diff --git a/src/node_contextify.cc b/src/node_contextify.cc
index 8235dcd49e093c..d50b4b568b5da5 100644
--- a/src/node_contextify.cc
+++ b/src/node_contextify.cc
@@ -205,7 +205,11 @@ class ContextifyContext {
 
     Local<Context> ctx = Context::New(env->isolate(), nullptr, object_template);
 
-    CHECK(!ctx.IsEmpty());
+    if (ctx.IsEmpty()) {
+      env->ThrowError("Could not instantiate context");
+      return Local<Context>();
+    }
+
     ctx->SetSecurityToken(env->context()->GetSecurityToken());
 
     // We need to tie the lifetime of the sandbox object with the lifetime of
diff --git a/test/parallel/test-vm-low-stack-space.js b/test/parallel/test-vm-low-stack-space.js
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000000..7c1313d47c1ad9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/test/parallel/test-vm-low-stack-space.js
@@ -0,0 +1,26 @@
+'use strict';
+require('../common');
+const assert = require('assert');
+const vm = require('vm');
+
+function a() {
+  try {
+    return a();
+  } catch (e) {
+    // Throw an exception as near to the recursion-based RangeError as possible.
+    return vm.runInThisContext('() => 42')();
+  }
+}
+
+assert.strictEqual(a(), 42);
+
+function b() {
+  try {
+    return b();
+  } catch (e) {
+    // This writes a lot of noise to stderr, but it still works.
+    return vm.runInNewContext('() => 42')();
+  }
+}
+
+assert.strictEqual(b(), 42);