Spurgeon's Sorrows, by Zack Eswine
25/30 | Started 05.24.21 • Finished 06.04.22 | 5 stars
In this three part book, author Zack Eswine draws heavily from Charles Spurgeon, as the title would imply, but adds in his own exceptional words of kindness and compassion.
To feel in our being that the God to whom we cry has Himself suffered as we do enables us to feel that we are not alone and that God is not cruel.
First he covers trying to understand depression - that which comes from circumstances, or the kind that Spurgeon calls melancholy, or spiritual depression. Next he teaches the reader how to help those who suffer from depression, including providing a language for sorrow and pointing someone to Jesus, the "man of sorrows." In part three he offers some practical helps for those who suffer from depression.
Hope has been dismantled, maybe for all intents and purposes destroyed. But a larger story exists in Jesus. In time, even hope demolished can become hope rebuilt, if it is realistic and rooted, not just in the cross and empty tomb but also in the garden and the sweat-like blood.
Everyone who suffers from depression or knows someone who suffers from depression should read this book. Pure balm. I cannot recommend it enough.
Sorrows are caused by ugly things. But Jesus adopts them as it were. He brings them into His own counsel…. In other words, our sorrows belong to Jesus. He is their master no matter what fiendish thought or unexplainable cause gave them birth. Jesus shows us His wounds, the slanders, the manipulations, the injustices, the body blows, the mistreatments piled on to Him. From there He loves, still. He invites us into fellowship with His empathy. We receive it from Him in the deeps…. "This is just what Jesus does in our trials," Charles proclaims. "He puts his arm around us, points up and says, 'Fear not! The water may be deep, but the bottom is good.'"
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