his people and that his. That the way he's teaching us to pray is that we would be filled with him.

We're going to fill our lives with. So many other times, and we don't, we don't, we especially, we feel that tangent emptiness. And so we fill our lives with scrolling through social media and we fill our lives with the internet and Netflix and alcohol and shopping. And just so many things that not, not necessarily bad.

But, you know, to me, a good example is like you ever been on a road trip and all of a sudden you're hungry. And so, you know, you want to fill up that empty stomach and there's this certain, you know, really good food, the, whatever it is that you're really like to see that logo on the sign, right. Driving down the interstate.

And you, you wait for a while because you hoping you're going to come upon one of those. And then you finally give it. And you go to that lesser place and you fill yourself up and then sure enough, what happens? You get back on the interstate and a few exits down. There's the one, there's the one girl, but it's all yourself.

And I think that's what we continue to do. We had fill ourselves up with lesser things. Not necessarily terrible things, but less things. Well, but there's no room left to fill our lives with his word, with his way. Uh, there's no room for his spirit to work, to generate that fruit of the holy spirit in our lives.

Uh, distractions, diversions, lesser things. Then. Yeah. And it's so interesting. I think, especially in this season, I've had so many conversations with people who've just found themselves more distracted than they've ever been before. You know, and we all know if you've been in the church, if you've read the Bible for a long time, you know, we have a very real enemy who is out to steal, kill and destroy that.

Which God is doing in the world, but when we just allow our affections and our desires and our time and all of those things to be spent and things that. Honor and glorify him, or like, like you're saying not even bad things, but we just trade that for those lesser things. So often it's like the enemy doesn't even really have to work that hard to get us distracted these days, you know?

Um, and so I've just been really challenged by a lot of my friends. Um, uh, God's used a lot of my friends in the season. Continue to point me back to that truth of, of choosing the greater things. And, um, I think there's never been a season where that's been more crucial than right now. So I love that you point that out.

And another thing that I always love to ask authors, and I'm curious for you to share just based off the topic is I've never heard an author talk about their books. Where it hasn't came from a deep sense of like, I went through this thing, God redeemed, God did a redemptive work. He put this topic on my heart and now I have this message going into the world.

That's going to encourage people. So I'd be curious what you feel comfortable sharing. How have you seen these concepts? Be true in your own life that you feel comfortable sharing? Yeah. Well probably the most profound and shaping experience of emptiness out of which that ministry of respite retreats has grown has been the loss of two of our children.

We have a son, Matt who's 30, and then we have a daughter named hope and a son named. Gabriel who each just lived six months. They were both born with a rare metabolic disorder and. You know, when I think back to hopes, like we didn't know when I was carrying her that there were going to be any issues and she was born and we could immediately tell that were problems.

And so it was on her second day of life that we found out that she had this syndrome called Zellweger syndrome. That meant that her life would be really short and really difficult. And. So, you know, just immediately all of the plans that I had, you know, I, I had really looked forward to having a daughter, a daughter who would look like me and talk with her hands, like me and would be my friend and my old age.

Yeah. And so just immediately I had to begin to let go. Of those plans and hope was with us for 199 days. And then we let her go. And when I think about the days, which became weeks, which became marts in, which have now been years.

Dealing with that empty place that I had anticipated that she was going to feel, you know, the shape changes the size change, the, the weight of the emptiness changes, but it's still there. Yeah. Um, but when I think about, especially those early days of grief, I remember people they'd often ask me, are you angry with God?

I would say, no, I don't, I don't think my grief it's in the form of anger with God. I'm just so disappointed. I'm so disappointed that she's not here. And I just miss her, you know, there's just, there's such an empty place that she left behind. And so. Uh, you know, the loss of her and then to have another child born with the same syndrome and to say goodbye to him and to figure out, so what does a family going to look like and what, what our lives going to look like?

The two who are missing. Yeah. And so, you know, dealing with that emptiness has been very profound for me. Um, but I can, I just be honest and say, you know, right now it's. It's always where we are right now. Right. And so, you know, here in the pandemic, there are times I'm feeling profoundly lonely. Yeah. You know, I feel, I feel like my wings have been cut.

I, um, I last fall, I launched this series of workshops where in the culture country called the biblical theology workshop for women. And I did, I have heard so many people. Oh my gosh. It was so much. I had, you know, about 17 of them set for last fall to this spring. And so, you know, I got to do about 12, 13, 14 of them, and, uh, just so much fun, so much joy.

And, uh, you know, then we had to start canceling them and start postponing them. And. You know, everybody can relate to that. Everybody has that thing that they had to plant, you know, and you know, I want to be chipper, upbeat, like, no it's going to happen and I can be fine. This is great to have this time.

And I'd like to be. But what I find myself, you know, oftentimes is really feel the robe of that disappointment and, and that, uh, confinement, um, that empty looming schedule, even as I look into the fall now, you know, not having another one of those schedules until February and, um, And, and sometimes disappointed with myself that having written the book, I'm not expecting him to work in that empty place.

I'm not welcoming him to work, which is what I want to do. You know, when will I ever have nine months? You know, with so much, uh, freedom in a sense to use my time in a way that's, uh, profitable for the kingdom of God uniquely during this time. And so I wanted to work in this empty place rather than I think we have the tendency to always want to pray away or pray away the emptiness fill up the emptiness with other things rather than say, okay, God, you are.

In this empty place. And so do the work that you can uniquely do during this time, in your way, in your time. Yeah. So for the listener who let's say they they're listening today and they are in that place, no matter, you know, we don't know what they faced or what 2020 has thrown their way, but how would you encourage them?

And. Practical steps. Might you encourage them to take so that they can cultivate that sense of expectation and hopefulness? You know, we are not without hope, right? No matter what we're facing in spite of our circumstances, how, how would you encourage that woman? Well, I think it's, it's helpful, first of all, to just name it, you know, to like, you know, you can find yourself being frustrated and disgruntled, but just to go, wow.

I feel lonely. Or, you know, I'm really disappointed about this. So just, just to name it and see what it is, and then to make it a matter of prayer instead of complaining, cause there's a whole lot easier. It's comes a lot more naturally to just complain about it, you know, or be, you know, uh, desperately seeking to fill it up with something else, but to say.

I'm convinced that you are in even this. What is it? You want me to know about you? What is it? You, how is it you want me to experience you? Yeah. Uh, in a way that maybe I can't, when I'm running around so busy, um, how is it you want to use me? Because I think that one of the greatest ways God fills our lives is that we, since we're being used by him in the lives of others, In a, in a way that maybe before we were too self-focused or too busy, too distracted to see.

And so to just make it a matter of prayer and, you know, I've been trying just, even as I wake up in the morning, you know, the eyes are still closed. I don't want to pull back the covers, but just, just to begin at that point, praying about this new reality in our lives. More don't let me waste these days to waste them by complaining or waste them, you know, filling them with, with junk or meaningless things.

But Lord, show me how you want to work in me and how you want to work through me and help me as I open up your work, speak to me, speak to me and help me. To hear your voice, not, not out there somehow, but as it, through the way you've promised to speak, which is doing your work. Yeah, one of our good buddies on the podcast or her name is Gretchen Saffell.

She started the well-watered women ministry. If you've seen that online, she does beautiful work, but she has kind of a term in her community that she uses. And she says word before world. So basically pointing us back to being in God's word, being in prayer, um, before anything. Else hits our minds or our fingertips, just to the word and to prayer before anything else in the mornings.

And that's been, that's just like a quick phrase that has been so powerful in my own life. That's pointed me back to that. And, um, man, my days are different when I start them that way versus getting on my phone and scroll on social media. So that's a really good reminder. Okay. So there is one last question that I ask every guest that comes on the show.

So I'm super excited to see what you have to say. And that is, what do you think is the best piece of advice that you've ever ever been given? Well, can I see a few? Absolutely. These are just what comes to my mind. Well, one that comes to my mind. What we were just talking about. I mean, I'm going to date myself a little bit with, um, I remember, you know, probably 20 years ago when bill McCartney started promise keepers, you remember the promise keepers.

So I remember being really impacted, you know, this was back when there were newspapers instead of, you know, scrolling through social media and he would always say, you know, that he had just determined. I'm not going to read the newspaper until I read the Bible. And yeah, so it was kind of for a different era, but it's the same idea.

Isn't it? Yeah. And that, that always got me because I've always been, you know, I'm a consumer of the newspaper newspaper. Don't get, I used to get, you know, two or three. I don't get any now, but so, so I just always felt like that was a good piece of advice. Um, I got a job in Christian publishing, working at a publishing house right out of college.

And I can think of two or three things. Some of the authors that I worked with. Early on said to me, I can remember this one author stopping by my office and she said, never marry a man until you can say, he's the finest man you've ever heard. Oh, that's a good one. That's pretty good. And another piece of marriage advice I got from another author, um, he had gotten from his daughter actually, uh, cause he was trying to make a relationship work and, and she said to him, Hey dad, instead of trying to make this work, why don't you head down the direction you want to head in your life?

And then take someone's hand. Who's headed in the same direction, man. Yeah, that was pretty good. And then one other thing, um, I remember this author that, um, it was really the author's wife who shared this with me. Um, She was telling me about how their kids, at one point they had kind of figured out that their dad was somebody and they thought that was so cool, you know?

And, uh, and she had said to her kids, um, it's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice. Um, and just to, yeah. Interact with people in that way. So none of those were necessarily. All that spiritual, but I love, yes. I love it. That's so good. Okay. We'll tell listeners where they can find out about your workshops because we are believing that they are going to happen again.

People are going to meet in person again, and that's going to be a great thing. Tell them where they can find and get your new book, all the things where they can get in contact with you. Just go to Nancy guthrie.com and actually I'm using this time. At home to offer the workshops online. So like I've got one coming up on August 29th and another one in October people, we do them via zoom.

And honestly, I've been resistant to that because I felt like, oh, I just want people to be interacting with them. But that's actually, you know, using the chat, they're very interactive and have been very much fun. So, and then there's a whole lineup of 17 or 18 workshops for 2021 that we'll have Lord willing around the country.

And in a couple of foreign countries next year, you can order the copies or, or compare prices for. Sellers for God, does his best work with empty? You can order the video series eight session video series. I did last summer@nancyguthrie.com. Awesome. Well, Nancy, this has been the best treat for me and I know it will be as well for our listeners.

So thank you so much for being on the show today. You're welcome. I'm grateful.