nine eleven

Raising the flag at Ground Zero

Nine eleven....two words that will forever be etched in our memory. Ten years ago on this day we witnessed and, for some, experienced something that, all these years later, are still difficult to describe and nearly impossible to understand. The television networks have been broadcasting all day about the events of Tuesday, September 11, 2001. The collective need to make some sense of what happened and, more importantly... to understand why... dominates the dialog.

If you are expecting me to say that I know why 9-11 occurred, you are going to be disappointed. I don't. But I do have some personal thoughts.

As a person of faith, an immediate reaction is to wonder about God. Did God cause this to happen?...did God allow this to happen?...the questions go on and on. The organizations that birthed the terrorist attacks claim that they did this in the name of Allah. They say....
I am a Christian and don't know much about Islam or its teachings. What I do know is that God created humanity. My Bible teaches that God gave his creation the ability to choose...choose to love and follow God or choose not. We know how the story starts.

Because mankind chose to disobey and break fellowship with God, mankind alone is responsible for the consequences of its actions. But, like a small child that has broken the lamp in the living room, we try every way we know to get back in the good graces of our parent. It's not my fault...if Mommy hadn't put the lamp there, it wouldn't have broken. Or we lie and say that we didn't break it, it must have been someone else. Or, rather than deny the wrongdoing, we draw Mommy a pretty picture and smile our most innocent smile hoping Mommy will pick us up and tell us it's OK...that Mommy still loves us (which, of course, she does.)

Over the ages, mankind has been doing all kinds of terrible things in its desire to impress God. We (humanity) unilaterally decide to go to battle against God's enemies or, at least, who we determine God's enemies to be. The depths that mankind can go and has gone continue to astound us. The horrific events of the past....the atrocities of the Assyrians, the brutality of the Romans, the wholesale massacres of the Middle Ages, the Crusades to cleanse the Holy Land, the modern-era mass murders under Stalin, Hitler, Milosevic...the genocide in Cambodia, Rwanda, Iraq, Sudan...the terrorist attacks of the last 15 years should painfully illustrate the capacity for evil in the human heart. Many of these events in human history were done in the name of God. But that certainly doesn't make any of these tragedies "of God." Scripture tells me that there is a battle going on...but those same scriptures tell me that the battle is the Lord's.

9-11 showed all of us the worst of mankind. To intentionally fly an airliner full of people into a building full of people is incomprehensible to us. But 9-11 also showed us the best of mankind. The human heart also has the capacity for love, kindness, compassion and we witnessed that in an incredible way in the aftermath of 9-11. People joined hands and hearts as we consoled and held onto one another. We joined hands and voice to lift up people, a city, a nation...ourselves. We picked up the pieces of the brokenness and started again. Church attendance surged as people sought comfort and answers in the place where, for ages, people have come to be in God's presence. But time passes, memories begin to fade, wounds begin to heal and we go back to being reliant on our own strength. But God is still here...and He is still in control even when our human minds wonder how that can be.

What do I learn from 9-11? Mankind, after all of human history, still has the capacity to do the most evil things imaginable. A human heart full of hate and anger and fear is a powerful force for evil. But mankind also has the capacity to be be an imitator of God...living a life full of love, full of grace and full of mercy.

How has 9-11 changed your life?