Luke Lezon’s life was already hard enough. Getting married and planting a church in the same year had turned out to be plenty challenging on its own. But Luke’s life got even harder when he suddenly contracted a mysterious illness. As doctor after doctor failed to diagnose just what was wrong with him, Luke found himself walking through the hardest trial he’d ever faced. Luke sits down with Davey to share some of what he learned about God both in the middle of hardship and in healing found in the most unlikely of sources.

“What is God’s will for my life?” If we’re honest, it’s a question we’ve all probably asked. For Mike Donehey, it’d be easy to think he’d figured out his answer. As the award-winning lead singer of Tenth Avenue North, it certainly seems like he’s doing exactly what God’s will for him is. But Mike found himself asking, “is this really God’s will?” And more than that, he even found himself wondering what “God’s will” even means. Mike sits down with Davey to talk about the things he’s learned, how he’s flipped the way he thinks, and what it looks like to live the title of his latest book Finding God’s Life for My Will.

Kelly Streiff’s story of pain isn’t one where she’s already walked through grief and healed and overcame. Those stories are powerful, but that isn’t the one Kelly has to share right now. When she sat down with Davey to tell her story, Kelly was only six months out from losing her baby daughter Imogen. While walking through still fresh pain and grief, Kelly shares her story and talks about what it looks like to have faith not just on the mountaintop after the valley, but even in the middle of it.

“Blessing” is a word we throw around a lot in church circles. Every pastor has probably preached about it more times than they can count, and Mark Batterson is no exception. He’s even written about it in his newest book, Double Blessing. But what does a blessing actually look like? How do we know what is and isn’t a blessing? And what does it mean to see blessings even in the midst of trials? Mark unpacks all this and beyond in conversation with Davey about blessings, prayer, trials, and more.

Kasey Van Norman knows firsthand how God takes our trials and our pain and turns them around for good. She’s written a book called Nothing Wasted, and the title alone tells you that she is no stranger to the sort of things we talk about on this podcast. Kasey learned the hard way that God doesn’t waste anything when trauma early in her life left her with a disconnect between what she believed about God for others and what she believed for herself. Kasey sits down with Davey to share her story of sexual trauma, infidelity, cancer, and more, and how she’s learned firsthand through it all that nothing is wasted.

Trauma has a weird way of sneaking up on us. So many of us have experienced traumas big and small that we don’t even know the effects of to this day. These things that happen in the past live with us in the present and shape our lives without our noticing. This is at the root of the work that Aundi Kolber does. As a professional counselor and author, Aundi tries to help people to understand the trauma that they’ve experienced and how to heal from emotional wounds both seen and unseen. Aundi sits down with Davey to share some of her own story of dealing with trauma and the tools she’s learned to help others deal with theirs.

Nona Jones had what looked on the outside like success. She got a job at a Fortune 100 company at only 23, and her professional life only seemed to go up and to the right from there. Married to a pastor and with a deep faith of her own, it seemed that Nona had the “perfect” Christian life. But under the surface, trauma that had gone unaddressed built up until it could no longer be ignored, and Nora found herself in a crisis. Was all her success really enough? In her newest book Success from the Inside Out, Nona talks about how to deal with your past to have real success in the present. Nona sits down with Davey to share her story and how she’s learned to overcome her past traumas and help others do the same.

Justin Skeesuck and Patrick Gray are, quite literally, lifelong best friends. Born only a couple days apart in the same small-town hospital, there hasn’t been a day when the two weren’t close. But when a teenaged Justin was diagnosed with a degenerative neuromuscular disease, both of their lives and their friendship were changed forever. Through unimaginable trial, these two friends have dedicated their lives to bringing the hope of Jesus to whoever they encounter. Justin and Patrick sit down with Davey to share their story and the things they’ve learned about friendship and hope in the midst of trials.

From the outside, you could look at Ciara Weese’s life and see something close to a modern-day fairy tale. Married to her kindergarten best friend with a baby on the way and jobs as youth pastors at a church, Ciara’s life today bears little resemblance to the darkness in her past. Under the weight of trauma kept secret, unhealed wounds, and unspoken temptation, Ciara found herself cheating on her husband with other women. She walked away from her husband and from God, but that’s not where her story ends. God met Ciara in a New York apartment, hundreds of miles from the love of her life, dating another woman and contemplating suicide. Ciara sits down with Davey to share her powerful story in the conclusion to our Toxic Relationship Series.

When Gary Thomas wrote Sacred Marriage, he probably didn’t know the amount of impact he would have. Now, with nearly a million copies sold, his words have been responsible for helping heal and sustain countless marriages. Which is, in part, why it’s so interesting that his newest book is called When To Walk Away. In the years since his earlier book, Gary has learned that in any relationship, whether friendship, marriage, family, or anything else, staying in a relationship with a person is not always for the best. Gary sits down with Davey to continue our series on toxic relationships by discussing what he’s learned about dealing with toxic people, and when the best thing we can do for ourselves and them is to walk away.

It’s easy to think of human trafficking as something that happens “somewhere else.” We’d all agree that it’s a horrendous evil, but our subconscious minds dull its edges by framing it as happening in countries thousands of miles away or in the distant past. But for millions of people in the world today, human trafficking is a monster that must be confronted each and every day. For years, Rebecca Bender was one of those people. Caught in a relationship that wasn’t what it seemed, Rebecca was forced through deceit, threats, and abuse to do things she never would have chosen. To continue our Toxic Relationships Series, Rebecca sits down with Davey to share her story of how she escaped from the hell of human trafficking and how she’s found redemption and purpose on the other side.

Relationships that are worth having are never easy. While this is true for any relationship from friends to family members, it may never be more true than in romance. Anyone, whether single, dating, engaged or married, will tell you that a good relationship with a significant other takes work. Debra Fileta knows this all too well as a licensed counselor specializing in relationships. She often sees people when their relationships are falling apart, and over her years of working with these individuals and couples she’s picked up a ton of wisdom about how to navigate these choppy waters. Debra joins Davey to kick off our Toxic Relationships Series and share some of her knowledge about how we can avoid toxic relationships and keep ours healthy and whole.

After a lifetime of trauma and hardship, healing and wholeness can seem unattainable. Every new trial feels like a step in the wrong direction, and eventually we look up and the life we want to live seems impossibly far away. This is where Kristi Blackburn’s story begins. She’s walked through more trials than anyone should have to face: an abusive father left her fearing for her life and the lives of her family. A physical assault in a foreign country left her injured and anxious. A failed marriage left her a single mother with seemingly no hope of a “normal” home life. No one would want to walk through any one of these, but Kristi has faced all of them and more. For this special 100th episode of the Nothing Is Wasted Podcast, Kristi sits down with Davey to share her incredible story of how God has walked with her through countless hardships and brought healing in ways she never would have expected.

Just about every pastor has preached at least a few sermons on how to go through trials. They can have all the right scriptures, all the best theology, all the best words to encourage and inspire the people they’ve been entrusted with. But what happens when a trial hits the pastor’s life? That’s what Mark Vroegop found himself asking when he and his wife lost their unborn daughter just weeks before she would have been born. As further medical complications made the aftermath of this tragedy even more difficult to navigate, Mark and his wife found themselves in a place where everything they believed was tested. And in that season they learned a deeper way to relate to God. They learned to lament. Mark sits down with Davey to talk about what he’s learned about walking through suffering and how we can develop a deeper relationship with God by trusting him with our pain.

It seemed like everything was right in Rebekah Lyons’ world. Recently moved to New York and with her children all in elementary school, it seemed like Rebekah was living a great life. But anxiety was lurking just below the surface, waiting to change all that. After her first panic attack left her lying on the floor of an airplane, Rebekah found herself living at the whims of anxiety and depression. But she found freedom from it, and now she wants to help others do the same. As a national speaker and bestselling author, Rebekah has made it her mission to help people find the same freedom and purpose that she has. Rebekah sits down with Davey to talk about her story, her newest book Rhythms of Renewal, and how we can structure our lives to find freedom from anxiety.

At age nine, John O’Leary’s world was very literally set on fire. Childish curiosity got the best of him, and playing with a gas can left him with burns over his entire body and an incredibly slim chance for survival. But when John came out of the hospital, this literal inferno had stirred up a metaphorical fire inside him. John now makes it his mission to help and inspire others by sharing his story and teaching people how to ignite the same “fire” that still burns in his soul. John sits down with Davey to share his story and what he’s learned through it.

Terry Wardle’s upbringing was not an easy one. Growing up impoverished in rural America, young Terry watched his family struggle through an unbelievable amount of disfunction. Crime, violence, and death became staples of his life, and this exposure to things that no young child should see made a lasting impact. Years later, all these hurts bubbled up to the surface. Terry had a successful ministry, but the unresolved pain in his life had left him in a dark place. It was only when he began to intentionally confront this years-old hurt that Terry began to find healing. Terry sits down with Davey to share some of his story and how he’s teaching others how to heal well from old wounds.

It seemed like an evening like any other for Karen Millsap. She picked up her kids from her husband’s CrossFit gym in the evening and headed home to do some work. But a single phone call was all it would take to shatter the illusion of normalcy forever. Amid the chaos on the other end of the phone, Karen was able to make out just one word. “Shot.” By the time she got there it was too late, and Karen found herself widowed at only 29 years old. Karen sits down with Davey to talk about the things she’s learned from grief and how she’s using her story to help others who find themselves in the same situation.

Debra Moerke’s story is one that is almost hard to process. It’s a story of immense tragedy and hardship, but also one of incredible grace and forgiveness. Being a foster parent couldn’t have seemed easy, but when Debra agreed to take in a group of siblings from an abusive home, she could never have foreseen the amount of pain that she was about to step into. But out of that pain, God thought Debra an incredible lesson in forgiveness, and now in her book Murder, Motherhood, and Miraculous Grace, Debra shares that lesson. She sits down with Davey to talk about this story and what God has taught her through it all.

When Sarah Forgrave was only four years old, her older sister was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. The doctors said her chances of survival were slim. This worst case scenario became “normal” for Sarah as she spent some of her most formative years watching her sister’s four-year battle with cancer. Having walked through this trial, Sarah found herself unknowingly prepared for more to come, and as an adult she would watch her loved ones face more medical trauma and eventually go through it herself. Through all the valleys she’s watched and walked through, Sarah found her purpose. She sits down with Davey to share how she found the power in stories and how she’s using hers to help others.