Remembering
This has been a weekend of remembering. We have all recalled those moments ten years ago, where we were, how we heard, what we did. Maybe some of us have remembered people that were lost in the Towers, or the Pentagon, or on Flight 93.
I remembered a seventh-grade Sunday School teacher named Jerry Paskins. I loved him because he always brought donuts. He was incredibly fit. Each day he did a pushup for every year of his life, plus one to grow on. On September 11, 2001 he did 58 pushups.
Jerry was in his final day of an insurance audit on the 94th floor of the North Tower when the first jet ripped into the tower in a ball of flame that consumed floors 92 through 98. Initially it was assumed that he simply never knew what hit him. But when rescue workers found Jerry’s body a few days later it was in the stairwell on the 20th floor. He almost made it. And in many ways that is harder to deal with.
What do you say to Jerry’s family? What can you say? Is God still good even in the face of unspeakable, unnecessary tragedy? As Christians, we believe Romans 8:28, that “in all things God works for the good of those who love him and are called according to His purpose,” but what does that really mean?
I can tell you a few things that I don’t think it means. I don’t think it means that we call Jerry’s death “good.” Jerry’s death – in and of itself – was evil. Period. Nor does it mean that God brings evil things into our lives intentionally to produce some good result that only He sees. Let’s not confuse tragedy like 9/11 with biblical references to God’s discipline or judgment.
Instead, here is my best shot at an illustration: if you love God and you are willing to relinquish control and make His purposes your purposes, then God weaves together the threads of your life to make something beautiful. Some of those threads are there because of God’s blessing, and others because of His discipline. Some threads are the result of the brokenness of this world, and others are a result of the willful sin of others.
But the point of the passage is not the threads. Live long enough and you’ll realize that most of the threads are out of your control anyway. The point is the weaver. You see, on my own I can’t weave the threads into something beautiful. But God can. So the question is, are you willing to be “called according to His purpose,” or are you bent on achieving your own purposes?
There are so many things for us to remember this weekend. But most of all I’m reminded of the truth of the words Paul wrote just a few verses later in Romans 8: “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God this is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
