"Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord . . . No king
is saved by the size of his army; no warrior escapes by his
great strength. A horse is a vain hope for deliverance;
despite all its great strength it cannot save. But the eyes of
the Lord are on those who fear [reverence] him, on those
whose hope is in his unfailing love, to deliver them from
death and keep them alive in famine" (Psalm 33:12,16-
19, NIV).
It is my understanding that a retired U.S. Marine sergeant
wrote the following message in remembrance of
September 11-the day that evil struck at the heart of
American freedom and Western liberty:
"I sat in a movie theater watching 'Schindler's List,' and
asked myself, 'Why didn't the Jews fight back?' Now I
know why.
"I sat in a movie theater, watching 'Pearl Harbor' and
asked myself, 'Why weren't we prepared?' Now I know
why.
"Civilized people cannot fathom, much less predict, the
actions of evil people.
"I will embrace the wise words of Prime Minister Tony
Blair who told Labor Party conference, 'They [the
terrorists] have no moral inhibition on the slaughter of the
innocent. If they could have murdered not 7,000 but
70,000, does anyone doubt they would have done so and
rejoiced in it?'
"There is no compromise possible with such people, no
meeting of minds, and no point of understanding with such
terror. Just a choice: 'Defeat it or be defeated by it. And
defeat it we must!'
"[So that I will not forget, today] I will force myself to:
* Hear the weeping
* Feel the helplessness
* Imagine the terror
* Sense the panic
* Smell the burning flesh
* Experience the loss
* Remember the hatred.
"We have no choice. Living without liberty is not living."1
In the United States of America it is written on every coin,
"In God we trust." In light of the tragic events that we
commemorate this day, may this message be forever
indelibly written and engraved on our hearts.
Suggested prayer. "Dear God, immediately following the
events of September 11, 2001 millions of us momentarily
turned our attention towards you, but all too soon we
went back to our old ways and forgot about you. May all
that has happened, and all that we have learned since that
day awaken us to the fact that the world is filled with evil
and that unless we, as a nation, make you our Lord and
our God, we have no guarantee of the safety of the world
we will be leaving to our children and our children's
children. May this day be the beginning of world-wide
spiritual awareness and awakening. Thank you for hearing
and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus' name,
Amen."
1Ed Evans, MGySgt., USMC (Ret.)
-- From
Daily Encounter (c) Dick Innes 2002. Subscribe
here.
