Gertrude Hobbs Chambers

Life

Gertrude Hobbs was born in England in 1883 (some sources give 1884). She learned shorthand (a technique for rapidly recording speech in symbols) through a correspondence course and is said to have been highly skilled, able to take down 250 words per minute. In May 1910 she married Oswald Chambers. Her husband called her "Biddy," from the initials B.D., for "Beloved Disciple." Their only child, a daughter named Kathleen, was born in 1913.

In 1915, during World War I, Oswald went to Egypt to minister to troops with the YMCA (Young Men's Christian Association). Two or three months later Gertrude followed with their daughter to the military camp at Zeitoun, near Cairo. On November 15, 1917, her husband died of complications following an appendectomy. At the request of the YMCA, Gertrude continued the camp ministry until the end of the war, returning to England in July 1919. She died on January 15, 1966.

Ministry and Achievements

In 1911 Oswald opened the Bible Training College in Clapham, London, in a building provided by an organization associated with the Holiness movement. Gertrude managed the school's household while recording every lecture in shorthand. During her husband's lifetime, these notes were published as Biblical Psychology (1912) and Studies in the Sermon on the Mount (1915).

After her husband's death in Egypt, she led morning services and taught Bible classes twice a week from his lecture notes. She also compiled his lectures into pamphlets that were issued monthly. In December 1917, Baffled to Fight Better, a compilation of Oswald's lectures on the Book of Job, was published.

After returning to England, she declined an offer to lead another Bible school. Instead, she ran a boardinghouse in Oxford while compiling the daily devotional My Utmost for His Highest. The book was published in 1927; its Korean edition is titled Junimeun naui choegobong ("The Lord Is My Highest Peak"). She is said to have kept none of the proceeds from its sales for herself, instead reinvesting them in publishing further books. By the time of her death, more than thirty books had appeared under her husband's name (some sources say more than fifty).

Influence on the Korean Church

There is no confirmed record of Gertrude having any direct connection with Korea. My Utmost for His Highest has been translated into more than thirty-nine languages, including Korean. Because Oswald published only two books during his lifetime, most of the writings that Korean readers use for personal devotions and similar purposes are based on Gertrude's shorthand records.

Assessment

For many years Gertrude remained little known, overshadowed by her husband's name. In 2017 Michelle Ule published the biography Mrs. Oswald Chambers, bringing renewed attention to her as the unsung contributor who made the devotional possible. It should be noted, however, that the devotional is not a manuscript written by Oswald himself; it is an edited compilation in which Gertrude selected material from various lectures and sermons and arranged it by date.