With raw honesty and persevering faith, Ed Grudier's book ‘Lifting God High from the Lowest Valley’ is a companion for the broken-hearted, pointing to the One who brings light into the darkest places.
In 2021, Ed and Kathy Grudier joined the SMBC community from the United States. Ed took up the role as Director of the SMBC Centre for Cross-Cultural Mission. Suddenly and sadly, in June of 2023, Kathy was diagnosed with cancer and in August she went to glory.
This year Ed published a book about the intense grief that followed the loss of Kathy. Lifting God High from the Lowest Valley is a deeply personal and hope-filled journey through grief. Ed turned to Scripture, books on sorrow, songs, and most profoundly-Kathy’s own prayer journals, where her praises to God became a source of strength and renewal.
“Whether you are mourning a loved one or supporting someone who is, this book invites you to lament honestly, cling to God’s steadfast love, and find hope in His faithfulness.”
The 30-day devotional journey weaves together reflections on loss, prayers of praise, and a curated collection of worship music to offer comfort to those walking through the valley of grief. Whether you are mourning a loved one or supporting someone who is, this book invites you to lament honestly, cling to God’s steadfast love, and find hope in His faithfulness.
In an interview at a recent SMBC Principal’s Hour, Ed shared his three reasons for writing the book and his three hopes for the book:
Why did you write the book?
“I found myself often wanting to just avoid the pain of grief. It just got so wearisome, and I got so tired of being sad and grieving that I would try to escape. And I realised that wasn’t helping me grow. So, I thought writing this book would force me to sit in the grief and process it and think more deeply about all the profound ways that the loss of Kathy affected me”
“The other reason was that through the grief process I was learning so much about God and his character and the preciousness of the gospel lessons about grief and I didn’t want to lose those. I’m very good at forgetting. And I didn’t want to lose these lessons. I thought if I wrote them down it would help me remember them.”
“And finally, my children were struggling mightily with grief as you would expect, with losing their mother. And I was a long ways away from them, obviously, and couldn’t help them the way that I wanted to help them. I was hopeful that a book would be something that they could read and, from a distance, get help from their father in the grief process.”
What are your hopes for the book?
“One of my hopes is that this book will help people see just in real time, in real life, not in a philosophical or a theoretical way, what it looks like in practice for God to heal someone who’s broken-hearted.”
“The second hope is that people who are going through grief would find some small measure of help as they read the book. That the hope of the gospel, the beauty of God’s character, will be a help to them in that daily slog of the pain of going through grief.”
“What it looks like in practice for God to heal someone who’s broken-hearted.”
“Thirdly, grief is a universal language. Everyone, irrespective of their standing with God, is going to face and deal with grief in their lifetime. And so my final prayer is that there would be people who don’t yet know Jesus who would read this book, and the hope of the gospel would be very beautiful and attractive to them and they would embrace Christ.”
Ed and Kathy Grudier
Lifting God High
In a particularly powerful part of the interview, Ed shared his reflection on the spiritual battle that often comes with grief:
“Kathy’s prayers reminded me that in every phase of life that we find ourselves in, there is spiritual warfare. I realised that the spiritual warfare that I was facing was what Job confronted. And that’s the terrible lie from Satan that God’s children will only praise him if he gives them good gifts. Take away the good gifts, and they’ll curse Him.
Praying Kathy’s prayers of praise helped me, in those dark times, to shake my fist at Satan and say ‘No, you are wrong, you are a liar! We will praise God because of who he is, not because of the good things he does for us.’
“Lifting God High from the Lowest Valley offers deep and God-oriented companionship for valley-walkers, and glimmers of true hope from the land beyond.”
Her prayers helped me to instead focus on ‘Yes, God, I’m going to praise you because you are all-knowing. You are all powerful, you are all wise, you are the sovereign God of the universe, and you are always good.’
And so, her prayers just every morning as I started off my day praying those, it helped me to reflect on that and to say, ‘Yes, God, you are worthy of praise because of who you are.’”
For Valley-Walkers
Whether you are mourning a loved one or supporting someone who is, this book invites you to lament honestly, cling to God’s steadfast love, and find hope in His faithfulness.
Lifting God High from the Lowest Valley offers deep and God-oriented companionship for valley-walkers, and glimmers of true hope from the land beyond.
Purchase a copy from SMBC or online
Lifting God High from the Lowest Valley is a deeply personal and hope-filled journey through grief, written by a husband navigating life after the loss of his wife, Kathy. In the aftermath of her passing, he turned to Scripture, books on sorrow, songs, and most profoundly-Kathy’s own prayer journals, where her praises to God became a source of strength and renewal.
