You may have heard the saying, “Behind every great man is a great woman.” Or maybe you’ve heard “behind every great man is a very surprised woman,” or a woman who is rolling her eyes. For high school graduation, I was given a devotional book that sadly I didn’t open for years, but it would become a favourite of mine. I knew little about the author, but learned in time that if you walked into just about any bookstore, that book would be there.
In fact, it became the world’s top-selling devotional book and still is. It’s been translated into 39 languages and has never been out of print.
But the book would never have seen the light of day were it not for the author’s wife who insisted on remaining entirely hidden behind the work of her famous husband, a chaplain and preacher back in the early 1900s.
Her maiden name was Gertrude Hobbs, but for some reason her husband called her Biddy—an endearing term in those days. Biddy was a highly skilled stenographer (that’s one who used an abbreviated symbolic writing method to transcribe what you were saying far faster than you could say it). Biddy breezed along at 250 words a minute! And wherever her husband lectured or preached, she took extensive notes.
World War I found them in Egypt, where her husband served as chaplain to soldiers preparing for battle in the Middle East. While many of the men attended concerts and movies and brothels, he offered them an alternative: Bible classes! Skeptics laughed, predicting no one would come. But soon his meeting place was packed with hundreds of soldiers. Free refreshments didn’t hurt (ha!) but they were there to listen attentively to his messages of Jesus, the one rock-solid foundation when the world is blowing up around you. For nearly four years, his faithful wife, the stenographer he called Biddy, filled notebooks with his teachings.
But in October 1917, he was stricken with appendicitis and resisted hospitalization, saying the beds were needed for wounded soldiers. Things went from bad to worse, and though a surgeon performed an emergency appendectomy, this much-loved chaplain died one month later and was buried in Cairo with full military honours.
After her husband’s tragic death, Biddy returned to England, a penniless widow with a six-year-old, Kathleen. She was offered the job she had before the war, but felt called by God to turn her husband’s notes into books. A publisher turned her down, but she continued to type out her notes from Oswald’s lectures and sermons, preparing them for publication.
With the financial support of friends, Biddy published 30 books in her husband’s name: Oswald Chambers. The most famous was released ten years after his death, that devotional I was presented in high school. My Utmost for His Highest has sold more than 13 million copies. But by her request, Biddy’s name never appeared on any of his books. Most readers of this uplifting and challenging devotional have no idea the role this resilient, brilliant, humble woman played in bringing it to the world.
In the foreword to the devotional, she merely tells how the selections came from various speaking engagements, then signs, “B.C.” Short for Biddy Chambers.
Well, Biddy’s story fascinates me. Friends described this busy woman as “interruptible.” Her humility and devotion sound a little antiquated in a day like ours, but that’s the way she wanted it.
The inspiring story of this faithful, persevering woman of God is a reminder of what can be accomplished by God’s grace when we don’t seek the credit.
As for her secret? She wrote that each morning she gave God the day and watched it unfold in His timing with anticipation.
I like that. And the thought just hit me: as a guy, I don’t always speak words my wife would want to transcribe. I think I’ll work on that.
Thanks for reading. Now, go make someone’s day.
