THIRTEENTH SUNDAY after PENTECOST

September 11, 2011

Text: Matthew 18:21-35

Pastor Dale G. Bauer

I can remember exactly where I was the morning of September 11, 2001, as clearly as I can remember where I was on November 22, 1963. (Yes, I’m that old.) I was at what was then the Men’s Bible Study here at Cross of Hope. We met in what was then known as the kitchen. We met there every Tuesday morning at 6:30 a.m. Close to the end of our study, a member of the congregation, Ron, came in at a little after nine o’clock eastern time zone, and said, “Did you hear that a plane crashed into the World Trade Center in New York?” Time stopped for a moment for me as I tried to get a fix on what I had just heard. What came to mind was the image I had seen of an Army Air Force bomber that had accidentally crashed into the Empire State Building in the 30’s or the 40’s. I can still see the photo of the bomber’s tail sticking out of the building but, all in all, not much damage was done. But I was compelled to head home, turn on the T.V.—and watch the first tower collapse.

If you are old enough, you remember where you were. You have your own memories of that day. And feelings. The human brain is a complex thing that stores and layers images and feelings.

Today is a day of memories. Of burning, collapsing buildings. Of hundreds of brave firefighters and police responding to the disaster, no matter the risk. Of phone calls to family by those who would die in the collapsing buildings. This is as it should be, because those who fail to remember history are condemned to relive it.

There have been many responses to 9/11. Grief is one of them. Anger justifiably is another. We have a complex airport security program that is ubiquitous. I believe we are now engaged in war for a longer period than any other in our history. Cross of Hope’s response was to commit itself to strengthening and expanding educational ministry here. At the end of 2000 the congregation voted to develop an elementary school. A search for a site began, a business plan was developed, and budget designed. A facility was located and then came 9/11. The stock market took a hit. Uncertainty was in the air.

But we continued with the development of a school, an ambitious and costly enterprise at any time. A start-up plan projected the fall of 2003 for the opening of the school. It finally required a building program here, which was completed in February of 2004. At the same time, the move to get national accreditation for the preschool was well underway.

It was a response of hope. We could have chosen a response of entrenchment, caution, and fear. But we didn’t; we chose hope. Hope given to us in the death and resurrection of Christ Jesus, not destruction promoted by angry and brutal men. Taking destruction and turning it into construction. Then. Now. And in the future. Some once asked our name sake, Martin Luther, what he would do if he learned that the end was near. His reply? Plant a tree.

Jesus suggests another response. A much more difficult one: forgiveness. Have we forgiven or are we ready to forgive those who perpetrated the dastardly acts of 9/11? Or are they too evil to forgive?

Peter, the rock, runs up to Jesus and says, Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him?

Without
hesitation Jesus replies, I do not say to seven times, but seventy times seven.

Yikes. I can get over this 9/11 disaster, even put it behind me, but forgive these people? I confess I find it very hard, even after ten years. The Old Adam (as in Adam and Eve) that lives
in me was glad to hear that Osama Bin Laden was dead. About the only good thing I could find in what the terrorists did on 9/11 is that they destroyed themselves.

When I get stuck with forgiving, I turn to a little book called Forgive & Forget: Healing the Hurts We Don’t Deserve. The author, Lewis B. Smedes, suggests some important things about forgiveness:

1. The deeper the hurt, the longer it takes to forgive.

2. Forgiving is not forgetting.

3. Forgiving allows for healing.

4. Forgiving monsters makes them real human beings who are held responsible fortheir actions.

A personal slur takes a lot less time to forgive than the World Trade Center, or Pearl Harbor, or the Bataan Death March. Forgiving doesn’t erase the pain or the consequences of horrendous acts. Healing by forgiving is not for the perpetrator as much as it is for the victim. It brings a level of closure and release. He makes the point that although we are sinful, we are not evil human beings. We side with evil, take up its cause, and do horrible things. But evil needs no forgiveness; evil human beings do. And making them responsible humans choosing to do evil allows God, in the future, to do the avenging.

Finally, he suggests forgiveness is an act of love, patterning our lives after the life of Jesus Christ.

All this, on this day: remembering, hoping, and forgiving.

Amen.