Book Review: Limping Heavenward (Karrie Hahn)

Have you ever felt like life on Earth often seems like a lonely crusade through a dark fog? Have you experienced times when it felt like it was impossible to take another step, much less to “rejoice always...giving thanks in all circumstances” as 1 Thessalonians 5:16 and 18 instructs? We will all experience different types and degrees of suffering, but as Karrie Hahn writes in Limping Heavenward, “suffering in a fallen world is an undeniable, ever-present reality.” So often Christians are lured in with the false theology that we will be successful in this world if only we do the right things. This sandy-beach theology does us no good when the waves of life crash down upon us. Even less so when the waves are unrelenting and we experience what Hahn defines as “comprehensive and chronic suffering”. This type of suffering is not just “one big thing” going wrong in life, but when “all the pillars holding up your life crash down around you”.

Limping Heavenward is a book written for those who feel stuck in comprehensive and chronic suffering and are struggling to believe that God is good and his Word is true. This book is also a great resource for those with loved ones experiencing suffering. Karrie Hahn has walked the long, lonely road of suffering herself, and does a great job of pointing her readers to the truths about God, giving practical ways to walk through suffering with fellow believers. As Hahn describes, “[i]n the race of faith, it doesn’t matter how quickly we can run, it just matters that we keep moving in the right direction, toward the Lord, and that we don’t give up.” It often feels as though we are just limping, but limping “isn’t less noble or difficult than running.” How much easier would it be to limp along with a trusted and wise companion at your side?

I have personally experienced the type of suffering that feels like abandonment by God, or as Hahn describes, feels as though “God is taking his other children on a field trip and we’re left behind at school to stand in the corner all day - or, even worse, thrown under the school bus.” Questions race in our minds of what we could have done wrong to anger God - does he not love us? In Limping Heavenward, Hahn gives us the framework to defeat these lies from the Accuser: recognize and resist. First, to know the patterns that Satan uses to attack, and then to repel them with the truths that God is with you and for you. I would recommend this book to all Christians, but specifically to those that are experiencing long term suffering and feel alone and unseen. In this online, isolated culture we live in, we must learn how to surround ourselves with the truths of the gospel, something Hahn does a great job of reminding her readers. As she notes, we can put our hope and trust in “the suffering savior whose suffering guarantees that our suffering will one day end.” He alone is where we find strength and peace amidst the brokenness of this world. I hope this book is a helpful resource to remind you of these truths.