You may be feeling that life just isn’t worth living anymore, that you have made such a mess of things, or that life has dealt you too many blows. You are down for the count. Will you get up? Even in the most difficult of circumstances, here’s why you can go forward and live with purpose.

“Consider the work of God: who can make straight what he has made crooked?” (Eccles. 7:13). Here are seven reasons why God allows various afflictions, also known as “crooks,” in the lives of his children.

It’s not fun being kicked while you’re down. Job’s friends rushed to judgment when he suddenly lost his children, wealth, and health. Here are six things to keep in mind when tragedy strikes.

Maybe you have recently experienced a devastating loss, or you know someone who has. Even though it seems impossible to do when facing a sudden tragedy, here are five good things to remember.