Testimony Tuesday: Dr. Smallwood

By Bella Agnello

“To get me to look more like Jesus, it’s probably going to be a painful process.”

Dr. Will Smallwood was only two and a half years into his new position as vice president of Advancement at Cedarville University when God would begin to radically deepen his faith. During Homecoming of 2023, Smallwood experienced a debilitating pain in his spine. Because his team is heavily involved in engaging with alumni during Homecoming, he prayed for God to get him through the weekend. When he finally had time to think about what caused the pain, he attributed it to genetics.

“The Smallwood men all had back issues, so I was like, ‘OK, now it’s my turn,’” he said. “But it didn’t disappear for a couple of weeks.”

The excruciating pain, followed by significant weight loss over a month, drove Smallwood to make an appointment with his doctor, who recommended an MRI. The week of Thanksgiving, the doctor called with the news that lesions had developed on his spine and could potentially be cancerous. After undergoing a biopsy and running blood tests, the doctor confirmed Smallwood had multiple myeloma, an incurable cancer that forms in bone marrow.

Smallwood had six months to live. He and his wife, Caroline, wrestled with God in prayer. In their questioning, Smallwood and his wife realized that asking God to explain why he gave him cancer would be met not with an explanation, but with an invitation to remember who he is even in their circumstance.

“We had to go back to the truths of Scripture: God is good, His steadfast love endures forever, He knows all things and He’s sovereign over all of our lives, even cancer,” Smallwood said. “We realized whether the Lord gives me six months or whether He gives me six years, all those are still true.”

On January 2, 2024, Smallwood started a five-month chemo process at Kettering Health’s Cancer Center at Soin Medical Center. The oncologist started the process earlier than typical cancer patients to increase his success rate. Through her, God again reminded the couple of his sovereignty.

“The fact that she had done all the research, talked to so many doctors and read things from around the country gave us great confidence that the Lord had provided this amazing doctor to us,” Smallwood said. “She has been a gift to us from the Lord.”

Every Monday and Friday, Smallwood received two abdominal chemo injections. As he came into the cancer center for various appointments, he found himself surrounded by other patients with cancers much worse than his. His prayers continued to change as God burdened his heart for those suffering more than he was. His conversations began to change, too. God gave him opportunities to share the hope of the gospel, that Jesus came and died to save people from sin and its effects in order to restore a relationship with them and transform them more into his image.

Several of the people Smallwood shared the gospel with were his nurses. One of them got diagnosed with breast cancer and asked for Smallwood and his wife to pray for her. Though they did not see her again for several months, they continued to pray for her healing and salvation.

As God allowed Smallwood and his wife to minister to those around them, he also blessed them with encouragement and support from fellow believers.

“We were overwhelmed by the Cedarville community,” Smallwood said. “There was not a day where I didn’t receive a card, a text message, a phone call, an email – something every day that the Lord used to encourage us and strengthen us.”

When Smallwood completed his fifth round of chemo in April, the cancer cells in his body made up less than 15 percent of his blood cells. The doctors approved him for a bone marrow transplant, otherwise known as a stem cell transplant. Before the procedure, the center needed to harvest some of his healthy stem cells, which would rebuild his system once the cancerous cells were destroyed by a fatal dose of chemo.

Leading up to the transplant, Smallwood prayed with his wife and discussed what the future may look like if the procedure proved fatal. He remembered Psalm 90:12 where the psalmist asks God to teach him to number his days. As the head of the 1,000 Days Transformed campaign at Cedarville, he already understood the verses’ prayer to intentionally give every day to God. But over the past five months, God pressed this message closer to his heart as he learned the humbling brevity and precious purposefulness of life.

“What the Lord wants from me is to die to myself and be more conformed to the image of Jesus,” Smallwood said. “Therefore, He receives glory and honor because I don’t look like Will Smallwood – I look like Jesus.”

When it came time for the transplant, Smallwood made his way to the 14th floor of  the Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital at Ohio State University – where he spent the next 16 days. On the first day, he received an intense dose of chemo, and two days later the doctors put the harvested stem cells back into his body. For the rest of his time in the center, he battled the brutal effects of the chemo killing the cancerous cells and the fever that confirmed the stem cells were being successfully grafted back into his body. At the end of the 16 days, the doctor cleared him to go home for rest and recovery.

In August, Smallwood and his wife returned to the James Cancer Center for a post-bone marrow transplant checkup. While there, they ran into the nurse they prayed with in April, who praised God for healing her from cancer. Not only did they get to celebrate her healing, but the doctor declared Smallwood’s cancer to be in durable remission, as the cancer was no longer impacting the rest of his body.

Smallwood is back working with Cedarville’s advancement team, and he still goes to the cancer center once a month to keep his condition stable. Now, God is teaching him how to remain just as dependent upon Him as before.

“How do I have joy that I can’t muster within myself?” Smallwood said. “That’s what I want the Lord to foster more in my life: joy in the mundane. Joy to spend time with him in his Word. Joy in every conversation I have with my wife. Joy in serving well with my colleagues.”

As Smallwood prays for opportunities to keep spreading the love of Christ, God is answering those prayers in ways he never imagined. He is engaging with alumni and students struggling with cancer or other trials. He is speaking words of encouragement into those watching their loved ones struggling. He is spreading the story that God has given him to encourage and strengthen others. And through these, God continues to teach him about the preciousness of life, for him to die every day to himself to become more like Jesus.

“God is willing and able to do anything and everything to make us more like Jesus,” Smallwood said. “Certainly cancer is the result of a fallen world, but God says, ‘I’m not wasting that cancer, I’m using it. Whatever it is you’re going through, I’m not wasting it because I want you to be like my son, Jesus.’”

Bella Agnello is a junior Broadcasting, Digital Media and Journalism major with a concentration in Journalism. She enjoys thrifting, listening to records and reading classic Russian literature in her spare time.