Adventists Respond to
Attack on America

As we reflect on what the last few days have brought us of terror and trauma, uncertainty and confusion we feel as ordinary human beings so utterly helpless; it is as though there is an empty space inside of us as though we have been drained. It is hard to find words which can express the horror we have experienced and how we now feel about it. Words seem so empty it feels as though they have all been used up. We sense our own human frailty, and we sense that the structures which we make around ourselves are not going to stand the test. And so we must look out elsewhere for help. Immediately to mind come the words of the Psalmist:

"I lift up my eyed to the hills. Where does my help come from?"
And the answer of faith comes immediately:
"My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of Heaven and earth"
(Psalm 121)

As believers we are a people of hope, and we speak the language of hope, faith and belief in the future, even as we face such a distressing moment as we are now faced with. And we are reminded of the words of David:“ Some trust in chariots and some in horses [those were their strongest instruments of war], but we trust in the name of the Lord Our God. (Psalm 20:7) Therefore, difficult though these days are, as believers we are not the agents of gloom and hopelessness. But we do need to look to the Lord.

There is no doubt that the hand of the evil one has been at work in what has happened the fingerprints of the one the only one –who is constantly looking for opportunities to create havoc, to destroy, and cause chaos are there. He is the undisputed master in developing evil into an intricate system. The abominable thing about what has happened in New York and Washington DC and by that to all humanity is that it is not just against institutions and structures of society that the evil has been inflicted, but against innocent people multiple thousands who have paid with their lives at the hand of evil; and we feel with the many more multiple thousands who lost a loved one and who are crying their hearts out at this hour.

How do you put life together again after something like this?

The answer is not easy, and some will search long and may not find it. We will not be short of opinions and theories during the weeks ahead. My concern is: How many more innocent lives will be lost before we will be able to leave this one behind us.

How can you and I help? How can we as a church community help?

As a believing community we read the Bible and we are guided by the Spirit in our understanding of what we read. Some of what we read tells us about developments in the final days in earth's history, and some of those will be rapid and of cataclysmic proportions. But it is important to remember that God only knows precisely how the future will develop and how events will play themselves out. It helps no one, and it does not help the mission which God has entrusted to his church to carry out, for you or I to become overly speculative about that which is yet to happen. We are called on to be vigilant, to be sober, and to carry on with his mission until he comes.

To me that means that as we engage in God's Mission and as we await the coming of our Lord, we must be calm and deliberate, awake and informed, but not to become hysterical or give in to colourful speculations. We must be sensitive to the problems which fellow-members of humanity suffer, and we must be compassionate in our efforts to help. That means, in the current situation, that we give comfort, we give blood, and we give money. It means that we pray for our suffering neighbours and we pray with them. But we will also remember to pray for strangers who may be a long ways off but who are also innocent victims caught in some evil net not of their own making. And we reach out to help them, as would Christ, for also they are his.

As believers we talk regularly with God. Well, remember to talk to him also about the leaders of our nations, America and elsewhere, who now face some very difficult decisions. In seeking to repair that which is damaged, may not the repair be worse than the damage!