i was feeling so down this Saturday night... I feel so unfulfilled.. i feel sad.. i feel depressed...

i grabbed a cute bottle containing encouraging and enlightening Bible verses. My fingers were going through the papers inside, choosing from among a hundred of those verses, while i silently encouraged myself thinking "the joy of the Lord is your strength".. And out came my fingers holding the verse i've chosen.. Can you guess what verse i've picked?

These past days i have been confused, disoriented. How can an ordinary person be fully at awe of and enjoy and contemplate every beauty God has put into creation when bad things are happening in the world? It's like how can you rejoice for the birth of your firstborn child when you know your wife died after labor.. Because if i were to choose, i'd rather dwell on subjects and thoughts and happenings that bring me joy and inspiration... But i was thinking of babies dying, girls raped, Christians executed, distorted beliefs. Yet i cannnot deny that i am also very amazed with the way God watches over me and tells me He loves me as much as He loves all of us.. i was aware that this amazement was not pure amazement because at the back of my mind, i was worried about whatever evil was going on in the world.. And yet for the nth time, God reminds me that He is God... He can handle that stuff and everything else not only under the sun, but also everything surrounding the sun.. He can handle that! i cannot fix everything yet i have myself..i have my faith..and He says that i can never go wrong pleasing Him..because He is the source of all goodness..

So lemme tell you too, somewhere over the rainbow, blue birds fly.. And they are happy and joyful blue birds because they know they are pleasing God by becoming the kind of birds God wants them to be.. So when in doubt, just remember, "The joy of the Lord is your strength." (Nehemiah 8:10)