Innocent?

Well, the sun came up again this morning didn't it? Preacher man and I went for our herd walk and we were in time to catch the setting of the full moon. Man that bad boy was huge! I found myself waiting for something to happen yesterday, or to hear that they tried something. I don't know why. Watched some of the NY football players tear up and saw ground zero. 


I heard that right after 9/11 the churches had been packed for about 2 months, then everything went back to normal. I find that sad cuz I feel like the church missed a huge opportunity to be the church during that time. We didn't take the bull by the horns and call evil, evil. We called it a select few crazy people. Then I read one of Dr. Fred's blogs and he was talking about how the media had said we had lost our innocence on that day. I looked up innocence and this is what I found; the quality or state of being innocent;freedom from sin or moral wrong; state of being untainted with or unacquainted with evil. 
Us? Free from moral wrong? Are you kidding? Then Dr. Fred went on to say that surly they meant 9/11 signaled the end of naivete' - a state of denial that consists of a number of unnamed, indefensible assumptions:


There is no such thing as evil.


It can be reasoned away or 'niced' away.


It can not happen here. It will not touch me.


I don't need to be attentive to it's presence.


I do not need to sacrifice my comfort (never mind my life) in opposing it.


And I can not find it within.


He goes on to say Of course, these are not just indefensible assumptions. They are dangerous and self-indlgent. And it did not (or should not) have required a national tragedy to come to grips with the realization that they cannot possibly be true. We owe it to our parents and children to be spiritually wiser and stronger than that. And we owe it to those who dies on that day to foreswear feeling sorry for ourselves - and to practice vigilance, both within and without. The world did not change on 9/11. It has always been this way.


That my friends is the sad truth and we had better open our eyes. I'm not saying we need to see satan behind every bush, but we better get some perspective on the situation and do some dang research! The church had better stand up and be the church or someone else's religion will come in and do it! 

Hope

One of the really cool things about going to seminary besides what you learn and who you meet has got to be The Reader! For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, I will explain. For those of you that know what the reader is, you may skip to the next paragraph. The Reader is something that JD Walt, along with scads of other crones, puts out every semester so that we can read scripture together. There is something so powerful and moving when the body of Christ reads the word of God together. Not like you see in some churches, where you recite what's written on the big board in front of you. More of, this is what we're reading, read it sometime today, ponder these things and be blessed.


This semester they have decided to spend sometime with Matthew, today was Matthew 4:1-11. This is when Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert. I love this scripture, mainly cuz this is when I see that Jesus is tempted and by the Word put's the tempter in his place. It gives me reason to believe that if Jesus shows me how to do something, by golly, I can do it! As The Reader puts it This Word in not a spelled-out Word; it is a lived-out Word. God's method is a Man. Jesus is God speaking to the man in the street. He is God meeting me in my environment, a human environment. He is God showing his character in the place where our charters are formed. He is the human life of God. Is that not the richest thing you have heard today? It is for me.   



God came down to be with us in Jesus. It's that simple and that complex. To me, this story shows me hope. It shows me that God wants to be with us and to help us. Does that mean that satan is going to leave us along? You can bet your bottom dollar it does not! If it means anything, he's going to come after you harder and stronger. That's how I judge if I'm in the middle of God's will, cuz all hell is coming after me! 


Hope; to believe, desire or trust. It's something that is hard to come by anymore. A lot of people don't have much to hope for. In this day and time, when they can tell preachers there will be no prayers at ground zero on 9/11, where is the hope? When they tell us the mosque at ground zero shows tolerance on our part, where is the hope? When they throw that word at us, tolerance, where is the hope.


I tell you what friends, my hope is in Jesus Christ! I WILL be praying that someone at ground zero does pray! I WILL say NO, when I feel like my religious rights are being stomped on! I WILL say no to tolerance, because Jesus wasn't tolerant! He called a sinner a sinner. Will I be popular? I doubt it. But they will know how I feel and what I believe, Cuz I am not ashamed of the gospel! 

In the stairwell

I received this from a friend this morning and I think it says so much! I wish I could have written something like this. But I didn't, so the next best thing is to share it with you anyway!

Meet me in the stairwell.

You say you will never forget where you were when

you heard the news on September 11, 2001.

Neither will I.

I was on the 110th floor in a smoke filled room 

with a man who called his wife to say "Good-bye".

I held his fingers steady as he dialed. I gave him the peace

to say, "Honey, I am not going to make it, but it's OK...I am ready to go."

I was with his wife when he called as she fed

breakfast to their children. I held her up as she

tried to understand his words and as she realized

he wasn't coming home that night.

I was in the stairwell of the 23rd floor when a

woman cried out to Me for help. 'I have been 

knocking on the door of your heart for 50 years!' I said.

'Of course I will show you the way home - only believe in Me now.'

I was at the base of the building with the Priest 

ministering to the injured and devastated souls.

I took him home to tend to his Flock in Heaven. He

heard my voice and answered.

I was on all four of those planes, in every seat,

with every prayer. I was with the crew as they

were overtaken. I was in the very hearts of the 

believers there, comforting and assuring them that their

faith has saved them.

I was in Texas, Virginia, California, Michigan, Afghanistan.

I was standing next to you when you heard the terrible news.

Did you sense Me?

I want you to know that I saw every face. I knew

every name - though not all know me. Some met Me

for the first time on the 86th floor.

Some sought Me with their last breath.

Some couldn't hear Me calling to them through the 

smoke and flames; 'Come to Me...this way...take

my hand.' Some chose, for the final time, to ignore Me.

But, I was there.

I did not place you in the Tower that day. You 

may not know why, but I do...However, if you were

there in that explosive moment in time, would you have

reached for Me?

September 11, 2001, was not the end of the journey for you.

But someday your journey will end, and I will be there

for you as well. Seek Me now while I may be found. 

Then, at any moment, you know you are

'ready to go.'

I will be in the stairwell of your final moments.

~Jesus~ 

Where were you?

Preacher man started a blog yesterday asking the question, "Where were you the morning of 9/11?" and I'm going to run along side him during this week, blogging about that too. 

So where were you when the planes flew into the World Trade Center? I was getting ready for my second day of work at Manna Soup Kitchen in Durango Colorado. That's right, I had started on Sept 10th 2001. Is that bazar to anyone other than me? I had turned on the TV to pass the time as I got ready and I kept hearing excited voices. I went to the living room and there in all it's awful glory were the Twin Towers burning like candles. I could not believe it! I wanted to call Preacher man (before he was Preacher man) and tell him what I was seeing, but it was before the cell phone craze. I stared in disbelief at something I thought surly was someone playing a joke on me. I was so wrong. To this day, I still cry when I see programs about it. I still get upset when I hear people talk about how loving Islam is, and how we worship the same God. They do not worship my God, they worship Allah, and want all Zionist dead. I will go into that more later.

What I get the most upset about is that 10 years later, ton's of folks have forgotten. They have let the media and the now governor of NYC tell us we don't need to have prayer about this event. Let's not call attention to the Mosque they are wanting to build at ground zero either. That day our vocab list got bigger. We all know where ground zero is don't we? We know the battle cry from flight 93, "Let's Roll!" We know where we were and what we were doing when they decided their religion needed to be inflicted on us! 

Whether you think it or not, your life changed on 9/11.

So how are you going to remember it? Is your church doing anything? All I know is my heart is heavy as the day comes closer.