When the Stars Disappear: Help and Hope from Stories of Suffering in Scripture

Suffering and the Christian Life #1

by Mark Talbot

When suffering overwhelms us, it is easy to despair and even doubt God's goodness. As the clouds of suffering roll in, we can lose sight of everything but our pain. In these moments, when the stars disappear, we must turn to Scripture to find assurance that God can and will carry us through. In this book, Mark Talbot recounts the suffering of some of the Bible's greatest saints. They show us what it means to remain faithful and hopeful through life's darkest times--and thus help us cling to God's sure promise that he will never leave us or forsake us but will be with us and sustain us until the storms subside and the stars reappear.

Genres: Theology, Christian, Nonfiction, Christian Living, Religion, Audiobook, Christianity

144 pages, Paperback

Published August 25, 2020

About the author

Mark Talbot (PhD, University of Pennsylvania) is an associate professor of philosophy at Wheaton College and the host of the When the Stars Disappear podcast. He is also the author of the Suffering and the Christian Life series, including When the Stars Disappear and Give Me Understanding That I May Live. He and his wife, Cindy, have one daughter and three grandchildren.

Associate Professor of Philosophy, Wheaton College

Reviews

[Dr. David Steele · Rating 4 out of 5]

Several years ago, I was introduced to the writing of Dr. Mark Talbot. His sharp intellect and warm heart instantly grabbed my attention. Talbot is well-known for his writing on the subject of pain and suffering. As one who was partially paralyzed in his teens, he is uniquely qualified to address the subject. He not only sympathizes with fellow suffers; he has the biblical background and experience to offer counsel that is meaningful and God-honoring.

Sometimes one sentence makes a book worth reading. Such is the case with Mark Talbot’s book. When the Stars Disappear. This is no way detracts from the rest of the book. Indeed, the book is filled with biblical wisdom and encouragement for people who are experiencing a season of suffering.

When the Stars Disappear is the first installment in a series of four books, which are appropriately titled, “Suffering and the Christian Life.” The first volume attempts to show readers that suffering is not only a part of God’s plan for his people; it is a gracious gift, which is to be received in faith.

Talbot utilizes the painful stories of Naomi, Job, and Jeremiah to illustrate the central thesis of the book. He paints a realistic portrait of these characters who struggle with suffering and struggle with a God who allows and ordains it.

The great strength of this book is a biblical perspective that leads readers to a gracious God who is eager for people to draw near in faith and communion. That leads us to the sentence that captured my attention:

“Biblical faith and hope are grounded in God’s self-revelation that - no matter how dark and hopeless life may now seem - his saints will ultimately know him as ’the God of chesed,’ for that is indeed his name.”

The author helps us understand how God is accomplishing good in the lives of his people, even in the midst of pain and suffering. “Believing that this is what God has in store for us,” Talbot writes, “is essential to Christian faith.” He continues, “God’s apparent delay in fulfilling his promises refines our hopes. We lift our heads and see God’s eschatological rewards from afar as our earthly hopes die. Our suffering inclines us to reorient our hopes toward the consummation.”

In the end, our gaze is set upon a Savior who promises to make all things new. Dr. Talbot’s warm-hearted biblical perspective is a welcome gift that is sure to be received with open arms by many. I look forward with great anticipation to the remaining volumes in this soul-stirring series.

I received this book free from the publisher. I was not required to write a positive review.

[Jeanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

When suffering the big question is why? What could I have done different? Depending on what the suffering entails, the questions will come and may never be answered or at least in satisfying way. This text is not to answer why but the answer is who. Suffering is meant to lead us to Christ and his suffering. If you have read the word, you know that life is not pain free. Suffering reveals and this is what this text helps the reader to see, take courage, have faith, and look forward to hope.

As I was reflecting on this read, I was reminded that suffering is not to be compared. For example, my suffering is greater than so and so. That thinking doesn't get us anywhere and see the value of suffering. Suffering's value is the increase of our faith. Knowing the value of suffering before, prepares our heart and minds to when the suffering will occur. The bible has great examples of those that suffered to show the glory of God and his attributes. To breath and to be in His presence. Suffer well.

A Special Thank you to Crossway Publishing and Netgalley for the ARC and the opportunity to post an honest review.

[ValeReads Kyriosity · Rating 3 out of 5]

My favorite quote from the book "Stories like Naomi’s, Job’s, and Jeremiah’s . . . show that things are not always as they seem. . . . If God’s saints were always to know what he was doing then that would sometimes defeat God’s purposes."

It was OK, but didn't knock my socks off.

Narrator was very Countrytime Lemonade. Pretty sure I've heard him on something else.

[Glenn Crouch · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a marvellous, easy-to-read short book that leaves me eager for the remaining volumes to be available.

The Author introduces us to Suffering and the Christian Life by sharing a major incident in his own life, the lose of a child (where he is counselling the parents), and through 3 Old Testament stories - that of Naomi, of Job and of Jeremiah.

His emphasis on the Psalms of Lament is very welcome, as is his approach to both the Old Testament and the New Testament. I quite agree with his argument about “stories”!

Highly recommended to all Christians - especially those struggling with the “Why” questions in regards suffering.

[Knowlton Murphy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'll admit it--I'm a pretty simple man. I see "Wheaton" attached to a book/author, I quickly move on to something else. Good thing my pride/snobbery can be occasionally thwarted--humble pie has rarely tasted this good.

Dr. Talbot makes every effort to write clearly. He does this well. Dr. Talbot's word choice is accessible, but his ideas are too. This is a great strength, and it has made an excellent book--perhaps not because Dr. Talbot is saying things no Christian has ever realized before, but because he presents the wisdom of suffering Christians in a way almost anybody can grasp.

Often when Christians "deconstruct" they blame it on Christianity not answering their questions, usually regarding pain and suffering. This is the kind of book they should have read. They should have talked with their elders, read this book, and then talked with their elders again.

[Elise Citrowske · Rating 5 out of 5]

An encouraging and reorienting read. The tone and brevity of the author’s articulation carried me through the work effortlessly as difficult topics were broached and met with comfort and wisdom. I especially enjoyed the expounding of God’s word in regards to the stories of Job, Naomi and Jeremiah.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Helpful book.

[christina · Rating 5 out of 5]

When the Stars Disappear: Help and Hope from Stories of Suffering in Scripture, by Dr. Mark Talbot of Wheaton College, is the first in a planned 4-volume series called Suffering in the Christian Life. In this first volume, he examines the lives of Naomi, Job, and Jeremiah as case studies for the place of suffering in the Christian life. In the process, he normalizes our various sufferings and demonstrates how they manifest and convey the steadfast love of the Lord to His children (counter-intuitive as that may seem).



One component of our response to trials is our expectation of how life ought to go. Expecting storms in life is a bulwark that helps faith and hope to endure and outlast them. This lesson is one Dr. Talbot has had to learn for himself in an adult life marked by chronic pain and disability and the devastating loss of one of his students to suicide. In Dr. Talbot’s words,

Although this book began in response to a particular calamity, it is written for all Christians who are puzzled or distressed by the griefs, troubles, sicknesses, trials, betrayals, persecutions, and afflictions we and others undergo, whether that suffering is acute and perhaps calamitous, or chronic in some potentially overwhelming way, or even if it is simply significant enough to make us wonder why it should be. I hope it will remove some of the obstacles that suffering tends to throw across the path of Christian faith and hope. I want to help you, my fellow Christians, trust that our suffering is part of God’s loving care for us as his people, and that we shall ultimately see each piece of it as an unsought gift from him, no matter how difficult or perplexing it may now be. I shall show this from Scripture as corroborated by personal experience. As Augustine said, “I feed you on what I am fed on myself. . . . I set food before you from the pantry which I too live on, from the Lord’s storerooms” (Kindle location 248).



In some ways, this is a tale of 2 books. Nearly half the book consists of endnotes. Yes, really. The main text, if read straight through, provides a useful introduction to the topic of Christian suffering for those who have not considered it in a systematic or detailed way. In particular, I appreciated Dr. Talbot’s emphasis on breathing in Scripture and breathing out prayer. We can so easily catch ourselves holding our breath, literally and metaphorically, in seasons of trial, and Dr. Talbot calls to us like a physical therapist: “Don’t forget to breathe!” His case studies were well-chosen to draw out different facets of suffering, or perhaps I should say distinct constellations in the astronomy of suffering. He helpfully points out that Jeremiah’s suffering, unlike Job’s and Naomi’s, fails to resolve within the biblical narrative. We don’t know whether the stars ever reappeared for him in earthly life. I needed that reminder. Maybe you do too. We chart our course in such trials by the promises of God and the hope of the resurrection, when everything sad will come untrue.



In my view, the filet mignon of the book is in the second half, that is, the notes. This is where readers already familiar with the theme of suffering in the Bible will find treasure. In the author’s assessment, the dessert is a careful reading of the Scripture passages cited. Here is his proposed reading strategy for this book:

I suggest that on a first and perhaps even second reading, you read only the main text and the footnotes. The footnotes, which are designated by small-letter superscripts like the one in this paragraph, will bolster your understanding of my text. During a second or third reading, please look up the Bible passages I’ve included. When I refer to biblical passages without quoting them, I put “see” before the reference to encourage you to look them up. There are a lot of those references because all of our theological claims should be backed up by Scripture. J. I. Packer has written that the “biblical references in my studies . . . are not . . . skippable; they are part of the argument, and are meant to be looked up.” The same goes here (Kindle location 1929).



The opening story of a student’s suicide triggered some anxiety for me at the time I read it, to the point that it caused me to set the book aside for some months. Dr. Talbot’s consideration of the steadfast love (chesed) of the Lord amply repaid my perseverance in reading the rest of the book. Who would have expected a beautiful examination of God’s love in a book about not being surprised by suffering? Yet the love of God even in the dark is what so often carries us through trials. That’s why the steadfast love and great faithfulness of God reside at the core of Jeremiah’s carefully constructed Lamentations. Here is one lovely, helpful passage on that theme:

Ultimately, our staying faithful and hopeful in the midst of profound suffering does not depend entirely on us. Yet there are steps we can take to maintain our perspective. First, we must remember that chesed—steadfast, kind, loyal, and merciful loving concern for others—is basic to God’s character and emblematic of all he is. Second, we must appeal to God’s chesed whenever we need reassurance of his radical and unceasing care for us. Third, we must believe that God is able to do all that his chesed intends for us. Suffering, we must remind ourselves, may pursue us in this lifetime, but God’s invincible power guarantees that the joy implicit in our being the recipients of God’s chesed will come to us with the morning. And, last, we must “read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest” biblical stories like Naomi’s, Job’s, and Jeremiah’s that trace God’s steadfast and unstoppable love for his saints through the starless darkness of their profound suffering. The truths that held for them will hold for us, and so we must apply them to every one of our personal stories. Sometimes we can do no more than merely endure. And as Jeremiah’s story shows, suffering can test our ability to do even that. It may be all we can do simply to avoid denying our Lord. As the clouds of suffering rolled over Naomi, Job, and Jeremiah, they lost their bearings. Things appeared so dark it seemed nothing good could lie ahead. So their hopes vanished. They even began taking false bearings that led them to believe falsehoods—most crucially, the falsehood that God was no longer manifesting his steadfast love to them. We now know they were wrong. Their stories teach us that appearance is not always reality. What appears at some point to be the story of a life may not be what the full story of that life actually and finally is. God was still working for their good (1549).

Every Christian’s story has a happy ending, even if we never see it in this life. Let me repeat that: every Christian’s story has a happy ending. The God who cannot lie has promised. The stories of Naomi and Job display that resolution in their earthly pilgrimages. Jeremiah’s demonstrates how to endure in faith when visible, earthly things go from bad to worse to awful to excruciating.



The title of this volume hints at that contrast between appearance and reality. The stars never disappear, even when we can’t see them because of ambient light or cloud cover. In Dr. Talbot’s words again,

When profound suffering strikes, it can seem that all of the stars that have guided our Christian lives have disappeared. And yet the core of Christian faith is the belief that God sovereignly controls all of life’s storms and that he can—and indeed ultimately will—see his people safely through even the worst storms. We have his word and the experience of his saints in Scripture that when those storms finally begin to subside and the sky begins to clear, we will look up and once again see the sun and the moon and the stars, and then realize that our loving heavenly Father has indeed been with us all along our way. This may not happen in this lifetime, but then it will happen in the one to come (1875).



As noted at the outset, this book is planned to introduce a quartet of books on suffering. The author does readers the courtesy of sketching out the content of the rest:

This volume introduces the topic and tries to offer suffering Christians some immediate aid by, among other things, showing that suffering is common in Scripture. We shouldn’t be surprised when we suffer, and we should expect from what we find in Scripture that our God will help us through it. The second volume, which will appear in a year, answers the questions, Why do we suffer? and Why is there so much suffering? It places our suffering in the context of the full Christian story. The third volume shows that a thorough knowledge of Scripture is indispensable for healthy Christian life and then explores what Scripture tells us about the relationship between God’s will and our suffering. It is meant to reassure you, if you are suffering, that nothing slips past God and he is always working for our good. The final volume will consider how suffering relates to the three Christian graces of faith, hope, and love. It closes by considering how we will regard our suffering in the afterlife (1945).



In summary, When the Stars Disappear provides a useful, narrative-driven overview of the normalcy of suffering in the Christian life. Because of a particular suffering in my own life when I started reading it, I needed to pause for a matter of months before picking it up again. Because of that, I might be more inclined to recommend this to someone preparing for suffering, coming up for air between storms, or seeking to love a suffering friend well, as opposed to someone in the throes of the acute grief and pain of his or her own typhoon. It offers a thoughtful, relatively brief, nuanced consideration of the theme. Dr. Talbot writes with the wisdom of a seasoned professor and the compassion of a seasoned sufferer. I look forward to the next volume, due in summer 2022.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

When the Stars Disappear, Vol. 1 by Mark Talbot takes readers on a thought-provoking journey into the depths of suffering experienced by Naomi, Job, and Jeremiah in the Old Testament. We are suffering in a similar way to the suffering that man has endured since the Fall. As believers, we can find strength, hope, and comfort as we read about the trials endured by these three pivotal individuals. As each wrestled with their suffering and a couple even cursed the day they were born they ultimately worked through their sufferings. They were reminded that God's plans do not always make sense to us but He uses man's sufferings as part of His perfectly planned storyline. Suffering should draw us closer to the Lord. We can find hope and joy amidst our suffering when we yield ourselves fully to God. We can trust that God in His grace and mercy will see us through.

Mark Talbot talks about his own personal sufferings throughout his life. Mark like so many of us, experience seasons of profoundly disorienting perplexity. Mark says, "When, night after night, sleep fled from me because I was utterly unable to understand how God in his goodness could have been playing any part in what was happening to me. I have experienced hurts so deep and disruptive that they have dominated my consciousness, making me feel I could lose the Christian faith that has oriented me for almost my whole life." Wow how many of us can relate to those thoughts and words? I know I can.

Chapter 3 entitled "Breathing Lessons ~ How to Survive Great Suffering" takes readers into the book of Psalms. Talbot writes, "Sufferers sometimes need the same reminder, for thinking God has forsaken or betrayed us involves losing our perspective, which can make it seem as if everything is closing in on us so we can hardly breathe." Talbot talks about how women in labor, athletes training, and his own experience in physical therapy when the therapist would say, "Breathe!"We have to learn how to breathe. Mark talks about lamenting in the Psalms. Studying the Psalms teaches believers how to breathe in two ways. First, it teaches us to pray. "Profound suffering can stifle our prayers by overwhelming us and by tempting us to think that God mustn't care if he didn't prevent this pain." Second, it helps us to pray properly. "These psalms of lament also show us how to breathe. As acts of faith, they are little portraits of proper praying. Faithful praying has a rhythm that envelops our suffering in hopeful stories." Psalms is full of encouraging words as well as individual laments that we can both learn from and draw hope from. The psalmists so eloquently displayed their trust in God as we read throughout Psalms verses such as: Whatever the Lord pleases he does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps. Psalm 135:6, Some boast of chariots, and some of horses; but we boast of the name of the Lord our God. Psalms 20:7, 5 Thy steadfast love, O Lord, extends to the heavens, thy faithfulness to the clouds. 6 Thy righteousness is like the mountains of God, thy judgments are like the great deep; man and beast thou savest, O Lord. Psalms 36:5-6.

The book ends with an Epilogue, and A Reader's Guide. The Reader's Guide is very useful in helping you get the most out of this book. Talbot explains the necessity of reading the book more than once. He talks about footnotes, quoted Bible passages, poetry, and endnotes. Also at the end of the book is a 26 page section entitled Notes. Here Talbot provides explanations for the endnotes throughout the book by chapter. There is also a Scripture Index at the end of the book.

When The Stars Disappear is a wonderful book. I read this book during an exceptionally difficult time of suffering in my life. When The Stars Disappear and Give Me Understanding That I May Live were recently sent to me for review by Crossway Books. A few weeks ago I needed to be taken to the ER. I knew that I would more than likely be waiting a bit so I brought When The Stars Disappear to begin reading. I was in a considerable amount of pain and due to complicated circumstances I endured over 12 hours without pain relief. I have multiple chronic medical conditions and one that requires daily pain medication. I was beside myself in pain. I prayed and tried to distract myself by reading and each page I read was like a salve to my suffering. God meets us where we are. It was even more impactful to hear the author discuss Jeremiah's suffering. This is because Jeremiah's calling, life, and trials are being studied right now in BSF, so it's fresh inmy mind. What a blessing this book has been. I cannot wait to read Give Me Understanding That I May Live, Vol. 2 by Mark Talbot.

[Parker Bentley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Suffering is something I realized I hadn't thought through a ton. From a theological perspective I know why it exists, what its purpose is (God's glory), and can confidently say Christians will experience it and should expect it, but I hadn't really thought much about it from an experiential standpoint. How do Christians deal with suffering despite pleading with the Lord for it to go away? How do Christians think about the character of God through suffering? Why would God allow certain things to happen to His people? I read this after listening to a podcast and hearing how encouraging the book was. The author has a lot of credibility when it comes to the topic as he is wheelchair bound due to suffering a tragedy at a young age. He has also mentored many students in his time as a professor, and one specific story is helpfully used throughout the book.
This first volume directs readers to the scriptures. It first centers readers on the mere fact that suffering is integral to the life of the Christian (see Jesus, Paul, any NT saint, and countless scripture texts). The Psalms are then examined to display their continual praise and plea to the Lord for relief from distress or suffering. Readers are encouraged to "breath" in the Psalms and the scriptures and to model the Psalmists when seeking the Lord during trials. The work then goes to a few particular places in the Old Testament where suffering is prevalent in the biblical storyline. Job, Naomi in the book of Ruth, and Jeremiah are the main people who's stories are reviewed. These stories are seen as helpful and instructive for Christians, and the call is to be encouraged by and to model their perspectives (Rom 15:4). While they questioned and toiled with God, they ultimately didn't abandon their trust in the Lord. Luckily, the Christian's ability to stay in the faith in the midst of suffering does not depend on them alone. But, to keep a proper perspective readers are directed to remember chesed (described as steadfast, kind, loyal, and merciful loving concern for others) and to be other-centered, to appeal to God’s chesed when we need reassurance of his care for us, to believe that God is able to do all that his chesed intends for us, and to be grounded in the scriptures, including stories like Naomi's, Job's, and Jeremiah’s.

This work by Mark Talbot is really helpful on a complex, yet inevitable topic. I would recommend this to Christians to read in order to be equipped and encouraged by the graciousness and kindness of God, and to begin to formulate a godly perspective in the midst of suffering. I'm looking forward to reading the additional volumes in the series.

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wheaton Philosophy professor Mark Talbot has truly been given a 2 Cor. 1:3-5 ministry. Through his own long-term suffering from an accident in his late teens, he has used his God-given intellect and personal experience to minister to others in their suffering and to probe the Scriptures to examine and explain the reality, meaning and experience of human suffering. This book, the first of a planned 4 volume series, examines the lives of 3 Old Testament saints, Naomi, Job and Jeremiah. For each, their tragedies and sufferings are exegetically explained, and their responses to them analyzed. If all of that sounds very academic, it is not written that way. Although the endnotes are quite extensive and academic, the actual chapters are designed for ease of understanding. It is clear in its explanations, even though those explanations may take some time to think through. It is also very short. When you subtract the 35 pages of endnotes, the book checks in at a very concise 102 pages.

I really appreciated how the author displayed not only a keen sense of empathy with the experience of the Biblical characters and what they went through, but he explains both his own experience with suffering, and the traumatic death of one of his students and his interactions with that student's parents in the wake of his loss. So I might say the formula of this book is the experience of profound suffering + empathy for the sufferings of others + great Biblical and academic knowledge = a book that is both pastorally helpful and Biblically faithful. Highly recommended for those suffering, and for those who want to help them.

One disclaimer: I consider Mark Talbot a friend, and one who provided great counsel to me in the past. My friendship with him made me want to write this review, but it did not greatly impact my evaluation of this book. I do eagerly await the three remaining volumes that are planned.

[E · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mark Talbot, conservative professor of philosophy at Wheaton College, has written a big book on suffering that he has evidently convinced Crossway to publish as one book instead of four. I wonder what the royalty implications are . . . The idea itself has some merit--most in the midst of suffering don't want to sit down to a 500-page book. So this book has to be just an introduction, yet still "give away" enough of the "ending" to be helpful to sufferers.

I'd actually say that Talbot succeeds. He looks at Naomi, Job, and Jeremiah as three scriptural examples of saints who suffered and weren't afraid to lament about it. Talbot lays out their suffering, then takes a break to talk about lament and the idea of hopeful lamenting found so often in the psalms, then returns to demonstrate some of the redemptive elements of those three figures' suffering. He is hopeful without being trite--a fine balance to find, and one I appreciated.

Other things about the book are annoying. Why have both footnotes and endnotes, for instance? For the sake of readers everywhere, just make them footnotes! And he switches Bible translations constantly. He's all over the place--pick a translation philosophy and stick with it! Jumping all around various translations actually reduces readers' confidence in any of them. It is unfortunate that he chose to do so.

Nevertheless, Talbot has an important story to tell (suffering ain't merely academic for him), and I hope this book does a lot of good. I'm looking forward to the next ones. Maybe they'll fund his retirement.

[Reyna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can´t talk for all of the presbyterian authors, because I don´t know them all, but the ones I have read are very, very enjoyable. This is the first time I take one of Mark Talbot´s book. The title got me. I think all of us have been there, where everything becomes dark, nothing makes sense and you just forget about things you thought were going to be always there. I know it is when we need to go to the fountain of truth, go to stories of saints who endure till the end. "We need to feel scripture plumbing the life-despairing depths of human suffering. It is what you need, to know there is true hope and even when you see not stars, not even the light at the end of the tunnel, there is light for every step of the way. I pray this book to encourage many.
"We need to know how to maintain our faith and hope even in the midst of our suffering. And we need assurance that God will carry us through".
"Suffering has been near the center of a biblical outlook almost from the start. It has never surprised god, an so it shouldn´t surprise us".
The book is full of biblical references, a lot, I like when the author writes the bible verse and adds the book and number at the end, because when not, the book is full with numbers and parenthesis (that is just a personal preference).
I will continue reading books about lament, suffering, pain, hope, and faith, because is part of life and because sadly, a lot of people don´t like to talk about it.

[Kirstyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a bizarrely succinct overview/summary of the previous two books I read (dark clouds and trusting God).

It encapsulates both the reasons we should trust God in suffering and how to navigate that suffering in a Godly way. I have no issue with the contents, except there is the occasional part where I feel it is padding with words just to make it credible as a full book. Which I don't believe it is.

It is very short. Little under 100 pages, yet also the first of four volumes that are referenced and alluded to even though they aren't published. Since this book is so very small this irritated me. It would be easy to have combined them into one volume or at least two. Volumes are expected with 1000 page tomes, not mere 100 page books. It seems more like a money grabbing attempt than anything else which, when marketed to people who are suffering, leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

[Olivia Schube · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a very thorough, thoughtful and helpful read. Even though this book is rather sobering, it is filled with rich truth from scripture that can speak into the different ways suffering can disorient our faith. I really liked how he focused mainly on Job, Naomi and Jeremiah's stories because they all had their own unique struggles when it came to processing their hardships and different outcomes. He made a great point that even the best of saints are vulnerable to being disoriented and shaken up in their faith during times of immense suffering, but that God is always faithful to see them through. These stories can give us a roadmap for how to process and navigate our own struggles and ultimately give us hope.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

“…when we suffer as we know we must, we brace ourselves in the conflict between the already of Christian suffering and the not yet of Christian glory.”

Suffering is my favorite topic to read about. That may sound strange or even morbid but I believe that to endure any type of suffering we should prepare ourselves.

Volume 1 in this 4 volume series(future volumes on the way) introduces suffering and tries to offer some immediate aid by showing how common suffering is in scripture.

I highly recommend this book.

[Matt Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

"[W]e must 'read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest' biblical stories like Naomi's, Job's, and Jeremiah's that trace God's steadfast and unstoppable love for his saints through the starless darkness of their profound suffering. The truths that held for them will hold for us, and so we must apply them to every one of our personal stories." (p. 83)

My review:

https://reformedbrit.wordpress.com/20...

[Brittany]

This is a collection of insights and reflections on three Biblical sufferers: Job, Naomi, and Jeremiah. Tucked between their narratives are reminders and encouragements of how to take pain to the Lord in prayer and engage Him in the story of suffering. My favorite line: “We must strive to be faithful, hopeful, and obedient for the sake of those who will come after us.” A tiny but mighty little book for considering the ways suffering impacts every Christian life.

[Josh · Rating 4 out of 5]

While brief, this book on suffering (the first of a projected four volumes) helps orient sufferers to the steadfast love of God in the midst of trial. Talbot examines biblical stories to show that suffering is not alien to God's people (in a great line, "the seas of suffering are not uncharted", 26), and that there is sufficient revelation in Scripture to show us how to live in the midst of suffering. I want to read subsequent volumes, but this was a good start to the series...

[Unchong Berkey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I feel so ministered to by this short book. Talbot places our suffering in the grand storyline of the Bible. And that makes all the difference. I love his treatment of Naomi, Job, Jeremiah, and some of the psalmists’ laments. “Orienting ourselves by stories involves using their storylines to put our lives in proper perspective.”

[Timothy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A biblical answer to suffering

To anyone who has gone to the place where it seems that even the stars have disappeared, the moon has gone down, the sun has set - to anyone who has experienced the darkness of pain and suffering - this volume will be a great help. I thoroughly endorse it.

[Caleb Walker · Rating 4 out of 5]

The stories of Naomi, Job, and Jeremiah all communicate that God remained faithful and brought them all the way home even while they were doubting it. The fact that God remains at work even when we are doubtful of His favor is not novel, yet profoundly helpful. Good discussion of Exodus 34 and God’s self revelation in Ch 3 as well.

[Gail · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful book written by a compassionate man who knows suffering. It looks at suffering in the lives of biblical characters, and offers practical “breathing lesson” to help the sufferer get through painful times.

[Drew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good. Written to sufferers at probably a post high school level. No unjustified promise, just simple clarity to see God's historical use of suffering in the lives of the godly, and the godly's looking to God in lament and persistent, stumbling faith.

[Daniel Tortorici · Rating 5 out of 5]

Single best book on Christian suffering I have encountered. And it’s not even close……

Wonderful and insightful book. Could not recommend more. Excited to read #2.

[Dorothy Crabtree · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this.

[Chase Polishchuk · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well-written, scripture-rich, and incredibly empathetic exposition on suffering.

[Lachlan McCan'tread · Rating 5 out of 5]

10

[Shannon Majeski · Rating 5 out of 5]

Short but helpful and timely.

[Reid Williamson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent treatment of suffering through biblical lenses. Helpful for a plethora of circumstances. Highly recommended for basic life discipleship.