This book should become a “Lutheran classic.” It is disturbing to imagine how many pastors have engaged the same struggles as Peperkorn, all the while denying themselves the same grace they are called to give out to others. This book reminds all Christians that the Lord has not called them to be “supermen/women,” but to make good use of the gift of faith in the midst of personal struggles and depression. Pastors especially should read this, whether they think they are depressed or not.

-Rev. Dan Torkelsen, 2nd Vice President, South Wisconsin District.  Pastor of Zion Lutheran Church in Clyman, Wisconsin.

Here is a review by Rev. Alan Kornacki.  One pertinent quotation is as follows:

I highly recommend this book to both pastors and laypeople. As a pastor, it’s important to recognize that you are not some sort of superman, and Pastor Peperkorn points his readers toward helpful resources in recognizing and dealing with depression. For laypeople, this book is a poignant reminder that your pastor is a fellow brother in Christ and a fellow sinner who faces the same struggles and frustrations and even illnesses as you do. He needs you love, your understanding, and especially your prayers.

Thanks be to God for Pastor Peperkorn and this fine new resource!

Rev. Alan Kornacki

And here is a review at the blog O My Soul.  Here’s a pertinent quotation:

My wife exclaimed after she read Chapter Two: The Place of the Family, “So that is what is happening to us!” Dad’s growing anger and both emotional and physical withdrawal from her and our three children.

Through the fog of my depression, a new view of the last twenty-five years began to emerge. Teenage depression in the 1980’s triggered by divorcing parents. The severe recurrence of that depression while cutting my teeth as a pastor on the foreign mission field in the 2000’s. (But, hey, the 1990’s weren’t so bad:) Anyway, the Reverend Pepperkorn’s description of his descent into mental illness is helping me become aware of my own descent into that “ghastly landscape called clinical depression” as described in the introduction by Dr. Beverly Yahnke.