How do we respond to the terror on September 11?
The recent terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, DC are perhaps the most tragic events witnessed by many alive today. Many watched in real time as the horrific scene unfolded. Through the medium of cellular technology people listened to the last words of some spoken on earth as they made calls to loved ones and others. The hurt brought about by these events is still fresh in the hearts of many. As with any tragedy, questions abound. The believer looks to the Word of God to not only find comfort but also to find applicable eternal principles that help us understand the current scene.
HONOR THE KING
Support for America’s president has never been higher. Many are volunteering for military duty and more are ready to enlist should the need arise. Patriotism is everywhere evident where before it was a vague if not a maligned concept.
While we recognize that we are not of this world and that our citizenship is in heaven, we still heed the words of Peter when he said, “… Fear God. Honor the king” (1 Pet. 2:17).
This being said, believers in the Lord Jesus Christ must still evaluate our leaders’ words and actions in light of the Bible.
RID THE WORLD OF EVIL
Though made in the heat of the moment, President Bush stated that we would “rid the world of evil.” Since then the statement seems to have been modified to “ridding the world of this evil” referring to the terrorists. Yet facts are stubborn things. Will we indeed ever be free of terrorism? Is this really a winnable war? If we rid the world of the perpetrators of these attacks do we really think that we will be free of the threat of terrorist activities?
TROUBLE IS GUARANTEED
The Lord Jesus Himself while on earth told His followers: “In this world you will have trouble” (Jn. 16:33 niv). The freedom God has granted the human race to make their own choices has resulted in countless horrors over the centuries. The events we’ve witnessed recently are the results of sin taken to an extreme. Even if we “root out” terrorism man’s basic nature will not change. Injustice, genocide, and inhumane acts didn’t begin with Osama bin Laden. Describing the condition of sinful mankind, Paul said:
Their feet are swift to shed blood: destruction and misery are in their ways: and the way of peace have they not known: there is no fear of God before their eyes (Rom. 3:15-18).
BOMB AFGHANISTAN?
Under the control of the radical Islamic clerics known as the Taliban the situation is dire. One Afghan living in the United States writes concerning his own countrymen:
“…they’re starved, exhausted, hurt, incapacitated, suffering. A few years ago, the United Nations estimated that there are 500,000 disabled orphans in Afghanistan—a country with no economy, no food. There are millions of widows. And the Taliban has been burying them alive in mass graves. The soil is littered with land mines…
We come now to the question of ‘bombing Afghanistan back to the Stone Age’…Trouble is, that’s been done. The Soviets took care of it already. Make the Afghans suffer? They’re already suffering. Level their houses? Done. Turn their schools into piles of rubble?
Done. Eradicate their hospitals? Done. Destroy their infrastructure? Cut them off from medicine and health care? Too late. Someone already did all that. New bombs would only stir the rubble of earlier bombs.”
Thousands suffer in Southeast Asia, South America, Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Many live daily in fear for their lives. This certainly by no means justifies the unwarranted attacks. It does, however, give us a sense of what much of the world lives through daily to one degree or another.
Modern America has been exempt from foreign intrusion and has dwelt in a relative sense of security—separated from much of the world by two oceans and bordered by friendly neighbors. The U.S. has enjoyed a prosperity that most of the world cannot even imagine. Certainly most of us do not mind living in an affluent society and enjoying its benefits.
WHERE IS OUR SECURITY?
Yet these recent events have been a startling reminder that we live in a world of uncertainty. It has been amazing to realize how tenuous a thread many institutions are hanging upon. Within a week of the attack the airline industry laid off 120,000 employees. In one week the stock market lost 1.4 trillion dollars in value. Besides this there is the yet uncalculated cost of equipment and infrastructure. Add to this the insurance companies losses. How strikingly clear ring the words of James:
Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that” (Jas. 4:13-15 NIV).
God repeatedly warns His people in the Bible to not look for security in their armies, their governments or their riches, for none of these will provide adequate protection when real adversity hits. These things certainly cannot secure us an eternal dwelling place with the Lord.
…Those who trust in their wealth and boast of their great riches? No man can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for him—the ransom for a life is costly, no payment is ever enough… (Ps. 49:6-8 NIV).
The Lord warned us that these very things can distract us, focusing our attention on things of far less consequence than eternity.
Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not highminded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy (1 Tim. 6:17).
How many of those that perished in the attack were prepared for eternity? Only the Lord knows, but we can be certain that the majority of those people thought it was just another day. But the Bible says: “Boast not thyself of tomorrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth” (Prov. 27:1).
Yet surely there were those who died that day who, while unprepared for such an unexpected attack, were prepared for eternity. They had previously recognized their own sinful condition before a holy God and had found the truth that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. They had personally called on the name of the Lord in faith and had found forgiveness of sins and eternal life. They could therefore claim the promise: “We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:8).
RAMPANT PLURALISM
The president called for a national day of prayer and it was conducted without any apparent opposition. The call of the nation’s leaders to prayer is certainly commendable. But what do we make of it when one of the Protestant ministers began his prayer by invoking the “God of Abraham, Mohammed, and Jesus Christ”? In John 14:6, “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by Me.” Woe to anyone who seeks to put Him on the same level as Mohammed or even to elevate modern day Christ-rejecting Judaism with the Lord of glory. Perhaps more clearly than ever we saw the forebodings of events yet to occur when world religions are melded into one.
MUCH MISUNDERSTANDING
One television host opined about those on the planes, “Their souls were with God before the plane crashed. I just feel in my spirit it must have been like that.” Many have called on us to pray for the victims that have been killed. Some have declared, “The roster of angels has been increased.” Without the clear light of God’s revelation we are left in a fog of uncertainty and speculation. The Bible emphatically states that now is the time, today is the day, and after death is too late! This fact alone should spur the Church on to its business of proclaiming the gospel of God’s grace, warning the lost of their plight.
DOOMSDAY REALLY IS COMING
Soon the Lord will judge the world’s economic, political and religious alliance, a system known as Babylon. Remember that Babylon began as a city built in defiance to God; it was noted for its tower reaching to the heavens.
Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen… And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities (Rev. 18:2, 4-5).
And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn over her; for no man buyeth their merchandise any more: The merchandise of gold, and silver, and precious stones…and slaves [or bodies], and souls of men (Rev. 18:11-13).
OUR CERTAIN HOPE
We who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ have this confidence: no matter what the future holds, we know who holds the future. We know how the whole thing will end. The throne in heaven is occupied. The Lord is still in control and “all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose” (Rom. 8:28).