The Tenth Anniversary of 9-11: The Lord Questions Us

Our nation has experienced the Lord's hand of discipline. Ten years ago wicked men flew three large jet aircraft full of fuel into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Virginia. A fourth plane aimed at a similar diabolical purpose but fell short, thanks to the sacrificial courage of its passengers and crew. Thousands of people died in these conflagrations. One of the greatest symbols of our nation's financial prosperity fell to the ground in a heap of dust and wreckage. The very headquarters of our armed forces was pierced and ignited in flame. We were stunned, shocked, horrified, and scarcely knew what to do. We had perceived ourselves as untouchable, shielded by two wide oceans and the might of our military from such dangers.

But after September 11, 2001, we could never feel untouchable again. While God viewed the actions of these terrorists with hatred and detestation, nevertheless we remember Lamentations 3:37-38, "Who is he that saith, and it cometh to pass, when the Lord commandeth it not? Out of the mouth of the most High proceedeth not evil and good?" Yes, both good and evil are ordained by the Most High. These evil men could not have accomplished anything unless the Lord had decreed it in His righteousness and wisdom.

But this is not all. Six years ago, in early September, the people of Mississippi and Louisiana were starting to pick up the pieces after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina (August 2005). Much of the city of New Orleans was under water. Refugees streamed north and west, desperately seeking shelter and aid. Many trace this disaster to human hands, and no doubt human wickedness and incompetency greatly aggravated the situation. But, again, we remember from the Scriptures that God rules over life and death. Psalm 107:25 reminds us that the winds and the waves of the sea still obey His voice, "For he commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof." Katrina did what God ordained for it to do.

Three years ago the housing bubble collapsed (August 2008) and the value of the real estate market fell dramatically. Banks and lenders staggered under the defaults of millions of homeowners, and massive bailouts by the federal government have not renewed the economy. Unemployment is about nine percent. The national debt is ballooning at an alarming rate.
Again, we could trace these effects to human greed and foolishness. But over all is the hand of the Lord.

Moses warned Israel in Deuteronomy 8, "Lest when thou hast eaten and art full, and hast built goodly houses, and dwelt therein; and when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied; then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget the LORD thy God...  and thou say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth. But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth" (verses 12-14, 17-18).

Why does God send such judgments upon the land? Our Lord Jesus explained that disasters call all of us to repentance. Luke 13:2-5 says, "And Jesus answering said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilaeans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish."

We dare not look down upon New York City, Washington D.C., or New Orleans, and say, "We thank Thee, Lord, that we are not sinners like these men whom Thou hast judged." God forbid! These disasters call to all of us, especially the visible church, Repent, repent! These are but the lightest touches of the Day of the Lord upon our world. What will it be when the hammer of divine justice falls? When the towers fell, the United States of America should have fallen to its knees in true repentance of its national and individual sins.

But did we fall down? Yes, there was a brief surge in church attendance and prayer. No doubt some individuals turned from sin to Christ, by the drawing power of the Father. But where is the fruit of repentance in our society as a whole? Our national culture has seemed to accelerate in its downward plunge into immorality and false teaching.

Secular humanism continues to thrust God's name and laws out of the public square, ignoring our history and heritage and preferring the atheistic philosophies of communism and socialism. Morality has dropped to an all-time low in our nation. Uncleanness abounds, immodest dress is common, and adultery is socially acceptable. Divorces on unbiblical grounds tear apart our families. Perverted practices once viewed with shame now demand rights in society, rights invented out of men's imaginations.

Materialism and the love of money drives our quest for self-gratification. Gambling and lotteries are endorsed by the government itself. Pride and self-centeredness are promoted as psychological health. Though America is known as a Christian nation, in reality it is a worldly nation. The lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life are not only accepted but advocated and advanced by worldly music, worldly movies, worldly relationships, and worldly reading materials. We live for entertainment. We pay more money and more attention to professional athletes than we do to the generals that command our armies and defend our land.

Violence and crime threaten our safety in both the cities and the small towns. Movies and video games train children to shoot and kill in cold blood. Illegal drugs and excessive drinking enslave our bodies and minds and consume our resources. The voluntary abortion of unborn babies bathes our feet in the blood of tens of millions of innocent children. America has murdered more in our abortion clinics than Germany ever killed in its Holocaust. Sabbath breaking is the norm rather than the exception. Taking the Lord's name in vain, cursing, and obscenity fills the media and defiles our workplaces. Politicians as a group have lost their dignity and honor by selfish, immoral, and deceptive conduct. National debt is multiplied, and fiscal responsibility to future generations is ignored for the short-term gratification of voters.

Most abominable in the eyes of God is the condition of His own church in our land. Prayerlessness reduces our impact to an anemic shadow of what it might be. Millions build their assurance on the sands of easy-believism, claiming salvation without repentance.  Pluralism, relativism, and so-called tolerance have made us gutless, spineless, and voiceless in the face of great errors and evils. Family worship and the catechism of our children is neglected in some circles, and practically forgotten in others. Doctrine is either ignored as irrelevant and divisive, or idolized by dead orthodoxy without a matching experience of the glory of God. False teaching which our forefathers would have not given the time of day now abounds as a popular alternative within evangelical Protestantism. Public worship has become the playground of fallen man's imagination where anything that attracts a crowd is legitimate, instead of a reverent and glad submission to bring to the King all and only what He commands in Scripture. Submission to proper authority in the home, the church, the school, and the community is scorned as outdated and oppressive instead of the law of liberty.

In sum, American religion is a paper-thin veneer of faith barely covering the American idols of materialism, hedonism, secular humanism, and religious pluralism. The church drinks up worldliness like water, claiming it can act like the world but still follow the One whom the world crucified. And all around are prophets proclaiming, "Peace, peace," and claiming, "The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord," while God's glory withdraws and His judgment draws near.

To be sure, there are renewal movements and pockets of faithfulness among the American churches. We are grateful for the resurgence of some Reformed doctrines and the call in some circles for a deeper experience of the joy and fear of the Lord. But even among the faithful, we grieve that God's glory elicits so little love from our hearts, our neighbors' needs provoke so little compassion, and sin so easily lulls us to complacency. Too often we walk with Christ as if slogging through waist-deep snow in bitter cold, hardly making progress and feeling dangerously sleepy. We know that we need repentance, but we scarcely even pray for it.

It is precisely in this situation that the prophet Jeremiah speaks so powerfully to the American church. Jeremiah ministered in the last decades of the kingdom of Judah. God's covenant people had already seen the northern kingdom of Israel wiped away by Assyria. The throne of David's seed had survived the Assyrian incursions, but now Babylon had arisen as the regional super-power. Again and again, the Lord chastised His people through the hands of men.

But they would not hear the prophets. Indeed, they hated the true preachers of God's Word. They were satisfied with an outward form of religion so long as they could live as they pleased. So the Lord exclaimed against them in Jeremiah 2:30, "In vain have I smitten your children; they received no correction: your own sword hath devoured your prophets, like a destroying lion." All the discipline, all the prophetic warnings--but where was the repentance?
Judgment begins in the house of the Lord (1 Pet. 4:17). But it is a judgment designed by mercy.

Just as He did with Adam in the garden, before coming to pronounce the curse upon sin, the Lord comes to us with questions, searching questions. He seeks the lost.  When Jeremiah prophesied, he did so with weeping, sighing, and suffering--a picture of our Prophet Jesus in His compassionate calling of sinners to repentance. In Jeremiah 2:31 we see that the Lord questions His church for our lack of repentance. As we consider verse 31 we see two questions--one that is humiliating and one that is revealing.

I. The Lord asks us a humiliating question

The Lord came so plainly and simply to Israel, using pictures of the common things from ordinary life. He desires to speak to us plainly and simply today. God says, "Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? a land of darkness?"

A wilderness is a barren place full of dangers. Lions prowl seeking prey, and pits wait for the unwary traveler to slip and fall to his death. The wilderness is the place of banishment, away from friends. It is an uncultivated and unfruitful place. Darkness even today can stir our fears, even if we are inside our home with a light switch at our fingertips. For Israel, darkness was a time of real danger. It was the time when the wild animals hunted and killed. Crimes are committed most often in darkness.Therefore the Lord asks us, "Have I been such a God to you? Have I withheld light and life from you? Have I done nothing for you? Have you invested your time and energy into Me and found me to be unfruitful?"

Just a glance at the history of Israel shows how untrue this is. God multiplied them in Egypt until they were a mighty people. He showed His wonders and miracles. He preserved them from death by the blood of the Passover lamb. He led them out through the Red Sea with a mighty hand, treading the floor of the sea as on dry ground though no man had ever walked on it before. He brought them forth loaded with the riches of Egypt, gold and silver and beautiful cloth. Even when they journeyed long in the wilderness, God was not a wilderness to them but provided them their daily bread and saw to it that their clothing did not wear out. He made the bitter waters sweet and drew out water from the rock so they could drink in abundance.

The Lord God led them into the land of Canaan. He toppled the walls of Jericho. He gave the kings and armies of the land into their hands. Even when they proved unfaithful, He heard their cries and gave them judges. When they did not want judges but wanted a king, He gave them kings. He bore with them patiently but they hardened their hearts against Him. When they turned to other gods, He remembered His covenant with David. Even when God chastised them and warned them, He did it for their good, that He might bless them if they repented.
So the Lord said to them in all righteousness, "Tell me, O Israel, how have I wronged you? How have I failed you? Have I not followed you all your days with goodness?" As He said in Micah 6:3, "O my people, what have I done unto thee? and wherein have I wearied thee? testify against me."

How much more does this question ring in our ears now that Christ has come in the flesh and made atonement for sin! Did God wrong us by making a covenant from all eternity to save those who sinned against Him? Was God stingy when He gave His only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life? Did Christ turn His back on us when He gave His back to the whip and the scourge, then carried on His back the cruel cross? Indeed the cross was a light burden compared to the spiritual weight Christ had to bear. Isaiah 53:6 says, "The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." Galatians 3:13 teaches us that Christ bore the very curse of the living God so that His elect people would get the blessing. Has God failed us by providing a full and rich salvation in Christ, sufficient to save the chief of sinners? Do we have any right to complain against God? Do we have any justification for not turning to Him with all our hearts?

The Lord asks this question of us too. Look back as far as you can. Look back to the beginning of our nation. When those early colonists arrived in New England, did not God preserve them through great famines and dangers? Has He not granted us over the years an abundance of harvests to feed our bodies, while other nations have suffered terrible famines? God's blessings have rested in such abundance upon our land that millions of people made the arduous journey to immigrate here from their homelands, including our own forefathers.

Hasn't the Lord also provided food for our souls? Many of the first fathers of our land came with Bibles under their arms and ministers at their sides. While so many nations toiled in spiritual darkness, did not God grant this nation the truth of His Word from its very inception in the preaching of men like John Cotton, Thomas Hooker, and Thomas Shepard? When our dullness threatened to engulf the land in darkness, did not God send the light again through the preaching of men like Theodorus Frelinghuysen, Jonathan Edwards, and George Whitefield? Has not the Lord preserved in this nation His truth through faithful men like Charles Hodge, B. B. Warfield, and even to today? Surely we can say of the American church what the Lord said of Israel in Isaiah 5:4, "What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?"

Look back in your own life too. From the moment you were conceived, God cared for you. He formed you in your mother's womb. Has the Lord not provided food and clothing for you all your life? Whatever education you received, is it not His gift to you? And has not the Lord provided for the education of your soul? While multitudes perish in their sins without knowledge of salvation in Christ alone by grace alone, you are privileged to hear the call of the gospel. In Isaiah 45:19 God says, "I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain: I the LORD speak righteousness, I declare things that are right." Furthermore, is it not a singular grace of God that you worship in a church that preaches Reformed experiential truth, the riches of Christ for us and the riches of His Spirit in us?

The Lord says, "Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? a land of darkness?" No, no, a thousand times no! God has been a garden of delicious fruit for us, and a land full of light.
But now, if that is true, the Lord asks, then why does not your gratitude answer to My mercies? Why do you treat Me as if I were a wilderness and land of darkness? Why do you not seek Me earnestly in prayer? Why do you not seek Me in the keeping of My commands? The Lord demands an answer. He asks us, "If I am no wilderness to you, then why have you been a wilderness to Me? Why do you give more of your time and more of your heart to the idols of this world--which profit nothing--than to using the means of grace to draw near to Me? Why do you not desire Me, desire to know Me, or desire to have My wisdom and salvation? Though I have planted among you the seed of My Word, why do you not produce the fruit of righteousness for My pleasure?"

The Lord questions His church for our lack of repentance. What answer will you give to the Lord? It is not a mere man who asks you this question. It is not your neighbor. It is the Word of the Lord, the voice of God addressing your heart. What answer do you give to the Lord in the secret place of your heart?

This is a humiliating question. It aims at the humiliation of our souls. When God says, "Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? a land of darkness?" the question presses us to see that we have no excuse for the way we have forgotten the Lord. It's not His fault. He has multiplied His blessings, His words, and His warnings to us. There is nothing else to do but to humble ourselves to the dust and say, "It is I, O Lord. I am the problem. I am the sinner." Like Nehemiah we must review all the disasters which God brought upon us and still confess, "Howbeit thou art just in all that is brought upon us; for thou hast done right, but we have done wickedly" (Neh. 9:33).

We must say, "Thou hast sent the light, but I turned mine eyes away. Thou hast granted water, but I refused to drink. Thou hast told me to call Thy Sabbath a delight, but I have counted it a wearisome thing to worship Thee. Thou hast commanded me to speak of Thee to my friends, but I have hidden Thee like an object of shame. Thou hast called me to Thyself, the fountain of living water, but I have clung to broken cisterns which cannot hold water. O my idols! O my wicked trust in man! O God, have mercy on this stubborn sinner!"
But God not only asks a humiliating question. There is another question which Jeremiah records, another question which searches our hearts yet deeper.

II. The Lord asks a revealing question

The Lord will become more specific. This is His way. He desires to pinpoint the exact problem. This is always what He does through His prophets. It is not sufficient to know that we have sinned in a general way. The prophets addressed specific sins. This is what made people hate them. When we deal with sin in a general way it is easy for us to look at others. So God brings it home to us. Dear congregation, when will we ever look at ourselves?

The Lord says in Jeremiah 2:31, "Wherefore say my people, We are lords; we will come no more unto thee?" "We are lords," literally, "we reign." Here is the problem: pride--spiritual pride. We insist on being lords, masters, rulers of our own affairs. Our hearts say, "We will not bow before Thee. We will make it if we do it ourselves. Life is better our way. We will take all Thy blessings, but we refuse to bow before Thee."

What sad and proud language! It is the language of the fallen children of Adam. It is the language which springs from the mouth of Satan, "Ye shall be as gods" (Gen. 3:5). Instead of our rightful place under God, we chose and still choose daily to be above God. We would take God off the throne and put ourselves on. Indeed, we foolishly insist that we are already on the throne. "We are lords." The word can be translated, "We have broken loose," or, "We are free." This is exactly what we thought we were doing in the garden when we broke God's law. As Rev. Fraanje said, Satan wrote "independence" above the gate leading out of Paradise. In the secrecy of our hearts, fallen man breathes the same spirit as William Henley, who wrote defiantly:
And so rather than accept the laws which God puts upon us, we would claim to be the nothing less than the "I Am," declaring, "I will be what I will to be." We ignore our callings to be faithful children and faithful parents, faithful church members and faithful office-bearers, faithful citizens and faithful governors. We act as though we have the right to define our own destiny regardless of what God says or does. We throw His warnings to the side and go on blindly in our own ways. "We are lords."

Israel always lived in the midst of enemies, the nations surrounding them. But do you know who their greatest enemy was? The greatest danger they faced was themselves: the enemy within, the heart of fallen man. "We are lords. Who is the Lord that I should obey Him? Who is Christ? Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us. Who is this Shepherd? We all like sheep will go our own way."

Such is the idle boast of us all by nature. But, O, what a serious question this is because none can escape God's control or God's judgment! "Wherefore say my people, We are lords?"  Why do men say this, when there is only one Lord? Every knee will bow to Him. Everyone shall give an account to Him for what they have done. He is our only hope, the only Judge and only Savior. The Lord says in Hosea 13:9, "O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me is thine help." He calls out in Isaiah 45:22, "Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else."

But Israel would not. They would trust in their own prosperity and resources. Deuteronomy 32:15 says, "But Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked: thou art waxen fat, thou art grown thick, thou art covered with fatness; then he forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation." They would trust in Egypt or Assyria--anywhere but the Lord. Isaiah 31:1 says, "Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help; and stay on horses, and trust in chariots, because they are many; and in horsemen, because they are very strong; but they look not unto the Holy One of Israel, neither seek the LORD!" We too are determined to find our help in the strength of man, and so resolved to fight against the Lord. We know it from our own experience. The Lord is the last place we are prone to go. Many of us know that the things they are doing are wrong but we refuse to give in. We refuse to bow down. We hug our sins. We fight against the Lord. Why? Because we say, "We are lords."

We have chosen the most dangerous fight. The Lord can destroy us in a minute. The Lord can also give us up to our own lordship, give us up to what we desire. He can remove His gracious restraints and let us run headlong towards our sinful desires. That would be the most terrifying punishment of all.

Notice too in this question the sobering words "my people": "wherefore say my people, We are lords?" The Lord is not asking this question of the pagans, the heathen who openly worship other gods. The Lord asks this question of the visible church, those who outwardly separate themselves from the world and are marked by the sacraments. They have been brought up in the truth. They know something about the way of salvation. But to them too God says, "Why do they say, We are lords?" God is probing His church, revealing the deep roots of pride underneath our refusal to repent.

Then come the awful words, "We will come no more to thee." What does this mean, for God's visible people to come to the Lord? It is written in 2 Chronicles 7:14, "If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land."

So this coming involves first humbling ourselves for our sins, confessing sin, grieving over sin, bowing before God's just punishment of our sin. Secondly, we come to the Lord through seeking His grace in private and public worship, crying out for mercy with an eye upon His promises and atonement for sin in Christ. Prayer is the panting of faith after mercy. Thirdly, we come to the Lord through true repentance, turning from our wicked thoughts, words, and deeds and returning to the Lord as our Lord. This is the three-fold work of the Holy Spirit.

How tragic then these words, "We will come no more to thee." We will not humble ourselves for our sins. We will not pursue grace in faith. We will not repent of our wickedness. Perhaps such people will go through the outward motions of piety, but they will merely honor God with their lips while their hearts are far from Him.

How these words will ring in the ears of the damned: "we will come no more to thee," no more, no more! How about you? Will you, too, choose be forever separated from the Lord? Will you choose to serve His arch-enemy forever? Remember, in rejecting the prophet of the Lord you reject the Word of the Lord, and in rejecting the Word you reject Him. How can we embrace the Lord while we insist on being lords ourselves?

This is the ultimate motivation behind our stubborn refusal to repent. It is not that sin satisfies us. Sin against God cannot satisfy anyone created by God in the image of God. It is not that God's terms of submission are unreasonable. They are most gracious and kind. The deepest reason why we refuse to turn back to God is that in our hearts we say, "We are lords," and therefore, "We will come no more to thee." If the church is ever going to move beyond a superficial repentance, it must come to grips with our insistent demand to be lords.

The Lord questions His church for our lack of repentance. God's humiliating question leads us to acknowledge that He is not the problem. We are the problem. God's revealing question shows us the heart of the problem: we think we are lords, so we will not come to Him, indeed cannot come to Him apart from His drawing grace. May God grant that we feel our own lordship as a painful, crushing burden. May the Spirit move us so that we cry out to the Lord Jesus to save us from our own lordship.

Conclusion: See the Word of the Lord

As people visit the 9-11 Memorial in New York, and stand looking at the waterfalls and pools located where the bases of the Twin Towers once stood, many questions will no doubt flood their minds. Some of those questions will be directed to God. What we need to realize is that ten years after 9-11, God has questions for us. After such a massive reminder of our vulnerability and mortality, why haven't we repented? Why hasn't the spiritual condition of the American church evidenced a dramatic turn around? Why haven't we received correction? Has God been a wilderness to the church? Why do we, His professing people, say in our hearts that we are lords, when in fact we are poor and blind and naked? Why don't we come to Him for the gold and eye-salve and white garments of Christ?

The Lord Jesus has been knocking on the door of His church. Sometimes His knocks are quiet and subtle. Sometimes they make the ground to shake. But we fear that, by and large in the United States, the doors of the churches remain closed to their Lord. It would be just for the glory of the Lord to depart from His temple, leaving behind the empty shell of an outward form of religion without the power. Christ could very well send a famine to our land, not a famine of bread or water, but a famine of hearing the word of the Lord, so that people might wander from the East Coast to the West Coast seeking the word of the Lord, but not finding it (Amos 8:11).

Our nation is ripe for judgment. These events of 9-11 and Katrina and our economic woes caused much suffering, but they cannot begin to compare to the judgment which our nation deserves. We do not know how long the door of the ark will remain open, before the Lord shuts it and the floods of God's wrath wash away all who remain outside.

But by the mercy and longsuffering of God, we are not there yet. God's voice is still heard in our nation. Jeremiah 2:31 begins, "O generation, see ye the word of the LORD." Though God's humiliating and revealing questions should cause us to despair in ourselves, the very fact that God is speaking to us should move us to hope in the Lord.

"O generation, see ye the word of the Lord." You have heard the word often enough. But do you see it? In other words, have you taken it to heart so that it has become as real to you as what you see with your eyes? Do you see and embrace by faith the merciful Redeemer, the suffering Savior, the exalted Lord, as your Redeemer, your Savior, your Lord? Do you see everything you need in God's living Word, the Lord Jesus Christ--in His humiliation to pay for your sins; in His perfect obedience to the law, to earn you the right to eternal life? Do you see in His person and states and offices everything you need for this life and a better future life? "O generation, see--see ye--by faith--the word--the living word--of the Lord--in the person of Jesus Christ."

God is still warning us of our sins and pride. God is still inviting us and calling us to repent. But is it to you nothing more than a fantasy, like an interesting story or entertaining song that you hear but makes no impact on your life? Or has it gripped you with a conviction of the reality of God, the reality of sin, the reality of Christ, the reality of heaven and hell? Psalm 95:7-8 warns, "Today if ye will hear his voice, harden not your heart." Reverend Kersten said, "Oh that the Lord's complaints of love might yet break your heart and you might learn to make supplication to your Judge while it is still called today."

People of God, we have heard the Lord asking us humiliating questions and revealing questions, but we must remember that these are merciful questions. They are indeed the complaints of love, the calls of love, and the convictions of love. Let His love draw you to Jesus Christ, crying, "Thou art a garden of delights. I have been a wilderness. Thou art light. I have been a land of darkness. Thou art the only Lord. I have pretended to be lord. Thou art my only hope. But I have refused to come to Thee. But now, O Lord, have mercy upon me. Make me a fruitful branch on the vine of Christ. Make me a glowing light by the illumination of Thy Spirit. Take me as Thine own, demolish my petty throne, and establish Thy throne in my heart. Draw me to Christ, and I will come, and--joy of joys--He will certainly not cast out any who come to Him." Amen.