Life most certainly brings its challenges. Some of these are just little ruts along the way, some are deep and dark valleys, and some are lower still—the kind of rock bottom experiences that are so dreadful we wonder if we will be able to endure them with our faith intact. As Ray Ortlund says,
You don’t need to go looking for it. Sooner or later, it comes and finds you—something horrible, some experience unforeseeable and even unimaginable. It comes upon you. It lays hold of you. It changes you. And the reality you always understood to be your life—suddenly that life is gone for good. Now you’re stuck with a different reality, and not one you chose. It was forced upon you. And however it happened, things are different for you now. And not in a better way.
It could be loss. It could be betrayal. It could be the bewilderment of a terminal diagnosis and the knowledge of impending death. But at some point, each one of us encounters a trial that takes us lower than we thought we could go.
Ortlund wants to assure us that there is good news at rock bottom. “What helps us most, when we need help urgently, is to discover who Jesus is for people like us. His wisdom is better than our escapism. What we want deep down is Jesus himself, with us, even us.”
And the good news is that Jesus is available to us. He knows rock bottom. He waits for us at rock bottom. He is our good news at rock bottom. And ultimately he is the subject of the excellent and encouraging book Good News at Rock Bottom.
Ortlund frames the book around an exposition of Isaiah 57:15, a wonderful verse that assures us that God dwells with those who are of contrite and lowly spirit. “The healing powers of this one verse can flow down into the deepest crevices of anguish within us,” he says.
He writes one chapter for those who have been betrayed, one for those who are trapped, one for those who are lonely, and one for those who are facing death. In each case, he ministers the hope of that one verse and, beyond it, the hope of the gospel. He draws deeply from Scripture and also from the wells of Christian writers and theologians. He is honest, pastoral, and fatherly in his tone.
Ultimately, he does exactly what he sets out to do—he proves that Jesus offers us the deepest hope in the deepest valley—that when we hit rock bottom we will find him waiting there to assure us, comfort us, and bless us. And because each one of us will hit rock bottom at one time or another, this is a book that can bless us all.
