Often times, I just don't know what to think of this world.  Heartache, pain, sadness, terror, all of these things that we feel can leave us feeling hopeless.  Especially over the last few months as I've read in the news about horrible situations, I just keep thinking, "I just can't believe that the world is so terrible." It doesn't do any good to ask why because the answer is simple: sin is in the world.  And so, since we can't cast the blame that we want to, and the answers we want are not easy to come by, our hearts simply ache as we read of shootings, hurricanes that wipe out villages, and high school students growing up far too fast.

What can we do?  What tangible thing can we actually do to comfort those who hurt, nurture our own wounded hearts, or change the world to make it better?  At this point, I could go into a number of quotes that we have all heard hundreds of times about "being the change" and "actions that start small will grow", but I won't.

As I was reflecting on all that has happened lately, part of Psalm 27 came into my mind:

I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living!

He is so present here on Earth, how can we not have hope?  When there are so many blessings each day, how can we not give thanks?  His goodness is here, just as it is in Heaven, just as it was in the days when David wrote this Psalm, just as it will be as long as the Earth is in existence.  We will see His goodness in the land of the living, the land on which we live, work, and play.  He offered us this hope long, long ago, coming to fruition in the tangible way that we humans often need to understand on a Sunday morning when a group of women came together at the entrance of a cave and met an angel.  This angel told them that their teacher, the Son of God Himself, who had been killed was no longer there, but alive again, having looked death in the face and said "You no longer have authority here."
How can we stay is despair and grief when such hope lives?  Where would we be if we had no hope?  This world still belongs to the Father and His goodness remains.  As Maltbie D. Babcock wrote so beautifully,

This is my Father's world. O let me ne'er forget

That though the wrong seems often so strong, God is the ruler yet.