It is the most honest question in the Psalms, and it lands like a fist on the table. The psalmist looks at the world around him, the chaos, the moral confusion, the crumbling of the things that were supposed to hold, and he asks what any thinking believer eventually asks when the foundations crack: what do the righteous do? What do you do when the laws are broken and the evil is escalating and the things that were settled yesterday are suddenly unsettled? When the foundations are being attacked from within and without, what is left to stand on?

The answer comes in the very next breath, and it is the only answer that has ever actually worked. The Lord is in his holy temple. The Lord’s throne is in heaven. That is not a retreat from the question. It is the answer to it. Before you decide what to do, you have to settle what is true. And what is true, what has always been true and will always be true, regardless of who sits in the White House or on the Supreme Court or in the halls of Congress, is that God is on His throne. He was not surprised by this moment. He is not in a panic. He did not step away.

Nations have a lifespan. Read your history. Every empire that has ever risen has eventually fallen. Every power that seemed permanent has proven temporary. The Roman Empire is gone. The Soviet Union is gone. Every earthly throne has cracked and collapsed. But the throne of God has never once been shaken, and it never will be. A republic that has stood for two and a half centuries is a remarkable gift. But the only foundation for confidence about the future is not the strength of any constitution; it is the unshakeable sovereignty of the God who holds nations in His hands.

This means the righteous do three things. They look up, to the One who is still on His throne, whose purposes cannot be derailed, whose kingdom is coming. They look inward, with the honest examination of hearts that revival always requires, asking God to search them and try them and reveal whatever needs to be confessed and surrendered. And they look outward, with love for their neighbors, with salt and light poured into a culture that desperately needs both, with the Gospel that is still the only power that can actually change a human heart.

The foundations are shaking in our day. Anyone who is paying attention can see it. But the throne of God is not shaking, the Word of God is not shaking, the Church of Jesus Christ is not shaking, and the child of God held in the grip of the One who paid for them is not shaking. Know what cannot be moved. And stand on it. That has been the posture of the righteous in every generation when the foundations cracked, and it is the posture for this one.