Light on the Fringe: Finding Hope in the Darkness of Depression

by Gary H. Lovejoy, Gregory M. Knopf, John Wollinka (Illustrator)

"Light on the Finding Hope in the Darkness of Depression" addresses the difficulty that many depressed Christians often have in understanding their experience from the perspective of their faith. They feel ashamed that they are depressed because they believe that it means they are failures to God, and that God can no longer use them as servants for His kingdom. They feel that they are worthless and totally inadequate believers who have let God down. To them, "good Christians" are always happy and content, absent of any major emotional struggles. This volume dispels such non-biblical notions, and opens the reader's eyes to the fact that God views His followers who are contending with depression much differently than they view themselves. It reveals the truth that, in some of His most redemptive acts in history, God mightily used servants who were experiencing depression, sometimes severe, even suicidal, depression. His responses to each of them provide dramatic lessons in contrast to what many Christians typically believe. Along the way, this book also places our emotional life (including the hard experiences) within the context of the divine image and therefore provides the grounds for exposing the false stereotypes of depression and the debilitating concepts of God. With this framework, the authors lay out, not only the psychological and biological underpinings of depression, but also the biblical teachings about them. In other words, they integrate a sound theology with a professional assessment of the psychological dynamics of depression to answer the What if depression has a good purpose in God's plan? Here is a book that goes beyond finding a cure to demonstrate the positive results an experience with depression can have when we look for God's purpose in it. Since depression is a matter of the whole person, nothing is left untouched. Our spiritual life, our emotional life, and our physical life are all at stake. Readers are challenged then to see the gracious, loving, and merciful character of God in a new, far more transforming way, so that their faith may become a source of healing, not a source of further anguish. This is the life changing foundation for finding hope and purpose within their depression.

254 pages, Paperback

First published September 15, 2009

Reviews

[Randy Alcorn]

My friends Gary Lovejoy and Greg Knopf have written a fresh and insightful book on a vitally important subject. They view depression as an alarm system that alerts us to issues we should address as interdependent people who need God and each other. Having finished Light on the Fringe, I am left appreciating their handling of true and false guilt, the need for authenticity, how depression has been stereotyped, and their thoughtful depiction of biblical characters who faced depression. I found this book warm, helpful, biblically solid, and full of hope.