A Day to Remember...
"That day is a day of wrath, A day of trouble and distress, A day of devastation and desolation, A day of darkness and gloominess, A day of clouds and thick darkness, A day of trumpet and alarm Against the fortified cities And against the high towers."(Zephaniah 1:15-16) A watershed moment is a momentous event that cannot be forgotten and serves as a turning point in the history of mankind. September 11, 2001 is one of those days. People around the world recall exactly where they were when the hijacked planes destroyed the World Trade Center towers in New York. I remember driving with Guia to our place of work in New Jersey when I heard the news on the radio of a plane "accidentally" ramming into the north tower of the WTC. Then we found out later on, when a second plane hit the south tower that this was not an accident but rather a coordinated terrorist attack against the country.
We remember the people who were at the towers, the passengers and crew of the planes, the police officers, medics and firemen and others among the almost 3000 who lost their lives on that day. We remember the heroism of those who risked and lost their lives saving those trapped inside the towering inferno and in the rescue mission after the towers collapsed. We remember the brave men and women of the armed forces who lost their lives in the ensuing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. We remember the rare moments that political division was set aside and in the months after the tragic day, a wounded country was solidly united. Such national unity is a phenomena that we have never seen since and is just an afterthought in the severely divided America we live in now. The Lord can use periods of tragedy to awaken and repurpose a nation. The days following 9/11 saw churches being filled to capacity as people looked to what is spiritual to find answers and healing. Sadly, that spiritual awareness did not lead to a spiritual revival as it did not take long before the country went back to business as usual. It is important that we remember and treat the gaping wound that 9/11 inflicted on the national psyche. This nation has been so desensitized that now, in the middle of an unprecedented global pandemic, although churches can no longer be filled like in the days after 9/11, we do not see the same response of seeking what is spiritual. Most just accepted this pandemic - the "mother" of watershed moments - as just a "new normal" that we need to get used to and move on from. This is the kind of desensitization which will normalize future tragic global occurrences wherein people will not be so alarmed and as the Lord Jesus said in the Olivet Discourse: "For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be." (Matthew 24:38-39) Biblical remembrance is not just a mental recollection of the past, but should be a time of soul searching and reflection on God's message inside the cataclysm, what He is telling us now, and what He is about to do next. Rising above the darkness of 9/11 is our sovereign God, Who continues to govern in the affairs of men and gives hope found in His Son Jesus Who will return very soon. Pray that we and many in the world will be in step with what the Spirit of Almighty God is orchestrating through history before the next watershed moment, the Great Tribulation comes; where a greater devastation as prophesied by the prophet Zephaniah in the scripture I quoted above will come to pass. Bigger perils are coming, but we don't fear because Christ is near! Let us remember and pray, but be ready in Christ and be busy for Him.
Be blessed in the Lord Jesus in these last days, Pastor Ramon
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