What Works When Life Doesn't: What God Has to Say about Life's Difficulties and How to Handle Them

In this updated edition of What Works When Life Doesn’t, Stuart Briscoe shares solid answers from a most unexpected place—the book of Psalms.

Popular author Stuart Briscoe understands that for many Christians the wonderful promises and benefits of Christianity do not seem to work. Happiness is elusive, doing right does not always pay, stress is not eased, and suffering continues. Far from more bedtime devotionals, the psalms speak plainly to today's postmodern uncertainty with directness and relevance. Briscoe selects twelve psalms that show how happiness, joy, and meaning are more than good feelings resulting from pleasant circumstances. Rather, these blessings result from knowing that God is in control of every situation and that he walks with us through our pain and fears. Far from delivering a head-in-the-clouds, "be more holy" sermon, this book deals head-on with the stuff of being human—failure, sin, self-doubt, unbelief, depression, and stress; showing how God's ancient wisdom can make life work in today's tough times.

Stuart Briscoe was born in Millom, Cumbria, England, where he embarked on a career in banking and preaching at the age of seventeen. In 1970 Stuart became pastor of Elmbrook Church in Brookfield, Wisconsin. He has authored more than forty books, preached in more than one hundred countries, and is invited to minister to pastors, missionaries, and church lay-leaders on all continents. Stuart and his wife, Jill, are now ministers-at-large at Elmbrook. They have three children and thirteen grandchildren.