Participants: Mike Leno
Series Code: FC
Program Code: FC000033
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00:29 On September 11, 2001,
00:32 the liberty of all freedom loving people 00:34 in the world was attacked. 00:36 And the airline crashes into the World Trade Center 00:39 in New York, in the Pentagon in Washington D.C. 00:45 Seven thousand people were either dead or missing. 00:51 On September 11, more people died 00:52 in the attack than on any other occasion, 00:56 on an attack by a foreign power on U.S. soil. 00:59 We lost more people on that day than in Pearl Harbor. 01:04 In a picture of poetic tragedy the statue of Liberty 01:08 overlooked the scene of terror and devastation. 01:14 We struggle to make sense out of the senseless, 01:17 but that is the nature of evil. 01:20 If evil made sense it wouldn't evil. 01:23 But today even while we mourn this great tragedy, 01:28 we can find good news. 01:29 We can find what God is doing in this situation. 01:33 Now it would be easy to capitalize 01:35 on all the fear and the trauma. 01:38 After all this is the end time. 01:40 Bible believing Christians all over the world 01:42 see events like this as simply typical of what will happen 01:47 more and more towards the end of the world. 01:51 But if all we get out of this is fear. 01:54 Then we've missed the good news. 01:58 While fear can get our attention, it can't save us. 02:02 And so today we're going to examine two aspects 02:05 of dealing with this kind of trauma. 02:08 Number one, God did not cause 02:11 the terrorist attacks on our country, 02:13 nor did He want them to happen. 02:16 Number two, God can and will bring good out of this evil. 02:21 In fact, we see that happening already. 02:24 You see Satan is the terrorist of the universe. 02:26 God has been fighting a war against spiritual terrorism. 02:30 Unfortunately, you and I are in this world 02:33 and we're caught in the crossfire, 02:36 cause of spiritual liberty 02:37 is worth fighting for, it's worth dying for. 02:41 And Jesus demonstrated that on the cross. 02:43 Two days after the attack on the World Trade center. 02:46 Dateline NBC, ran a story on a man 02:49 by the name of Harold Lutdnick 02:50 CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, a bond trading company 02:54 with about a thousand employees in the World Trade Center. 02:58 The company occupied floors 101 through 105 in the north tower. 03:05 As it happened Harold Ludtnick the CEO 03:07 was late getting to work that day. 03:09 So he drooped his son on his first day of kindergarten, 03:14 which made him late to work. 03:17 On that fateful day as he arrived to work, 03:20 he saw the towers coming down. 03:25 His interview with NBC was a gut wrenching interview. 03:30 He broke down several times but NBC noticed that 03:34 in spite of being a hugely successful man, 03:38 in spite of being a head of hugely successful company. 03:43 Harold Ludtnick was proud not just because of his companies 03:47 bottom-line but you see he considered his company a family. 03:51 He was proud of the kind of people he had to work with. 03:56 Ludtnick lost 700 of his employees that day. 04:00 None of his employees who were up in their offices 04:03 that day made it out alive. 04:05 There were few who perhaps arrived late as he did, 04:08 some of them made it to the lobby but every one, 04:13 who were already in their offices, 04:17 everyone died that day. 04:20 The average age of his employees 04:22 was about 30, Ludtnick said. 04:24 So he said, "We have a lot of people to take care of." 04:29 But that's what we want to do, he said. 04:33 It's interesting to notice the reactions to these attacks, 04:39 politicians, the pundits, public reactions. 04:43 We heard all kinds of reactions. 04:45 Some said, "Let's bomb them 04:47 and if there's collateral damage, so be it." 04:51 One person even said, "God have mercy 04:53 on you because we won't." 04:56 There were reactions from the religious world as well. 04:58 Some said, "It's a sign of the end." 04:59 Some said, "It's a fulfillment of prophecy." 05:01 Some said, "It's a judgment of God." 05:05 A couple of well known religious leaders 05:08 even went on television angered a lot of people with statements, 05:12 that God had allowed this to happen 05:14 because of activities of pagans, abortionists, 05:16 feminists, gays, lesbians and even the ALCU. 05:20 Understandably there was quite a backlash 05:22 to those kinds of statements 05:24 nd they since backed away from them. 05:25 But this often happens when we make get records 05:29 about making sense out of the senseless. 05:33 Actually I like what Elder Don Schneider had to say. 05:36 Don Schneider is the President 05:38 of the North American division of Seventh-day Adventist. 05:42 The day after the attack, he gave worship talk 05:45 to the employees in his office. And this is what he said. 05:48 He said, "It's incredible to think 05:51 that the tragic killings of yesterday 05:53 would be attributed as an act of God." 05:56 He went on to say that, 05:58 "When we help people hurt by the attack, 05:59 so when we get together to pray for the victims 06:02 of the tragedies those are acts of God." 06:07 How do we make sense out of all of this? 06:10 Is there something we need to learn? 06:13 What does God had to do with this tragedy? 06:17 The answers are this. 06:20 God does not cause evil 06:23 but God will bring good out of it. 06:27 God did not cause this evil, in fact He did not even allow it 06:32 in order to teach us some thing. 06:36 In what sense does God teach us things? 06:39 Does God wish bad things to happen to us 06:43 in order to teach to us a lesson? 06:45 Does God need the devil in order to teach us something? 06:48 The Book of Job pictures the context 06:51 between good and evil. 06:53 In the first chapter of Job, it pictures 06:55 all the representatives of the world coming before God 06:59 and Satan accusing God of giving 07:02 inordinate protection to Job. 07:04 Of course he will serve you, said Satan. 07:07 You've put head around him, You have protected him. 07:10 God said okay, "Take the hedge down. 07:12 I know my servant Job, he will serve me 07:14 even if you threaten him and even hurt him." 07:20 You see innocent people suffer and die. 07:22 For this short life span that we're here 07:25 God must allow evil to reveal itself. 07:28 There's more at stake here than just us. 07:30 The eternal security of the universe is at stake. 07:34 The universe needs people 07:36 who will live righteous unselfish lives, 07:38 even when it's inconvenient or even painful. 07:42 Being good must be its own reward. 07:45 God modeled that sought of character, 07:48 when Jesus came here and lived and died for us. 07:52 Whenever you're tempted to wonder 07:54 if God is using bad things to teach us something, 07:57 go read and reread the story of Job. 08:01 Did the attack on New York and Washington reveal 08:04 a judgment on people who were especially evil. 08:06 Many people think that this was a judgment of God. 08:09 Now I have no doubt, that there's a lot of wickedness 08:12 in New York and Washington, 08:14 and all of the other major cities of the world. 08:18 But the terrorist attacks did not happen 08:20 because people in New York and Washington 08:22 were especially evil. They happened 08:24 because the terrorist were especially evil. 08:28 Remember it was the well meaning 08:31 but mislead friends of Job who said, 08:35 "That evil happens because God 08:37 is punishing you for something." 08:42 Well if God does not cause evil to teach us something. 08:47 How does He bring good out of it? 08:49 I wanna show you some pictures from around the world, 08:52 after the World Trade Center disaster 08:54 and after the attack on Pentagon. 08:55 People around the world joined in kind of a common 09:00 outpouring of sympathy and prayer. 09:06 For example Palestinians in east Jerusalem, 09:10 the American Consulate in St. Petersburg, 09:13 the American Embassy in Moscow, 09:16 the American Embassy in Beijing, Pristina Kosovo. 09:22 And Russian players in a football game 09:25 in Germany were unwilling to compete 09:28 when they heard of the tragedy, 09:30 but officials told them to play anyway 09:32 and they played defiantly 09:34 but spiritlessly and uncompetitively. 09:39 Yes, things like this should be a wake up call. 09:43 It should wake us up to realize that we need the gospel 09:48 and we need to share the gospel. 09:51 We need to turn to Matthew 24 and see 09:55 what Jesus had to say about the bad things 09:58 that would happen in the end of time. 10:01 I'm turning to Matthew 24:6 to 8. 10:04 Jesus words, "You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, 10:07 but see to it that you are not alarmed. 10:10 Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 10:13 Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. 10:16 There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 10:19 All these are the beginning of birth pains." 10:24 Many people have said, 10:26 that when bad things like this happen, 10:27 it means the end is here and I have no doubt that if-- 10:33 if I had been standing there in the shadow 10:35 of the twin towers, I would have been convinced 10:39 that the end was happening right there. 10:43 But you know bad things are not the sign of the end. 10:46 Wars and rumors of wars are not the sign of the end. 10:49 Even famines and earthquakes are not the sign of the end. 10:51 The Bible says, those are just the beginning of birth pains. 10:56 We need to read on later in the chapter Matthew 24:14, 11:00 where Jesus says, "And this gospel of the kingdom 11:03 will be preached in the whole world 11:05 as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come." 11:13 Tragedy can be a wake up call. 11:15 In the case of the terrorist attacks 11:17 on New York and Washington, it should be a big wake up call. 11:21 But bad news is not the gospel. 11:24 The gospel is good news. 11:30 Sometimes it's easy for a preacher 11:32 to take advantage of tragedy. 11:35 You can get a lot of, amen's. 11:38 You can get a lot of people flocking 11:40 to churches in the wake of a disaster like this. 11:44 But fear although it can get our attention,cannot save us. 11:49 The gospel is good news, not bad news. 11:51 I ask you, what will we do when things 11:53 get back to normal, whatever normal is? 11:57 When the dead are buried, the mess is cleaned up, 12:00 the buildings rebuilt, the stock market recovers, 12:03 people feel safe to fly again, what happens then? 12:10 Fear of the end can go only go so far. 12:12 If fear is your motivation to turn to God, 12:15 what will you do when you feel safe again? 12:17 Will you turn away from God? 12:19 That's why the real sign of the end 12:20 is not the bad news in the world, 12:22 the real sign of the end is the success of the gospel. 12:27 Now some of us need a wake up call. 12:29 We need to say, "If I'm heading the way, 12:31 I'm headed, I'm not going to be in the kingdom. 12:34 And a tragedy can be that kind of wake up call. 12:37 But there is no eternal security in this world. 12:42 We're all doomed to destruction eventually 12:44 unless we have good news. 12:49 Once you wake up you have to have 12:52 something positive to believe in. 12:55 Do you know the God, who loves you? 12:57 And do you know what He really wants from you? 13:02 One of the first victims that was brought 13:05 into the Trade Center was a young woman, 13:09 who appeared to be in her late twenties. 13:12 She was terribly mangled up. 13:15 From what they had heard about what happened, 13:18 from those who had rescued her 13:22 and loaded her into the ambulance 13:25 and taken her into the hospital. 13:26 From what they could gather from eyewitness. 13:30 She had been struck by falling debris, 13:32 it may even have been a piece of a landing gear 13:35 from one of the airplanes and as she was running 13:39 terrified away from one of the Trade Center buildings 13:44 where she had worked. 13:46 A piece of debris and probably 13:48 this landing gear stuck her from behind. 13:51 They said, if it had just been a couple of inches higher 13:55 it probably would've hit her head 13:57 and would've killed her instantly. 13:59 But it plowed into her back side 14:01 and when she arrived in the hospital. 14:03 Of course she was unconscious, 14:05 they didn't know who she was 14:07 and her life hung by a thread. 14:12 They called her Jane Doe number 1. 14:16 She was the first victim to arrive at that hospital 14:19 and since she was unnamed, 14:21 she was called Jane Doe number 1 14:24 Well they put intravenous fluids into her, 14:29 they kept her alive and they prepared to amputate her legs. 14:34 One of the traum a surgeons there 14:35 who was very well trained and expert in his field, 14:39 took one look at her and said, we got to amputate her legs, 14:42 its necessary to save her life. 14:46 But there was also a foot specialist there 14:49 and as he looked at the damage 14:52 he wondered who she was. 14:54 He saw her long dark hair, he thought, 14:59 "I wish I could save her feet and her legs." 15:02 And so he begged for little bit more time. 15:04 "I think I can save them" he said. 15:07 And so they gave him a little bit more time 15:10 and in a very arduous surgery 15:12 they reconstructed her whole back side, 15:15 her lower torso, and her legs and her feet. 15:21 At the end of the surgery, 15:25 she was still alive, she survived. 15:31 Eight hours later, in spite of tube down her throat, 15:36 she was able to wake up and whisper 15:41 a phone number and her name. 15:44 it turns out she was Debbie Martinfeld from Manhattan. 15:50 They called the phone number 15:52 and the voice on the other end of the phone 15:56 turned out to belong to her fiancé. 15:59 She was engaged to be married 16:00 in about a year from that time. 16:05 One of the nurses who took care of her 16:08 said that she-- she had looked at her 16:11 and wondered who she was 16:14 and then once they found out who she was 16:16 and found out she was engaged to be married. 16:19 She looked at her and she thought, 16:24 "This person, who is so badly mangled, 16:28 whose life was almost taken, who almost lost her legs 16:31 and her feet is going to use those legs 16:35 and those feet at her own wedding." 16:42 She had 30 units of blood. 16:45 She had a tube between her vocal cords 16:47 and she could hardly whisper. 16:51 But when she looked up at the doctor 16:54 and the nurse and opened her eyes. 16:58 The nurse and the doctor both started crying 17:02 and they thought, she is going to live 17:04 and we are going to her wedding. 17:08 You see the end of time, the end of this world 17:15 is not meant to be something 17:18 that scares the wits out of everyone. 17:21 Yes there are bad things that happened, 17:22 they've been bad things they've been happening 17:24 all through earth's history. 17:27 And sometimes we as Christians are tempted 17:29 to capitalize on the bad news. 17:33 And we look at the bad news as the message. 17:40 Bad news is not the message. 17:42 The gospel is good news. 17:45 You see just like Jane Doe number 1, Debbi. 17:50 We are helpless, lost in sin. 17:53 We have been damaged by sin. 17:56 When God comes to this earth to save His people, 18:01 it will not be in order to destroy His people, 18:07 it will be a rescue mission. 18:10 And unlike Debbi, you and I 18:14 are never John Doe's and Jane Doe's. 18:18 God knows us, He knows every hair of our heads. 18:23 And He will reconstruct us too 18:24 just like those surgeons who meticulously 18:27 operated on poor Debbi's feet and legs and lower torso. 18:32 Our heavenly Father, He is our creator. 18:35 He can create us better than we ever were before. 18:39 The second coming is a rescue mission. 18:43 It will rescue us from the terrorism of sin 18:48 and the evil conditions of this world. 18:53 Jesus calls us to be His bride. 18:56 Just like Debbi, Jane Doe number 1, 19:01 she was destined to be a bride. 19:03 You and I are destined to be the bride of Christ. 19:07 That is the kind of symbolism 19:09 that the Bible uses to picture the redeemed. 19:13 When that New Jerusalem comes down 19:14 out of heaven according to the Book of Revelation. 19:18 It will be adorned as a bride, 19:21 beautifully dressed for her husband. 19:26 God will reconstruct His people. 19:29 He will create them new. 19:31 He will bring them to Himself 19:34 as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 19:37 And no longer we'll be subject to the terrorists of the world. 19:41 No longer we'll we be subject to the terrorist 19:44 of this unnerves, Satan. 19:48 No longer will evil wreck havoc on our lives. 19:55 It would be tempting to motivate people 20:01 to serve God out of fear. 20:04 Many a times fear has more immediate 20:08 motivational power than good news. 20:10 And that's the unfortunate-- that's the unfortunate case 20:15 for many of us human beings. 20:17 We are more immediately motivated 20:20 by fear and by tragedy. 20:23 How many of us have ever suddenly decided, 20:26 well it's time to fasten our seatbelts 20:28 when we know of somebody, 20:30 who was killed in a car accident. 20:32 How many of us have suddenly realized 20:33 that may be it's time to slow down 20:36 when we see a bad accident on the highway. 20:40 Yes, God can use bad news 20:44 and He has all the way through history. 20:47 When Jesus sat down on the Mount of Olives 20:50 and gave that famous sermon about the end of time. 20:55 He was very honest, blunt even about the fact 20:59 that there were going to be a lot of bad things happen. 21:01 In fact, He even, He even said, 21:03 not only will there be wars and rumors of wars, 21:06 but you will be handed over to people, bad people. 21:09 You will be handed over to people 21:11 and persecuted for my sake. He was very honest about that. 21:15 But such things are not the motivation to serve God. 21:21 They are necessary, unfortunately 21:24 they revealed the character of evil. 21:27 But we should never mistake it 21:28 for God's wishes, or worse His will. 21:34 Although nothing ever happens outside the will of God. 21:36 We can be sure that God never wants anything evil 21:40 to ever happen to His children 21:42 or to anybody for that matter. 21:45 So at the end of time, 21:48 the character of evil will be revealed. 21:51 In one of the most important speeches ever made, 21:55 the Mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani 21:57 stood before the United Nations, 22:03 and recounted what had happened to his city, 22:07 New York during the terrorist attack. 22:11 And he recounted how lives have been lost, 22:16 and what a horrible tragedy this had been. 22:20 And then he looked at his audience 22:22 and he said something that was probably more blunt 22:28 than any United States statesman 22:33 had ever said to the United Nations. 22:37 He said, we are right, and they are wrong. 22:42 What was he referring to? 22:44 He was referring to the principles of freedom 22:47 upon which our democracy is based, 22:53 the principles of freedom that people 22:55 all over the world believe in, 22:57 the principles of freedom to worship 23:00 according to your conscience, the freedom to work 23:03 for a living, the freedom to believe 23:08 as your conscience tells you to believe. 23:11 And he says, these principles are what has made us great. 23:15 This attack on us was an attack 23:20 on our liberty and our freedoms. 23:24 Because of this horrible tragedy that had happened 23:28 in New York and Washington D.C. 23:31 Rudy Giuliani could stand before the United Nations 23:33 representatives from all over the world, 23:36 and he could say something 23:37 that couldn't have been said before with such force. 23:40 He could say we are right, and they are wrong. 23:45 There is going to come a time when God is going to stand up. 23:50 There is going to come a time 23:51 when evil will have revealed itself 23:53 so completely to the entire universe 23:56 that God is going to be able to stand up 23:57 and he is going to be able to say 24:00 something with such bluntness and finality, 24:03 that the end will have to come. 24:06 And he will be able to stand up 24:07 and before the whole universe say, 24:10 my way is right, my law of love, 24:14 The way I govern in the universe is right. 24:16 It is the spiritual terrorist, it is Satan, 24:19 the terrorist of the universe that is wrong. 24:22 And why will he be able to say that, 24:24 because it will have been demonstrated 24:27 to the entire universe already. 24:31 You see folks, we live 24:34 in the middle of the war and war hurts. 24:40 It may be a spiritual war, 24:42 but it still has devastating results. 24:45 And the fact that it's a spiritual war 24:47 means that it not only has results in this life, 24:50 but results for eternity. 24:54 When evil will have revealed itself. 24:59 Good will also have revealed itself. 25:03 When Jesus Christ went to the cross, 25:06 He showed to the universe 25:08 what kind of person He really was. 25:11 He was the kind of person who would rather die 25:14 a miserable death than be without you and I for eternity. 25:18 He was the kind of person who would rather be strung up 25:21 and nailed to a cross than violate His own law of love. 25:27 He was the kind of person who would go through this. 25:30 In the Garden of Gethsemane 25:32 drinking that cup as He called it. 25:34 In other words, the suffering 25:36 that He was going to go through. 25:38 According to the will of His Father, 25:40 rather than give up on this world. 25:44 And so when God stands up at the end of time. 25:50 After all the wars and rumors of wars 25:52 have run their course and they have been done with. 25:57 When people from all over the world rather than 26:01 fighting each other will now have to see 26:04 Jesus Christ come back a second time. 26:08 They will realize why He is right 26:11 and why He has the right to take His people home. 26:18 John 14:1 to 3 is the message from Jesus to us. 26:26 "Let not your heart be troubled, 26:28 ye believe in God, believe also in me. 26:33 In my Father's house are many mansions, 26:38 if it were not so, I would have told you. 26:41 I go to prepare a place for you. 26:45 And if I go and prepare a place for you, 26:48 I will come again, and receive you unto myself, 26:52 that where I am, there ye may be also." 26:58 My friends, that promise is for you and me. 27:04 You may be afraid of many things in your life, 27:10 and you may wonder what am I suppose to learn 27:13 from this tragedy, be it a national tragedy, 27:15 an international tragedy, or may be 27:17 just a personal tragedy in your own family. 27:21 What you have to learn is that there is good news. 27:25 God is not causing this evil to happen. 27:27 God does not want this evil to happen. 27:29 He has never ever caused evil to happen, 27:35 even to teach us something. 27:37 But the genius of God is that 27:38 He can bring good out of that evil. 27:41 He can use it as a wake up call if that's what you need. 27:45 You can turn to your Savior. 27:48 You can turn now to your Savior. 27:50 There is no better time than right now. 27:54 You can be right with God, you can know you are saved. |
Revised 2014-12-17