Thoughts on 9/11

I write a weekly article for the church that also gets printed in the Guymon Daily Herald. This is my article from last week reflecting on 9/11.

When the World Changed

            I was in college when the twin towers fell. I remember so many people filled with fear. I also remember being confused about what it was supposed to mean. So many times since then I have listened to people talk about how the world changed on September 11, 2001. I suppose that’s true. Every time I go through an airport, I find some of those changes. But I wander if it is good for us to see 9/11 as the great defining moment of our lives.

April 11, 1995, means a lot to me. That was the day the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building blew up in Oklahoma City. My mother grew up in Oklahoma City, and she insisted on going to witness it for herself. I remember her tears as we went downtown. In a way, life changed after that. It certainly left an indelible mark on me.

I sat at a table with a group of older women a while back. One of them started speaking about her late husband. She got to talking about when they were young and courting. They were happy and careless in those days. Then her voice got quiet and her face drew long. “That’s when they bombed Pearl Harbor,” she said. I remember my grandmother telling me once how everything changed when “the big one” hit (meaning World War II). My grandfather never spoke much about that war and his experience fighting in the Pacific and in Germany (he served in both theaters), and I don’t blame him. I think it changed him in ways that no one else in the family could ever really understand.

            Tragedies force us to change. A loved one dies, a house burns, a tower falls; change is simply in the nature of human experience. We get awful romantic about “the way things used to be.” Even I like to think about more innocent days before mandatory seatbelt laws, a Wal-mart on every corner, and genetically enhanced meat. I am only 30 years old, but I have come to appreciate how we mark the passage of time with celebrations and remembrances which help us stay connected to the important aspects of these previous ways of life. We develop customs and ceremonies to help keep cadence with change. And, yes, we cling to the tragedies as the most important and life-shaping. September the 11^th is often seen as the worst tragedy ever to happen in our national life. It is a grave and solemn remembrance.

Abraham Lincoln once remarked, “My concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God's side, for God is always right.” Lincoln knew about tragedy. He lost a son and led the country through its bloodiest war ever. Having lived in the American South, I can say with some authority that the Civil War is still seen as the great American tragedy, and it still draws on people’s emotions and fears. I wonder, though, if it is appropriate for Christians to look upon national tragedies as the most life-forming events. Did the world really change that much after 9/11 or April 15, 1995, or December 7, 1941, or even 1861?

We Christians have a slightly different narrative. We believe that the world changed forever during those confusing three days when our God – who we murdered on a cross – was being gloriously resurrected . Ultimately, every event in human history from then on has been viewed through the lens of Christ’s death and resurrection. I often say that if we were to put together every despicable act humanity has inflicted upon itself – the concentration camps, the wars, the violence, and the death – still it would not compare to what we did to Jesus. Even the horror of 9/11 does not compare to the bleeding, suffering God dying on Calvary.  We did that. We tried to extinguish the light of the world because we loved the darkness so much. The Good News, however, is that there is no tragedy that cannot be redeemed through the Christ who rose from the dead.

Remember, Jesus died and rose so that tragedies like 9/11 would not be the end of the story. Jesus went through this great ordeal so that our suffering could be redeemed into resurrection. Jesus came out of the tomb so that no one would be left without the hope of a new day. We rightly remember the tragedies and the horrors of our time. Yet, we must be ever committed in our proclamation that “neither death nor life, nor angels nor demons, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39).

I wonder what kind of world it is when Christians look upon every tragedy in light of the triumph of Christ over death. As I often say to myself when I am facing a difficult situation, “Just remember, Jesus is still risen. Christ has overcome the world.”  I will never forget where I was or what I was doing when the towers fell. Those images are burned into my memory. But, I pray that God will never allow me to subvert the most important act in human history as the true agent of change in a world of lost sinners. May we continue to pray for our enemies, honor our dead, and live the lives of love and peace to which Christ calls us.

Grace and peace