What did God See on September 11, 2001?
Turn to 2 Peter 3:9
Someone once said, "Life is what really happens on your way to your dreams."
A year ago this Wednesday we were a nation on it’s way to it’s dreams when Life happened. And it happened in the most horrendous way imaginable.
And many of you were not just observers after the fact but witnesses of history. I would bet that most of us can remember where we were during those horrible hours last September 11th.
I was in my office meeting with two men when my wife called and said, “turn on the t.v.” And like myself, many of you were watching live as the plane slammed into the second World Trade Center tower. For most those images will be forever etched in our minds. And what did we see that day?
We saw the incredible slow motion video of a jetliner slamming into a 110 story building.
We saw the footage as those two towers came crumbling down.
We saw firemen covered with dust.
We saw rescue workers combing the wreckage.
We saw a bastion of strength in the Pentagon with a gaping hole in the side.
We saw scenes that made us cry.
We sat in front of our television & saw an act of war against our country.
That’s what we saw.
But we must pause and ask the question, what did God see on September 11, 2001? And as I pondered that, based on what is revealed about God from the pages of the Bible, I can make some safe assumptions as to what God saw.
On September 11, 2001 God saw passengers, crew and hijackers on four airplanes that needed to know Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. He saw thousands in the World Trade Center that he wanted to call his children. He saw thousands in the Pentagon that he wished to be reconnected with. And he saw many that perished without ever coming back into relationship with their heavenly Father.
And we need to open our eyes not just to the tragedy of death but the tragedy of how many of them died without knowing Jesus Christ as their Savior.
How many attended church the Sunday before 911 and heard the last sermon they would ever hear, the last invitation they would ever have a chance to respond to and yet without knowing that it was the last one, stayed in their seats and never responded.
When I was 21 years old I preached at my home church in Hemet, California. I preached the evening service. The sermon was on being soul conscience. Aware and concerned for people’s souls. Less then 12 hours later, a gentleman that was at church that night, his name was Ray Hancock, suffered a heart attack and died. And at 21 I was overwhelmed with the thought that I had the opportunity to preach the last sermon that man would ever hear. To give the last invitation he would ever have a chance to respond to. And I told myself then I better take this seriously.
We don’t know when the last opportunity is for us, for those around us to respond to an invitation. To get our lives right with God. To confess him as our Lord and Savior. To be baptized for the washing away of our sin and the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Mark 10 – Blind Bartimaus rushes out to Jesus – didn’t know it was the last time Jesus would be passing through. Not all respond this way.
2 Pet. 3:9 says that God is not slow in keeping his promise, but he is patient not wanting anyone to perish, but all to come to repentance.
Will they all? No. They will go about their dreams until life wakes them up. And for some it will be too late. And that’s why a great church is consumed with an urgency for reaching people with the message of salvation.
Now, How do we do that? How do we become a church that is a rescue station searching for lost and hurting people. How do I become a person that has a passion and a sense of urgency?
And it has to begin with an understanding of the all-consuming love that God has for people. For all people.
God loved the people that died on 9/11 – he loved the firemen, the office workers, the airline travelers, and here’s the one that shocks us, even the hijackers. Did he approve of them. No, that’s abundantly clear in Scripture, he’s a righteous God and a just God. But he did love them because he’s also a loving God.
And there may be something inside us that says, How could God love them, but isn’t the real question “how could God love me.” I know what I’ve done. I know my sin.
King David said in Psalm 51:3 “I know my transgressions and my sin is always before me.” But he goes on to say 4 verses later that I know when you do cleanse me I will be washed and I will be whiter then snow.”
I’m a sinner, but you love me all the same. I think the love of God and the grace of God have got to be two of the hardest things for us to fathom.
Now we have no problem thinking big about the power of God – saw this last week in my own life – adult mentally handicap man at my old church named Ronnie. Lives at a home we ran. Every night for last few years he has prayed “Jesus make mama well.” Friday night he prayed something different for the first time in years. He prayed “Mama close eyes. Mama sleep with Jesus now.” Saturday morning we received a call that told us Ronnie’s mom had passed on the night before.
Only an all-powerful God can put a thought in someone’s head like that. And we see things like that and we have no problem thinking big about the power of God.
And we have no problem thinking big about the majesty of God. We look at the stars, the universe that we live in. We see the nine major planets in our solar system ranging in distance from the sun from 36 million to over 3 trillion miles away. And yet all of them moving around the sun in exact precision. Mercury making the lap in 88 days and Pluto doing it once every 248 years. We see the earth, all six sextillion tons of it (that’s a six with 21 zeros) and we see it perfectly balanced, turning easily on it’s axis, revolving daily at a rate of more then 1,000 miles per hour.
We see the beautiful sun, a place that every square yard of emits a constant energy level of 130,000 horespower in flames that are constantly being produced by an energy source.
And then we contemplate that the sun is only one star in the 100 billion bodies that make up our galaxy. If you were to hold a dime at arms length, the coin would block out 15 million stars from your view, if your eyes could see with that power.
And we see all that and we cry out as Job did in Job 37:14 about “The wonders of God”.
We echo the words of Isaiah in Isaiah 40:26 to “Lift your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these? He who brings out the starry host one by one, and calls them each by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.”
As the author Brennen Manning puts it “Creation discloses a power that baffles our minds…we are enamored and enchanted by God’s power. We stutter and stammer about God’s holiness. We tremble before God’s majesty…and yet we grow squeamish and skittish before God’s love.”
Why is it that we can think so big about the power of God and yet refuse to think just as big about the love of God. And the mercy of God. And the care of God. And the passion that God has for each and every person on this earth.
Our text says that God’s desire, his wish is that all people everywhere would come to repentance, to relationship with him. And maybe we say, okay, I get that. He loves us all. So how do I see people with the same passion and the same compassion? How do we do that?
#1 We need to open our eyes.
Often over the past couple weeks I have sat down in front of the television to watch the coverage of the anniversary of 9/11. And what I find myself doing is that after awhile I will think to my self. "Enough, it is time to change the channel or turn it off."
And I started thinking, isn’t that easy to do? We kind of build these little insulated cocoons to protect ourselves so we end up living with our eyes shut to the lost and the hurting people around us.
-Tony Compolo illus – in Haiti at restaurant. Kid’s begging at window – waiter pulls blind down.
That’s what we do in life. My eyes may be open physically, but I’m not seeing it. And everything feels okay around me, I’m oblivious to the pain of people outside my boundaries. So we end up developing a false sense of well-being.
This is what Jesus meant when he said, "You who call yourselves by my name have eyes to see, but you don’t see. You have ears to hear but you’re not getting it."
We feel good and believe God. We have church suppers. And then we can go home and change the channel because it’s so painful, and we find something to make us laugh.
But God’s not laughing because God doesn’t change the channel. God hears the cries of people who aren’t sharing the prosperity that you and I are experiencing. God hears the cries. Do we?
I was reading last week about a church of 3000. It was sometime back when the Ethiopian famine was going on. They brought World Vision in and asked, "What can we do to help?" World Vision said every single family in this church, 3000 people, every family could adopt one kid a month. Do it tonight. For just Twenty-two dollars a month you can totally feed, clothe, and provide medical support for a child.
Who cannot sacrificially afford to do that? I mean we’re talking about seven Big Macs. The pastor said he was so embarrassed and discouraged when their people on their way out adopted eleven children. A church of 3000 people and only eleven children adopted!
But are we any better? Our eyes and our arms are so often shut to those that hurting. How do we change that?
We spend time with God.
Mark 1:35. says that ”in the morning while it was still very dark, Jesus got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed.”
Early in the morning he went to get His heart in tune with the heart of God. And you know what happens when I start the day that way, when I spend time with God and I begin to ask God, "What do you want me to see, what do you want me to do? You know what happens. He opens my eyes to hurting people around me.
When you get up Early in the morning and you pray that, then I guarantee as you go through your day you will see hurting and lost people around you, and you will hear the voice of God in the back of your mind saying, "Don’t change the channel."
We need to quit changing the channel. We need to start seeing people not as a hindrance, a bother or an interruption, but as a potential child of God.
To turn on the t.v. and see a tragedy like we saw last year and be struck first off with the thought, you know, I hope they were saved.
To be consumed with a passion to reach lost and broken people with the healing message of Jesus Christ.
To not be ashamed of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, at work, at school, at home, with friends, with family, but to know that nothing else matters but people and their relationship to God.
Listen to me. Did you know that every single minute of every single day over 100 people in our world die? And seven out of ten of those who die do so without knowing Jesus Christ as their Savior.
Let me help you put some perspective to that statistic:
From one year ago to today 64 million people died.
From one month ago to today four and half million died.
From one week ago to today 1 million died.
From yesterday, as we were mowing our lawns and playing our games 150 thousand died.
From one hour ago, as we prepared ourselves to meet with God in this building 6 thousand died.
From one minute ago, when I began this illustration 101 died.
Every second that goes by 1.7 people die.
Count It: Snap - snap - snap - snap - snap - snap.
In that time, ten people in this world have just taken their last earthly breath and seven of those people did so without Jesus Christ to lead them home.
When will we get serious about what were doing. When will we open our eyes to see people as God sees them. When will we reach out to them in the love of Christ?
Over time you are going to see replays of the rescue operation that took place in New York and Washington DC. As you watch that, I want you to remember and meditate of the fact that Jesus Christ is involved in the ultimate search and rescue operation and so should we.
We’re going to sing an invitation hymn. We do this every Sunday. We don’t pressure anyone, we don’t sing 20 verses. We simply put out an invitation. If God is moving in your heart and calling you to make a decision, perhaps that needs to be a public decision, and we want to give you that opportunity.
As we sing I want you to meditate on how you as an individual can open your eyes to God, get closer to him, and in doing so open your eyes and your arms to the lost and hurting people around us.
If you have a decision, why don’t you come as we stand and sing.
