The Nothing Is Wasted Podcast

How do we take the immense heartaches we experience and use them for God's glory? How do we continue to trust in the Lord's goodness when our experience feels quite the opposite in our pain? For author Tim Challies, losing his 20 year old son tragically and unexpectedly gave him the opportunity to lean into all he believed to be true about God as he resolved to steward his sorrow well. Through his...

How do you stay afloat when it feels like waves of grief and trauma keep crashing over you? How can you keep a marriage together when it feels like everything is trying to tear you apart? For Jeff and Sarah Walton, navigating the relentless storms of a child's neurological challenges, losing a job, and the impact of Lyme disease in their home seemed impossible. It felt like the story of Job where...

What do you do when you have a good theology of suffering and pain and yet struggle in the midst of your experience to believe that God is even present, let alone good? How do you hold the tension between your pain and what you know to be true about who God is? For Pastor Adam Mabry, it was his own hardships and emotional struggles paired with the seeming silence of God that took him on a journey...

What does it look like to grow in your faith when you came from an environment that contradicted so many of the things of God? How do you become a follower of Jesus after experiencing a childhood riddled with so much trauma and pain? For Preston Perry, growing up in the inner city and facing so many challenges from being fatherless and the collective pain of a community in crisis, Preston struggle...

How do you continue on in faith when pain and tragedy seems to plague your life? How can you keep going towards healing and wholeness when heartache relentlessly comes into your life? Those were the questions Rachel Faulkner Brown had to wrestle with after losing not one, but two husbands: one in an unexpected medical trauma and the other in a military plane crash. As a young widow twice, Rachel k...

Have you ever watched someone you love struggle through addiction? Or perhaps you were the one with an addiction and saw the devastating impact it had on those who loved you most? How do you heal, on either side of an addiction? For Geoffrey Banks, a youthful curiosity turned into years long struggle with drug addiction while his father, James, endured the pain of watching his son walk through so...

How does our personality impact how we respond after a loss or heartache? Why does knowing more about our inner world matter when it comes to healing? Beth and Jeff McCord have been using the tool of the Enneagram to help countless people understand the connection between their core longings and the unhealthy ways they are showing up in the world. Using a gospel lens, they have found the value in...

Have you ever felt like you've just gotten to a good place in life only to have it completely unravel unexpectedly? What do you do when you had finally reached a mountaintop and then find yourself in the deepest valley? Danita Jenae knows all too well how life can be looking up only to seemingly fall apart in a moment. After struggling with chronic health issues and finally finding some relief, he...

How does the hope of the gospel apply in the midst of a miscarriage or season of infertility? Where can we find comfort when our desire for a child isn't being fulfilled? So often this conversation is focused on the experience women have but silently suffering are the men who too face the grief and pain after pregnancy loss or infertility. Eric Schumacher, pastor and author, walked through several...

You can be doing everything "right" and still find yourself struggling in the grips of depression and anxiety. The fact remains that depression and anxiety are indiscriminate when it comes to who will encounter it. How can you get to the spiritual root of what you are facing and experience freedom in the pit of pain? As a clinical neuropsychologist, Dr. Michelle Bengtson thought she had every tool...

How do we create safe environments for our children when it comes to emotions? How do we allow those within our home to feel like they can share their feelings and find healing when there is disconnection? Dr. Josh and Christi Straub have been on a mission to teach families what emotional health looks like and how to prioritize it in the home. Having worked with many ministry and business leaders...

How do you lead when your own story is full of pain? What is the cost of control when it comes to ministry, leadership and marriage? For Ike and Sharon Hodde Miller, learning to navigate the difficulties in ministry these past few years since church planting and a pandemic has led to some insight into their own hearts. As an adult child of an alcoholic, Ike began to see the way his past was impact...

What do you do when you're overcome with anxiety? How can we connect our faith with our physical and mental health? These are questions that Jenn Tucker began to ask after first walking her young daughter through anxiety and panic attacks, only to discover she herself was dealing with anxiety as well. As Jenn was on the journey of having a child who was struggling with both mental health challenge...

Imagine waking up in a hospital room and finding out that you no longer remembered the last thirteen years of your life. Think about the fear, the confusion and the uncertainty that would set in when you realized you had just been in a coma and parts of your life were no longer in your memory. Most of us have never experienced something as traumatic as that and can hardly imagine such a scene play...

Boundaries can feel impossible sometimes, especially if you have lived your life without them. How do you begin to draw the line when it comes to what you are willing to accept in a relationship? How do you know when it is beyond the point of healing and time to let go of a toxic relationship? Author, speaker and Bible teacher Lysa TerKeurst never dreamed that her life would look the way it does n...

Boundaries can feel impossible sometimes, especially if you have lived your life without them. How do you begin to draw the line when it comes to what you are willing to accept in a relationship? How do you know when it is beyond the point of healing and time to let go of a toxic relationship? Author, speaker and Bible teacher Lysa TerKeurst never dreamed that her life would look the way it does n...

How can we look at our lives and see God's faithfulness throughout the knots of disappointment, betrayal, criticism or abuse? How can we trust the goodness of God when so much has gone wrong in our lives? For Bible teacher and author Beth Moore, her life has been a series of knots. From being sexually abused as a child to extreme criticism from those who proclaim Christ, Beth's life has been full...

What happens when we start to share our story of pain and loss? How can retelling what we've walked through help us in healing? For Jonathan Pitts, sharing the story of how he lost his wife, Wynter, has been a part of the process God has used to heal his greatest loss. In 2018, life was going well for Jonathan and his family. With an exciting upcoming move to the Nashville area and a new position...

Sometimes, we can try to cover up our past pain with that which we can control-achievement, performance, and productivity. But at some point, those coping mechanisms cannot mask the hurt we are feeling deep inside anymore. What do you do when what you've done to run from your past no longer works to hide what you're truly feeling? For Dr. Elizabeth (Ellie) Stevens, there came a point when what she...

Parenting is complicated whichever way you come into it. When grief and trauma are part of the equation, it can add even more layers to navigate. How do you sit in the messiness of adoption and fostering while learning to see the joys and the wins in the midst of it? For Jillana Goble, it has been through the challenges of parenting via birth, foster care, and adoption that she has learned to welc...

Perhaps one of the greatest questions that comes after trauma or tragedy is how do we help our kids navigate pain? What do we as parents need to look for after loss or in the everyday struggles that kids are facing? When do we need to bring in an expert to help and what can we do in the in between? David Thomas knows all too well the questions that emerge when families encounter crisis and the eve...

So often, we tend to think very little about our story and how our past impacts our present. But, what if the key to healing the wounds we are experiencing now is inextricably tied to engaging our whole story including our past? For professional counselor and podcaster Adam Young, it was when he began to engage his story, the wounds of his past and his family of origin, that he started to see the...

WARNING: This episode contains conversations about suicide ideation and may not be suitable for all listeners/viewers. Having a baby seems like it will be a season full of unending joy, but for many mothers, the elation of a new child can bring with it an unforeseen darkness too. Recent studies suggest one in every eight women experience postpartum depression. It can be jarring to experience the j...

After tragedy, trauma or transition, it can be hard to find vision for a way forward. Often times, our pain can cloud any idea of a future or plans besides our deepest ache. How can we start to see above the fog of what has happened to us and begin to believe that God has a greater vision for our life beyond suffering? In this special release episode, Davey talks about the importance of vision whe...

Every parent looks into the eyes of their young child with hopeful anticipation for their future. What do you do when the dreams you had seem to shatter and you find your relationship with your child not what you had imagined? How do you continue to love well when their choices are taking them down a road of relational disconnection, personal pain or destruction? Through her own parenting journey...