Thanks so much to the publisher and to NetGalley for giving me access to this book. Good biography. I enjoyed seeing how her life shaped up. I will be recommending this book. Thanks again for letting have a chance to read it.

I've loved My Utmost for His Highest for many years, and recently was honored to join the Oswald Chambers Publications Association, so naturally I wanted to read up on not only this great man - but the great woman whose story hasn't been strongly known. I'm grateful for Michelle Ule's biography, which outlines Biddy Chambers' contribution to the world through her editorial work.

After Oswald Chambers died at the early age of 43, his widow felt the commission by God to transcribe her careful shorthand notes from many of his talks. Throughout the rest of her life, she turned the talks into many books and articles - the most prized being My Utmost.

Ule's biography tells the unknown story of Biddy and her work and life. I enjoyed it, but at times it felt like a list of all of the research the author had conducted. Still, worth reading for the encouragement we can find in a life lived for God's glory, and one who didn't seek the limelight (Biddy's name doesn't appear on any of Oswald's books).

My Utmost For His Highest by Oswald Chambers has long been a favorite devotional book of mine. One that I would pull out every several years to take time to read each day because it spoke so profoundly to me in my Christian walk. One that was so profoundly written that it is worth rereading multiple times. I knew Oswald Chambers was a British Chaplain in World War I, but that was about all that I knew about him. So, I was very excited to review a biography of his wife, Mrs. Oswald Chambers by Michelle Ule, that was recently published near the 100th anniversary of Oswald Chamber’s death in October of 1917.
It was inspirational to learn more about Chambers and his wife Biddy through this very well written and impeccably researched biography. The book was so inspirational that I wish I could quote most of the book in this review, and I know that it would be entirely too long if I shared all of the exciting things I wish I could about this amazing couple. They exemplified a life lived for Christ, and had such a powerful impact on so many people. When World War I began, Chambers was sent to Egypt, and amazingly, his wife Biddy and their toddler daughter Kathleen joined him there in his ministry to thousands of soldiers. Biddy had trained in office skills and thus took down in shorthand notebooks and notebooks full of Chambers’ inspirational sermons and lectures (They ministered at a Bible College in England prior to the war.). Biddy herself also taught, so she ended up with a wealth of materials which she faithfully turned into books and pamphlets for the rest of her life ( giving many away free and living frugally with the aim of turning the profits of the publications into more reprinting) after her husband’s death in Egypt during WWI. And she lived for a little over 49 years after his death. If not for her faithful note taking and transcribing all of those materials into print, we would not have My Utmost for His Highest. This was truly an inspirational biography to read and the author did an excellent job of pulling together research and photographs.
And now to share portions of this luminous book ( these quotes are very clearly expressed and formatted in the book so apologies for their being pushed together without paragraphs below):
An excerpt from the book about Oswald’s ministry focus in Egypt during WWI when he ministered to thousands of soldiers that passed through his camp: “Oswald went to the root concern: What is a person’s relationship to God? Do they trust the Lord or will they choose to be fearful of events? He knew his speaking and life would be influenced by the war and the need to make sure listeners explored their faith.“
A quote about the camp, Zeitoun, where Chambers ministered: “The Citadel YMCA secretary, Reverend Douglas Downes, journeyed to Zeitoun one evening and “found the unheard of thing had come to pass. Men whom no one could accuse of being religious, turned up in large numbers on a week-night to hear a religious talk.”12 One of the soldiers Downes met reported his life as being completely transformed by Oswald’s teaching. Outside the compound walls, desert stretched east as far as the eye could see. The fine, dusty sand drifted through the air and settled on everything. The heat beat down and flies swarmed in hordes. Oswald immediately obtained a fly whisk—something like a large artist’s paintbrush with long bristles—to scatter the incessant pests. (As one recent visitor to Egypt noted, “You get used to having twenty or so flies on you at any time.”13)”.
About Biddy and toddler Kathleen’s presence in that camp so far from home and so close to the war: “The soldiers immediately noticed the presence of two women and a toddling girl in the camp. Theo Atkinson, the opera singer turned soldier, appreciated the changes Oswald brought to the YMCA hut but marked his family’s arrival as a turning point: “Things got better and better. They kept open house for us all. Whatever they had they shared, and with little Kathleen running around and attending the Sunday services where she lustily sang the hymns, and Miss Riley’s cooking, we began to feel almost as if we were home again.”3 Biddy wanted to be where God placed her to work with Oswald. It would be a challenge to tend Kathleen in a land of dirt, sand, insects, heat, and thirst, but plenty of well-meaning people wanted to help. Most importantly, God remained her refuge and her strength, a very present help in trouble. She did not fear; God would help her.“.
After Oswald’s death, the YMCA asked Biddy to stay on at Zeitoun and continue to minister to the soldiers and she did. To quote the biography: “God’s faithfulness could be seen in the smooth transition as Biddy and Kathleen were surrounded by BTC friends at the Zeitoun camp. The people who loved them were wise, and they focused on God’s glory in the difficult circumstances. As Biddy wrote to friends in England: Unbelief said “What can we do?” But faith said “What cannot God do?” In this confidence, we stepped out into the new thing God had for us, and bit by bit God revealed His mind about the different parts of the work and so wonderfully gave us the wisdom we sought. Now I do feel that God’s order for this place is being fulfilled.2 The soldiers continued to come. Just as Biddy and Jimmy planned, two nights a week they studied Biblical Psychology together and one evening Biddy led them through the Gospel of John. Army “padres” (chaplains) took services on the other nights. Biddy oversaw a League of Prayer–style meeting on Saturday nights. The black prayer notebook from this time includes long lists of soldiers’ names, many serving at the front.“
Somehow, Biddy finds time to transcribe some of her notes during this time into pamphlets that are printed and distributed back in England as well as put out for the soldiers to take for free in Egypt. The response is so favorable that Biddy writes her mother and sister back in England: “It confirms me so much in the assurance I have that I am to go on getting everything I can printed. It will be like casting bread upon the waters and we’ll know someday all it has meant in people’s lives. I am more and more grateful to have the work to do. I feel like John that the world couldn’t contain the writings if I were to get all my notes printed.11.”
After the war, Biddy and Kathleen return to England, and in 1927 My Utmost for His Highest makes it into print. The book has never been out of print since. Into it, Biddy compiles some of the best of the notebooks. Quotations from the biography: “Her marriage to Oswald opened the world to Biddy, literally in the sense she had traveled to two continents with him but also through the opportunities to see God’s hand at work in people’s lives in extraordinary fashion. But then Oswald died, the marriage was interrupted, and Biddy had a choice—to accept Oswald’s death and move on, believing God planned for her to be a widow, or to fight against God’s redirection of her life. She accepted Oswald’s death and remained faithful to God. Perhaps, too, this passage explained about the financial testing she lived with. The November 15 passage addressed the question she probably heard more than any: Why did God allow Oswald to die? The unflinching biblical text from John 21:21–22 went to the heart: “Lord, and what shall this man do? . . . What is that to thee? Follow thou me.” The opening line said it all: “One of our severest lessons comes from the stubborn refusal to see that we must not interfere in other people’s lives.” The reading asked who we think we are to question what God decides should happen in another person’s life. (Similar to God’s words to Job.) Biddy selected the passage from talks Oswald gave in Zeitoun during the first six months of 1916. Biddy’s desire was for God’s will to come to pass; she prayed and allowed him to mold her reaction until she could praise God no matter the circumstances. She chose to believe God. She chose to break her independent way of thinking and be a bondservant of Jesus—advanced Christianity born of focusing on God’s desires, not her own. It’s worth noting that the next day’s title on November 16 also may contain a message: “Still Human,” with a text from 1 Corinthians 10:31: “whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.” Biddy used it, perhaps, to indicate she, too, missed her husband even in the midst of clinging to God. “It is one thing to go through a crisis grandly, but another thing to go through every day glorifying God when there is no witness, no limelight, no one paying the remotest attention to us.” She labored in obscurity—on purpose. Her name never appeared in any of the Oswald Chambers books beyond her initials, B. C.“.
And one last quote from the book: “Writing a devotional is a daunting task. While intimately familiar with Oswald’s words and concepts, Biddy’s work to put together 366 devotional readings of about 250 words each required a great deal of prayer, thought, and time. She worked alone. No one reviewed the notes with her, debated the merits of a passage or theme, or even discussed if the chosen excerpts made sense. She relied upon the Holy Spirit to direct her as she paged through her notes. Biddy often chose passages for a single devotion from as many as three or four different lectures. One paragraph may have sparked a memory of a similar idea from another talk. Perhaps she remembered exhausted soldiers in a sandy hut responding to something Oswald said that reminded her of neat BTC students scribbling at desks. A lecture given in rainy Blackpool may have paralleled the easy familiarity of a BTC devotion hour discussion. She pieced together a crazy quilt of concepts into a beautiful work of practical spiritual warmth. The words and original concepts may have been Oswald’s, but the potency of My Utmost for His Highest really came from Biddy’s Holy Spirit–inspired editorial skill.“
Thank you, Michelle Ule for this beautifully written book, and thank you Baker Books and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader’s Copy and for allowing me to review it.

MICHELLE ULE: BIDDY, MRS. OSWALD CHAMBERS

The hundredth anniversary of Oswald Chambers’ passing away

What can a woman expect of her marriage to a man who is completely committed to God? What can she expect from someone who says ”I have nothing to offer you but my love and steady lavish service for Him”?

Her name is Gertrude Annie Hobbs, or “Biddy,” as she was affectionately called, and she accepted without reservations the challenge presented to her by Oswald Chambers at St. Paul’s Cathedral, in London. It was a somewhat surprising proposal, as Chambers was an impressive itinerant preacher who lived to proclaim the Gospel, and who had no intentions of raising a family. He had no permanent salary or home, and thus he had no conditions to support a wife, much less a whole household.
Coming from a middle-class Victorian family and with her father’s premature death, Biddy soon had to find resources on her own to support her mother, applying her excellent understanding of grammar and her dexterity with a keyboard to specialize on dactylography, a skill highly valued among women, given the industrial and entrepreneurial development of that time.
Both Biddy and her older sister worked in London, and together with their mom, they served actively at Eltham Park Baptist Church, led by Oswald’s brother, Rev. Arthur C. Chambers. Though quite reserved on her spiritual life, she used the sermons to practice stenography, which helped her assimilate better what she heard. That virtue would be crucial for millions to come to know the writings and sermons of her future husband.
On the hundredth anniversary of Chambers’ sudden death in WWI, a good way to become acquainted with one of the greatest names in the sharing of the gospel would be through his wife and her testimony, who carried out his mission through the writing of books and devotionals.

Originaly Published at:
Biblion Online Magazine (PT): http://www.biblion.pt/biddy-a-senhora-chambers/
Biblion Online Magazine (EN): http://www.biblion.pt/michelle-ule-biddy-mrs-oswald-chambers/
Biblion #6 Interactive Edition (Nov-Dec2017 – Portuguese): http://www.biblion.pt/biblion-6-interativa-pt/
Biblion #6 Interactive Edition (Nov-Dec2017 – English version): http://www.biblion.pt/biblion-6-interactive-edition-en/
BiblionApp (iOS and Android) – Portuguese-only: http://biblionapp.mobapp.at/
Effective: November 1st, 2017