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Welcome to episode 200!!!!
Praise God and thank you to all my listeners!!!!
The Fierce Calling Podcast is part of Fierce Calling Ministries which exists to encourage, equip, and engage women to take action where their passion, compassion, and conviction intersect, use their God-given gifts to impact the world for Christ, and partner with God in Kingdom work.
In this milestone episode …
Doris welcomes Dawn Ward, a dedicated author, speaker, biblical life coach, and founder of the transformative ministry, The Faith to Flourish. which helps women grow and flourish in their relationship with Jesus in all seasons of their lives. Dawn delves into her personal journey from her childhood in a typical Midwestern family to navigating the tumultuous waters of addiction within her family. Through her story, Dawn shares profound insights into how God intervened in her life, steering her from overwhelming fear and guilt toward a path of trust and surrender.
Together, Doris and Dawn explore the intersecting lines of passion, compassion, and conviction that mark Dawn’s fierce calling, offering hope and Christian guidance to women burdened by life’s challenges.
Join us for an episode filled with encouragement and inspiration as Dawn reveals how her faith, fortified by God’s word, guided her through the trials of addiction in her family and empowered her to assist other women seeking hope and healing!
Key Topics and Takeaways …
*Dawn’s Personal Story
*Family Struggles with Addiction
*Emotional and Spiritual Journey
*Research and Seeking Help
*Support and Community Building
*Dawn Ward’s Ministry and Writing
*Impact of Dawn’s Ministry
*Call to Action and Resources
Connect with Dawn!
You can connect with dawn on her website thefaithtoflourish.com where you’ll find her resources, blog, her book From Guilt to Grace, social media links, and more!
Dawn is married to her wonderfully supportive husband, Steve, and is the mother of three adult children. She and her family live in Las Vegas, a city of bright lights, surrounded by the dry, barren Mohave desert. Thus, the name The Faith to Flourish was born. Dawn founded this ministry out of a desire to help other women grow and flourish in their relationship with Jesus in all seasons of their lives.
Professionally, until recently, she worked over 25 years in the medical field, primarily with female patients. Dawn has also served in women’s ministry in various teaching and leadership capacities for over thirty years. Both opportunities have given her invaluable perspective into the hearts and lives of women. Dawn’s passions are teaching, discipling, and equipping women to live victorious lives of faith.
Because of the painful seasons of experiencing the trauma of watching her family members engage in self-destructive behaviors, Dawn was falling apart along with them. And sadly, her relationship with the Lord was also suffering.
Dawn didn’t want to just say that Jesus was first in her life, she wanted Jesus to be first in her life. Dawn wanted to trust him in the good times, and yes, even in the bad, and longed to grow in grace while drawing closer to the Lord.
Dawn took a deep dive into God’s word and discovered God is always faithful and his word never fails. She learned that the destructive life choices of others are hard, but so are many other trials we face in our lifetime.
Her heart is for women to know that regardless of the journey each of us is on, it’s her heart’s desire to see each of us flourishing in our faith, rooted in God’s word, and growing in his grace.
Connect with Doris!
Connect with Doris at https://dorisswift.com/ For speaking engagements, visit her booking page at womenspeakers.com
Join us for this heartening episode of Fierce Calling and be inspired to deepen your biblical study and walk with God.
What Threatens to Steal Your Joy?
Check out Surrender the Joy Stealers: Rediscover the Jesus Joy in You 6-week Bible study rooted in John 15. You can find more info at https://dorisswift.com/book/
Let’s Stay Connected!
Find my free resources including Fear Fighting Bible Verses, Simple Tips for Sharing Your Faith, Surrender the Joy Stealers, Step Out of Your Doubt and Into Your Calling ebook, and more on my dorisswift.com homepage!
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Thanks for Listening!
I hope this episode with Nancy encouraged, inspired, and challenged you to cultivate community, live and walk in the value and worth God gave you, and take action where your passion, compassion, and conviction intersect. You’ll find links in the show notes to connect with Nancy and with me.
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Stay tuned for more amazing content and remember to check the show notes for all the links mentioned.
Thank you for being a part of our community. We are grateful for your continued support and encourage you to embrace the unique gifts that make you magnificently you.
I hope you’ll join me next time when I talk with another woman who is taking action where her passion, compassion, and conviction intersect …
Until then friend, have a blessed week, and I’ll talk to you soon.
With love and joy,
Doris
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Transcript
Doris [00:01:56]:
Welcome back to the show. Today, I am excited to introduce to you my friend, Dawn Ward. She is an author, a speaker, and biblical coach. I love it. Biblical life coach. This is gonna be an awesome conversation. She is the founder of the Faith to Flourish, and it’s a ministry that equips women with addicted loved ones to break free from the cycle of addiction, reclaim their lives, and flourish in their faith. So needed for today.
Doris [00:02:25]:
The faith to flourish also offers life transforming insight, wisdom, and Christian guidance for all women along with hope and support to those who feel burdened and overwhelmed by life. This is a powerful ministry. Welcome to the show, Dawn. It’s so great to have you on.
Dawn Ward [00:02:43]:
Storis, thank you for having me.
Doris [00:02:45]:
Yes. This is just something that I when I saw that you were you had written this book and that you had posted about it, and I just thought I need to reach out to Dawn and have her come on the show because this is just something that people need so much encouragement, and they need to know they’re not alone. And they need resources and tools to be able to look at these things from a biblical perspective and regain the hope that maybe they’ve lost because of what’s happening in their particular situations. So I would love if you would share a little bit about your story and then how you are taking action where your passion, compassion, and conviction intersect, which is your fierce calling.
Dawn Ward [00:03:30]:
Yes. It is. Well, again, thank you for having me. You know, my story really does start back in my childhood. I grew up in probably a very typical family. We were a midwestern family and came and moved to Las Vegas when I was a little girl. My father joined the fire department. And along with being in the fire department comes, you know, drinking beer and socializing and all the things the guys were involved in.
Dawn Ward [00:03:53]:
My uncles were also part of the fire department. But what I noticed when I was a little girl was that when they’re when my uncles drank, they got funny and, you know, silly and goofed off and everything. My dad got angry. And so I was often afraid of him. He didn’t hit me or anything like that, but he was just loud and, you know, his voice was so deep and everything. And I just remember being afraid. And so when I was about 4 years old, between the age of 4 5, I’m not being raised in a Christian home. My mother did take us to the Lutheran Church on the holidays, and I remember feeling God there and feeling his love there.
Dawn Ward [00:04:30]:
But I didn’t know much about Jesus or anything. But when I was about 4 or 5 years old, I remember that the Lord reached down and took my hand, and he said, hold on to my hand and never let go because you’re going to need me for this life. And that is very important to where, you know, my journey as I moved forward. So when I finally had got married, had kids of my own, I wanted to make sure that they didn’t have the same struggles that my dad, my uncles had with substances. And so if they were in Christian school and we went to the Christian church and they had Christian friends, and I did everything I could to vet who they hung out with and control their circumstances, just determined that, you know, they would not end up drinking. And I told them it’s just very dangerous and stay away from it. But it never crossed my mind that drugs would enter the picture, And I just didn’t. I I knew what alcohol looked like.
Dawn Ward [00:05:23]:
I knew what it smelled like. I had just never been around drugs or substances. And so I I mean, I probably had been around some people that maybe had smoked pot or something, and I just thought, you know, they acted silly and had red eyes and stuff, but I don’t even know anything more than that. So when my son started going through some changes, it was his last year of high school, and I noticed his attitude changing. I caught him smoking cigarettes. I noticed that his, you know, his, cleanliness, his hygiene wasn’t what it should be, grade slipping, those type of things. And I was like, what’s wrong with you? And I thought he was just burned out of high school and bored and but he’d always wanted to go to college and always been involved in sports and music. And so it just seems so uncharacteristic of him.
Dawn Ward [00:06:09]:
And when I would confront him, he would say, mom, nothing. Nothing. But one day, he did come home and tell my husband and I that he had thought he was smoking marijuana, but actually felt it was whatever he was he was smoking, he was addicted to. And so just like they laced drugs with very potent and addictive substances today, This happened almost 20 years ago, and they were doing it back then as well. And so he didn’t even really know what he was involved in. And, of course, you know, I panicked. We ran to the rescue, went to the doctor. They did, you know, some a urine test on him and then figured out what he was, you know, what he was involved with.
Dawn Ward [00:06:49]:
And it was just one of those things where he he had bitten off more than he he could chew by hanging out with the wrong crowd. And for me, I just saw that these substances were addictive, and I thought, oh my gosh. Those old sayings, like, once an addict, always an addict, that that, you know, most people don’t survive addiction. They will die from it. Those kind of thing things started to play in my mind. And I I had been parenting with fear my entire life, afraid that this would happen, and now I was dealing with it and it and it had happened. And so at that point, I kind of feel like my faith flew right out the window. I was just operating in mom mode, trying to save my child, trying to figure out what to do to help him.
Dawn Ward [00:07:31]:
And he because he wanted help. The counseling that we got for him really was beneficial because he was like, gosh. You know? I think he was naive and dumb probably from going to Christian school and just not having any idea what’s out there. And and so he really fought hard. And, you know, I had some slip ups along the way, but when he graduated from high school, he realized that being around those friends was only gonna, you know, cause him more problems and not blaming them, but you are the company you keep. And he wanted more for his life. And so he did go away to go to school, and he actually became a mental health and substance abuse counselor. He’s not doing that now.
Dawn Ward [00:08:13]:
He’s he’s gone into, another area of medicine, but he but he really grew from that experience. So when we thought that, you know, we dodged this bullet, if you’re looking at a situation where your kids get involved in drugs, even if they are addictive substances, this was more of a this was kind of that most ideal situation in that, you know, for a young kid to actually want help and ask for it is a really big deal and and an answer to prayer. So we we thought, hey. You know, we’re doing pretty good here. And then a few it wasn’t too much longer. Probably, maybe a year afterwards, his brother had his older brother who had already gone to college, had already graduated from college, had a surgery on his stomach, and they were prescribing him very strong opiates during that period when they said they weren’t addictive. And so many people were addicted to prescription drugs during that time, our son being one of them. And I remember taking him to our family doctor and saying, what’s going on? And she said, well, these drugs are addictive.
Dawn Ward [00:09:15]:
And I said, no one told us that. And he was on them for probably 3 months or so. And she said, I’m sorry. The, you know, medical system has failed you. And so at that point, he had had more mental health issues, struggles with depression, anxiety, a lot of it due to the chronic pain. This was a congenital birth defect that he needed surgery for, and so it was something that took many years for them to figure out and finally do the surgery on it. And I think along with that came some anxiety and social, you know, situations and things just from chronic pain. So I think for him, it was like mother’s milk.
Dawn Ward [00:09:49]:
I think it did a lot to help him with his mental health or make him feel mentally better and calmer and everything. So it had twofold, you know, purpose in his life, which was relieving the physical and the mental pain. And his situation did take us and him lower, more like the legal problems, the mental health breakdowns, the, you know, situations where he was in jail, those type of things happened with him. And that’s when I really was faced with the like, this is real and this is hard, and this is what you know, all my fears came out when it came time to start dealing with it. This this this next wave of addiction hit so much harder. It was like a tsunami, yeah, instead of a tidal wave. Yeah.
Doris [00:10:37]:
That’s tough. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you went through with your your one son and then to have this happen again, but it’s, like, different, but still yet the same. You know, you have the same mom mode where you wanna fix it
Dawn Ward [00:10:53]:
Mhmm.
Doris [00:10:53]:
And then the fears and then all of the things that, like you said, that we hear those phrases all the time, you know, that once an addict, always an addict, and and that kind of thing that really can put your mindset into an unhealthy place. Right?
Dawn Ward [00:11:09]:
Right. Yeah. I I think a lot of these I think a lot of these kinda sayings, you know, they come from maybe 50, 60 years ago when they didn’t understand, brains and how they operate and the neuro pathways and, you know, what what we think and what we speak has is so critical to how we see ourself and and how we do in life. And if we grow up always saying, I’m nothing but a loser. I’m so stupid. I nobody loves me. If we’re saying things like that to ourselves, we’re not going to think very highly of ourselves. And so I feel the same thing when it comes to addiction.
Dawn Ward [00:11:48]:
As a believer in Jesus Christ, he who the son has set free is free indeed. And I do believe that that God has the path. God has the answers. And they may not look the same for everyone else, but he wants our children and our loved ones to have a life that’s free from substances. And so I had to start to shift my thinking because it I was really overwhelmed with fear. And after fear came the guilt and shame because with when you’re when you have one kid, your parent, you know, your father, different people in your family, you kind of can give yourself a little wiggle room. By the time I got to my second son, now any wiggle room I had being an adult child who grew up in an alcoholic home, I am being told you kids are the reason dad drinks, your kids are the reason mom and dad fight. All those things that I pushed away as being lies, they just came flooding in on me.
Dawn Ward [00:12:40]:
And now it’s like, okay, mom. If you thought you had to get out of jail free card with the first one, 2 sons, this is on you. It’s either your family genes. It’s either how you raise them. It’s their environment. Whatever it is, mom, there’s no escaping this. And so that’s really where god wanted to work was on me and on my heart and on my mind because I was in so much pain feeling this guilt and this shame and this personal responsibility, then having it powered by my fear, that kind of faith and trust and hope went out the window there. I still had the lord in my life.
Dawn Ward [00:13:17]:
I loved him very much. I’d never let go of his hand, but it was like I had relegated him to the back passenger seat of the car. He didn’t get even get to sit in the front seat. It was like, I’m driving this. Hold on, lord. We’re going for a ride. And and so that’s what he had to work with me on was trust and surrender.
Doris [00:13:37]:
Yeah. That is so key. The trust and surrender. And how earlier in the conversation you were talking about when you were a little girl, you just remember at that young age that God wanted to hold your hand and wanted you to never let go. And then here, like you were just saying, you were taking the front seat and trying to take control over all of that. And and then also how you had said that you kind of went into this mode that was not integrated with your faith. It was just something where you were kind of going down this other avenue and your faith was kind of out here somewhere. And, but the fact being that it it was amazing that your son, when when you first had this issue with your family and your first son that went through this, that he wanted help, and he asked for it because that that was a really big step for him to do.
Doris [00:14:39]:
And then with your other son going through all of this, and it was just kind of it reminded me too about years ago when people said that smoking they didn’t tell us about smoking, you know, what the hazards are with smoking. And we just lost my dad. It was a year ago, this, Veterans Day, my dad passed away from lung cancer. It’s there’s a lot of misinformation out there, and it is so important for us to stay close to the truth, which is God’s word, and also to be informed. And he opens the doors for us to find out these things. I imagine that you did a lot of research. Right? So how did that work for you? How did you go about doing that?
Dawn Ward [00:15:23]:
When my when I first, you know, saw this was happening with my child, I was asking everybody online doing research, looking at programs, trying to understand it. And I just, you know, did what moms do, and that is, you know, kind of say, hey. This is what we’re gonna do. This is how we’re gonna fix it. And and that was it kind of gave me a little bit of a fake or a puffed up idea that it can be this easy for everyone with my first son. And I want you to know it wasn’t easy. It was a journey of probably about a year and a half or so with hiccups along the way and different things. So even though he wanted to get, you know, himself into a good place, he still was a kid, and he still, you know, thought he knew it all and all of this.
Dawn Ward [00:16:09]:
But as I would push and use the boundaries and do the things that my counselor had taught me to do, he would actually mold to that. He would change it. He would shift and so this idea of boundaries was really helpful in his case. But, also, remember, he was young. He was a minor. He was not he didn’t turn 18 till close to graduation. So he had that rough months in there that he was still a minor, really needed mom and dad. His older brother had already graduated from college.
Dawn Ward [00:16:39]:
He was living on his own. He thought he had it all figured out. He wasn’t used to coming to us with everything. And then all of a sudden, this is going on, and his life is spiraling out of control. And now I’m really in hyperdrive as supermom because this is not working as well as it did with his younger brother. And so what happened with me was I finally realized that I was putting more effort into researching how to help them than I was in the word, understanding what the word says about addiction. And God has a lot to say about everything that concerns us. He’s not silent on the matter of addiction.
Dawn Ward [00:17:21]:
What I had failed when I would go to some support groups and things, the traditional support groups, is I would leave so despondent where a lot of people feel very encouraged and uplifted by the support. It just didn’t ring true to what I understood as far as god’s character, what his word said. And that just possibly could be the groups that I went to, you know, in my search for the the right place to go. And maybe the lord wanted me to be somewhat disillusioned with them so that I would do what he knew I would do because my my gifting is teaching the word of god, and that’s always been my calling. I’ve been a women’s ministry for 30 years, and I’m just one that’s just gonna dig as deep as I can to understand what I can in the bible. But it just seemed like I was spending a lot more time researching what science had to say, what medicine had to say, and that was all good. But what was happening was I was feeling like, my faith was becoming weaker and weaker. So the knowledge wasn’t power for me.
Dawn Ward [00:18:22]:
What the knowledge was doing for me was causing me to put my eyes on it and not have my eyes on the lord. And remember, we all bring up different faith, you know, our life experiences and everything to the table when we go through these things. He god wanted me to be disappointed in anything else but him. So that was my experience. And so whether it was faith based or secular counseling, support groups, I always felt like it was like, well, yeah, god’s there. Jesus is there. He cares. He’s gonna help he’s going to help you help them.
Dawn Ward [00:19:00]:
Not he’s going to help them. Yes. Right? Yeah. Or he’s going to save them or he’s going to save you. It was he’s you know, in other words, he’s gonna help me, but mommy to the rescue. Yeah. And and so and I had to come to terms with it. That wasn’t the truth.
Dawn Ward [00:19:16]:
The truth was that I had to let go and let him work in the life of my child because he had a lot of work to do in me. And letting go doesn’t mean giving up. Mhmm. A lot of people kind of it has a little bit of a bad taste to it. Right? But in actuality, it’s not. It’s more of stop meddling. Mhmm. And trust me.
Dawn Ward [00:19:36]:
You know, let go and let god stop meddling mom and trust me in my case. And so what happened with me was by the time my older son was going through this and had been going through this, and we had dealt with a few suicide attempts, mental health breakdown, psychosis, come to find out some mental health diagnosis that we didn’t know about, things like that. So when it finally came to the point where god was, like, I have got to deal with this woman because she is losing it. It was at that point where I was functioning. I was going to work by all outward appearances. Everything looked like I had it together. And but in my mind, I could hear my brain over and over saying, you have to fix your son. You have to fix your son.
Dawn Ward [00:20:20]:
It was like if a if a radio was playing in the background real quietly. So even if you and I are having this conversation, I would hear that. It gave me a lot of empathy for people who do struggle with mental health issues and things to understand that our brains can really get to that point where they’re, like, at a snap, where they’re just they are worn out and lack of sleep, and there’s just things going on. And for me, that control, people pleasing, perfectionism, all the things I brought with me from childhood were they had a choke hold on me, and that was just playing over and over. And finally, my husband was the one who said, you know, you’re gonna worry yourself to death. And I always tell everybody, this is my moment. My moment was when he said that, and I said, you have permission to write that on my tombstone. She worried herself to death.
Dawn Ward [00:21:07]:
And I saw the words written on my on my tombstone, you know, in the cemetery. And that’s when I heard god’s voice again like I did when I was a little girl. And it said, no. He said, I want you to I wanted to say she trusted god. And so for me, that shift that took place was how does it look for me as the mom of these sons who have struggled? My husband also struggled with addiction to pain medications and also addiction to gambling. So at this point, everyone, every man in my life that I loved and was close to had struggled with addiction in one form or another. And I just was spiraling. And so what does it look like for Dawn to trust God? Because it was one thing for me to say, okay, God.
Dawn Ward [00:21:48]:
I hear what you’re saying. I hear you, Jesus. You’re saying you want me to trust you. I obviously haven’t been doing a very good job of that. So where do I go from here? And for me, the very first thing I had I felt like I was being led to do was to stop getting on and googling how to fix my child, how to save my child, what’s the best program to put my child in. I mean, I am talking about I was looking at programs in Mexico. I was looking in Costa Rica. I was looking everywhere for that little ray of hope.
Dawn Ward [00:22:22]:
And this is where parents go broke and everything because looking for that one thing I haven’t spent money on yet to fix my child. And so as I was, you know, looking at all these things, he said, I want you to I want you to go on and Google help for Christian moms of addicted children. I just felt it in my heart. And I did come across a few resources at the time. Now remember, this was 15 to 20 years ago, depending on which son we’re talking about. 10 years ago is probably no. A little bit more than 10 years ago. Probably about 12 years ago is when I really decided, lord, we’re gonna work on me.
Dawn Ward [00:22:54]:
You know? Like, I’m surrendering. And so when I started to Google, I found a few things. So I do my research. And but the best thing that it did for me is it gave me permission to I needed permission to let go of trying to save my child and let the lord work on me. And that meant feeling maybe a little selfish sometimes, maybe a little bit guilty. Like, all the feelings were still there of, mom, how can you possibly go spend money with on a Christian counselor for yourself when you should be spending that money to save your child? Like, that’s the mindset I had. Mhmm. And so those were the things that I had to start to work on just feeling uncomfortable, understanding that growing and growing pains don’t always feel good, but allowing god to start to work in my life.
Dawn Ward [00:23:44]:
And I took a real deep dive into the scriptures then to say, lord, I know that you talk about everything in here. Help me to have understanding. Help me to have wisdom. Give me a heart of wisdom in how to move forward with my child and how to talk about addiction. I feel like I’m not I feel like I’m leaving you out of it because it seems like you’re almost silent on it. Come to find out he’s not. So those are some of the things that the Lord worked on with me when he started working on my heart and changing my attitude.
Doris [00:24:11]:
Yeah. Wow. That was really a powerful thing that you had shared just now because I think people are gonna listen to this and say, wow. That’s me or that’s where I am or that’s where I’ve been. And just because when you were explaining how you were looking at everything else, and it it kinda brought back that thing that you said earlier that God was in the back seat, you know, just kinda sitting in the back seat. And sometimes we feel like God is silent, but I also love how you brought out the fact that, yes, all the solutions for life that we need are in God’s word. And so to dig deep in there and to find what he has to say about things and for his constant reminder, because he was near to you, and he was reminding you, seek me, come to me, open my word, and find refreshment there because that whole gap, it’s expensive, it’s it’s time consuming. Trying to fix things on our own when we try to do those things on our own.
Doris [00:25:25]:
So and the fact being too that you had things in your own life that you had not yet dealt with or really didn’t maybe even realize that it’s something you had to deal with. And like you said, when this started, it kinda broke that open. Well, you know, broke it wide open to where you also needed the help that God wanted to offer to you. Because we we really I mean, we can’t do anything for anyone else if we are not healed and whole ourselves. So that’s so important to be also not feeling guilty when there’s there’s a need that we have. That’s not a selfish need. It’s it’s a healthy disciple, healthy mom, healthy parent, healthy wife kind of a need, you know, that we have. So when you started then because you started the ministry, how did that come about? And you have a beautiful website, by the way.
Doris [00:26:25]:
It’s just beautiful, and it’s just very calming and peaceful. And it’s just like when someone goes to your site, they can say, wow. I can find some encouragement and some hope and some help here through a biblical perspective. So just, share with us, like, when you were beginning this journey in this ministry, maybe it was because you didn’t find what you needed and you felt like God was calling you to to step in and fill that void. So what did that look like?
Dawn Ward [00:26:54]:
Now what had happened was when I was googling and finding some help for myself, I came across a woman who was writing in that space where her faith she wasn’t hiding her faith, but it was definitely more secular. In that, it was open for anyone to just any mom to have that discussion and and to, you know, talk about their child’s addiction and all of that. And so I got a hold of her resources, and as I was going through one of her workbooks, I just kept making it, like, more and more of a bible study. Every question she asked, I went to the word. I I sought out the lord, and I was writing down the scriptures and writing what god had to say about it, and I’d go back through and do it again. And somehow, another her and I connected, and I showed her my workbook. And I said, I’ve gone through it 3 times, and god keeps showing me more and more. And so she said, well, would you like to meet? And maybe we can write a faith based workbook.
Dawn Ward [00:27:47]:
And that’s what her and I ended up doing as we ended up writing a faith based workbook. And, you know, it was really a good process for me because it I had buried my love for writing and everything when I was a a young girl in school. I love to write. And but when I got older and, you know, had to pick a career for myself, my my parents always said, oh, writing’s a hobby, and you’ll never make any money from it. And so I tucked it away and just did my administrative type duties. What happened was I in the process of her and I working on this book, the Lord really started to bring out my love for the study of his word and writing and and presenting in such a way that it would help other women to, you know, to face some of these hard decisions, some of these hard things in life in a practical and compassionate way. And so when I that kind of inspired me to start a blog. You know? There was a few things I was and I didn’t even know what a blog was.
Dawn Ward [00:28:44]:
I’m getting a little bit ahead of myself because what happened was in that time frame there, the Lord gave me a vision for a beautiful pasture, water, sheep, everything was happy, beautiful, gorgeous, and he wanted me to start a a ministry. And I was working full time. I was in the medical field. I worked as a licensed medical aesthetician doing skin care and plastic surgery and dermatology, and I’ve been doing it for many years. And so it wasn’t like I had a lot of time on my hands to go do start a ministry at the church or anything like that, but I I felt like he wanted me to use take the opportunity to use social media. And I had really other than the support group that her and I had that was more secular, I just didn’t really see where where my place would be. But the lord’s when he told me this, I said to him, this sounds great. I’m all in.
Dawn Ward [00:29:37]:
Anything but addiction. And, I mean, I have really fought him tooth and nail on the addiction thing, and now there’s a reason for it. It’s because I felt so you know, like, I had I was wrestling with all my own things. Like, I felt so ill equipped. I didn’t feel ready. I felt like they needed somebody else the god needed to sign somebody else up who had arrived, and I wasn’t there yet at that point. So he kinda went silent on me. And the second he went silent on me, I realized that’s what he was talking about.
Dawn Ward [00:30:07]:
And I just didn’t know what it was gonna look like. Finally, a a few months later, he said, I want you to start a Facebook group. At this time, my friend had dissolved her Facebook group. She was doing other things. And I was like, lord, there’s so many Facebook groups. Why do we need another one? And he was not having it this time. No arguing. Just told me to do it.
Dawn Ward [00:30:26]:
And so this time, I was like, okay. I started the group. He gave me the name, Christian moms of addicted children. Back then, it was called Christian moms of addicts, but they don’t like labels. And so we eventually changed the name to addicted children. And so when I started it, I didn’t know what it was gonna look like, and he didn’t give me much information. Once I started it, he said, okay. You’re gonna pray for their children, encourage the moms, and glorify me.
Dawn Ward [00:30:51]:
So I realized it wasn’t going to be a group where we were advocating, lobbying for law changes, teaching the science, teaching the medical side of things. That wasn’t gonna be the discussion there. This was going to be a place where moms could come and receive prayer and encouragement and god’s word. And so that’s how that started. And then in the process, I think with the desire for me to write and just knowing everything he had done for me, he told me to start a blog. I didn’t know how to start a blog. I started a blog. And over and then over time, it just grew and it evolved.
Dawn Ward [00:31:27]:
And so that’s how we got to the place where the Lord had me write a book. And the main reason I think for the book was when I first started writing because I’ve been a Bible teacher for a long time and I love to study the word, I started writing a bible study called faithful God’s relentless love for wandering hearts, and it was based on the book of Hosea. When I was studying boundaries, God showed me how much he had to say about boundaries, and the book of Hosea was a wealth of knowledge. So that was where I was kind of starting to work through this process of writing this bible study. And then and the lord says, no. I want you to make it a book. So all that deep dive into the scriptures and everything that I had learned to prepare for this bible study, which I did right, but but all of that, he wanted me to bring it down concisely and put it into a book. And to take those chapters that were in the bible study and make them into a book.
Dawn Ward [00:32:23]:
And he wanted me to put some of our family’s story in there. Now as a bible teacher, it’s very easy to hide behind the teaching and the bible and not put a lot of your own stuff out there. So I really wasn’t a big fan of that idea. And so as my developmental editor was working with me, that was one thing she said. She goes, I really like your stories in here, but you need more. So the challenge yeah. The challenge for me was to become more transparent Mhmm. That that that this ministry wasn’t gonna be me teaching at them, but me living out what I was going through and what they were going through, but living it out in front of them.
Dawn Ward [00:33:01]:
And so this was like this you know, I got plopped down the middle of this, whirlwind, and the Lord was like, make some sense of it because you’re gonna write from this place right here. And that’s how the book came about.
Doris [00:33:13]:
Wow. That’s great. Yeah. Because we’re connected by our stories, and sometimes we think, oh, this is TMI or or people might not even be interested in anything to do with my story, but but people love to be connected and hear stories, and it’s just something that helps them feel a connection in some way. And the the book is From Guilt to Grace, Hope and Healing for Christian Moms of Addicted Children, and it’s such a needed needed resource. It just released just a few months ago, and this has been an amazing conversation. And I really do love also that you pointed out the fact that we don’t wanna label people as addicts because it’s not their identity. That’s not who they are.
Doris [00:34:03]:
And when we say I’m a this, I’m a that, you know, it’s like I’m a child of God. That’s who I am. And so, just encouraging the families and their journey and their walk that they’re going through is really powerful, and it is a very fierce calling. And I just would love, Dawn, if you could share, how can the listener connect with you, find different resources that you feel might be of help to them, and grab this amazing book?
Dawn Ward [00:34:33]:
You know, one of the things I wanna say is that it takes a village. And and when I first got into this, that was one of my biggest arguments with god. It wasn’t that I I told you it was I felt ill equipped. He hadn’t given me 12 steps or 8 steps like celebrate recovery, and these are good programs that can really help people. And so I was like, lord, I don’t need to reinvent the wheel when there’s wisdom out there. There’s some wonderful programs like team challenge for our kids and even Salvation Army. I mean, there’s so many good biblical, programs out there if you wanna if they wanna be in a Christian program. Some do elect to go into secular programs because maybe they have a dual diagnosis.
Dawn Ward [00:35:13]:
They need help with their, medical issues and mental health issues as well. So there’s so much out there. That is where that was why I felt like, lord, I know you’re not calling me to reinvent the will when there are already good resources out there. And what he was calling me to do was to invite him into and to really focus on the spiritual side of things. And so you talked about the label addict. What people are often concerned about is that the church has kind of gotten itself a bad rap and a bad reputation. We’re we’ve come a long way. So I wanna make sure that I emphasize that.
Dawn Ward [00:35:53]:
But in the past, it was either a moral failure and sin or it was a disease. And because of that, if people went towards the disease camp, they hesitated to get into the church Christianity side of things because they thought that they would find guilt and shame there. And a lot of times they did. Or the church didn’t know how to handle it at all, so they just kinda set them back over to the secular type of, you know, of, help. And that’s where the lord really called me. He said, look. You know, there is we need each other. It takes a village.
Dawn Ward [00:36:28]:
Everyone needs each other. If you have, your arm amputated, you need a doctor in an ER to fix it. Like, you don’t need, you know, you don’t yes. I mean, I guess Jesus probably could do a miracle and grow the arm back. We don’t see a lot of that, but he could. But for the fact, most of us are gonna grab a tourniquet and head to the emergency room. So that’s really what I was looking for as I was writing this book is, lord, how can we come together and be unified, but really understand how to love on the people who are hurting. And the Lord teaches us so much about shame.
Dawn Ward [00:37:04]:
He, from the very beginning, when Adam and Eve first sinned, the first thing they did was try to cover up their nakedness because they felt ashamed. Very first thing they felt. 2nd thing they felt was fear, and they ran and hid from god. But when he came to find them, he addressed their issue. He addressed what they were going through, but then he covered them. And that’s the beauty of it is that we it’s not our place to play holy spirit. It’s not our place to get in the way if he allows them to feel some conviction. Because that conviction is meant to be this loving kindness that leads them to him, that leads them to repentance.
Dawn Ward [00:37:40]:
And my book contains all about what god did in my husband’s life in that area. So I know miracles are possible. And so I just say as far as the shame, as far as the guilt goes, we do not have a god who who heaps shame, guilt, condemnation on us as mothers or as our as our children. And, you know, and so the labels, yes. They’re we are children of the most high god, and he loves us. And so my hope is that that would be what they find when they come to me or to my site is just somebody who has been set free from that guilt and shame herself and is here to offer them that same hope and and healing through Jesus Christ and through his grace. So they can look for me at the faithoflorish.com. That’s my web page.
Dawn Ward [00:38:24]:
Also, the faith of flourish pretty much on Instagram, Facebook. I’m on those. The book is from Guilt to Grace, Hope, and Healing for Christian Moms of Addicted Children, and it’s available on Barnes and Noble, I think Walmart, Amazon. So I’m kind of flitting around out there. Thank you for having me.
Doris [00:38:43]:
Nice. Thank you so much. And if you’re listening to this today, be sure to check out Dawn’s site. And I’ll have the links in the show notes so you can find her, connect with her. And maybe this isn’t something that’s a story in your life or your family, but certainly, you know someone else who has been touched by this. And so please share about this and share Dawn’s ministry and about her book. And it’s just been, an amazing conversation and very powerful and filled with hope. And I just love so much that your heart is to help others to be encouraged and to find that hope.
Doris [00:39:28]:
And by sharing your own story of how God brought you through and how he is so faithful and how he’s always faithful. And it could be that story for them as well. So so thank you, Dawn, so much. I hope that we can have you back on the show again. I would love that.
Dawn Ward [00:39:45]:
Thank you so much.
Doris [00:39:47]:
Alright, friend. Well, thank you so much too, and God bless you and your ministry and your family as you walk this journey of a fierce calling and helping others to find hope and healing through Christ.
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