But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. (Isaiah 40:31)

My beloved country, is at war and last evening Dan Rather, one of our seasoned media reporters, author of best selling books including his latest Deadlines & Datelines broke down and wept before our nation. Dan Rather, who has seen it all first hand was attempting to explain the depth of a new and sinister evil we are facing. When Dan Rather weeps we must listen.

Today is Tuesday, September 18, 2001 and I am looking for a hero, a hero larger than life. Heroes or heroines whose acts are not marred by vengeful violence but motivated by faith, hope and love.

On Tuesday morning September 11, 2001 investigators have learned that terrorists aboard United Airlines flight 93 had hijacked the plane and intended to steer the plane into the home of the President of the United States of America and the offices of the Executive Branch of our government in the same way other hijacked aircraft had hit the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

A passenger on this ill-fated aircraft, one 32-year-old Todd Beamer was unaware that our President had already given orders to the U. S. Air Force jets to shoot Flight 93 out of our skies when he called a GTE air phone operator as he planned to somehow disrupt the hijackers.

Mr. Beamer spent the last 15 minutes of his life describing the men behind it. He said there were three of them; two armed with knives and a third wearing a bomb strapped to his waist with a red belt.

At this very same moment in time another passenger, Jeremy Glick was on the phone talking to his wife Lyzbeth. Jeremy had called her to tell her good by and advise her what was going down. They had decided to overcome the hijackers. Lyzbeth while holding her three-months-old daughter Emmie, had the courage to give him her whole-hearted support and strength in his desperate hour of need.

Mr. Beamer reported that twenty-seven people were being held at the back of the plane. Two injured pilots were among them and he was unsure if they were dead or alive. Ten more passengers remained behind the closed curtain in the first class section.

The operator advised that Mr. Beamer’s voice sounded completely calm, heard against a backdrop of chaos and screams.

As Mr. Beamer and the operator spoke the aircraft began to buck and shake rather wildly.

At first he thought it was going down. But suddenly the plane evened out and changed course. It was then that he asked the operator to call his family and tell his wife and children that he loved them.

Then the two of them said the Lord’s Prayer together.

In her interview Lisa Beamer said, "As a result of the bucking of the plane and changing course and maybe some information he was getting from others passengers who were on cell phones, he started to get an understanding of the gravity of the situation as far as the end result was going to be and he told the operator that."

"He then told the operator that he and some of other passengers had plans to jump the hijacker with the bomb and take him down." Mrs. Beamer said.

The last words the operator heard him say were directed at someone else in the background: "Are you ready? Let’s roll."

Lisa Beamer said news of her husbands final words almost brought a smile to her face. "That was a phrase that was very much like Todd. It was something he normally said to his sons as the family left the house going somewhere." She said.

The telephone connection remained open allowing the operator to eavesdrop on the general conditions and commotion on the aircraft. She was still on the line when the plane crashed.

Lisa Beamer added that her husband’s remarkable courage was truly "a blessing" that would help her and her family through the years ahead.

"People live their whole lives and don’t leave a legacy of faith and hope and love that Todd has left," said Mrs. Beamer, who is expecting a third child this coming January.

She went on, "Something clearly went wrong on that plane. It’s not what the hijackers planned on. They did make a physical effort to take the plane back. I do believe that what they did together really changed the course of history that day. If it had to happen anyway, I guess this is what I would chose."

I have found my heroes!

We must remember that America was founded as a Christian republic and that heretofore we, as a people, have found our own personal heroes literally by the millions. No other nation has sacrificed more lives, more blood, more sweat, more tears to preserve freedom. We do this simply because we believe that each one of us is so unique and that each person should have the opportunity to reach for the stars and in so doing, help someone else along the way. (See Chapter 36 of Monkey See, Monkey Do, Memorial Day)

Todd and Lisa Beamer, along with Jeremy and Lyzbeth Glick demonstrated the moral courage, the character, but more than that the faith, the hope and the love, the essentials truths as the bedrock of all our blessing. Todd and Jeremy by their actions, and Lisa and Lyzbeth by their steadfast courage; together they blended these God given blessings and gifts into our past, our present and our future.

Todd and Jeremy and their fellow companions, by turning prayer into action showed a frightened and saddened world, so much so that Dan Rather wept - the ultimate act of love.

Lisa and Lyzbetrh, the courage to show this same world that faith, hope and love will sustain them and their families even through the darkest of times.

The unnamed GTE air phone operator, who stood by Todd until the very end giving us the courage to keep on keeping on.

To me this is the ultimate heroic epic of my lifetime. The short lived mention of this story by the press and the TV media leads me to think, that to a degree, our heroes may become expendable. I earnestly pray that I am wrong.

We, as a nation, have never faced an enemy that has been consumed by pure evil than those that have declared war upon the Americans. It forces us to take stock of what we are facing.

We can liken this unto a scale ranging from pure black representing pure evil, graduating down the scale through the lessening hues and stages of gray, into pure white, representing perfect goodness. Somewhere in this range is a point of no return and is valid in any direction. We are somewhere in the middle. When evil moves goodness has no alternative. Goodness must make choices or be consumed. Our question is where does the good guys go from here! (See Chapter 12 Monkey See, Monkey Do, Of Good and Evil)

Most major religions of this world claim to have a way out of the fix in which man finds himself. To ultimately obtain a place in eternity without the presence of evil, I chose the faith that is right for me, the Christian faith. Any or all of them may have answers for you, but as a Christian, I seriously doubt it. The choice is yours and no one else can make it for you. God truly works in strange and mysterious ways!

Faith in this goodness, becomes an intrinsic part of ourselves and is our only protection against it’s opposite evil and fear; faith then takes us even beyond reason and understanding. The closer we get to this goodness the more we are amazed to find ourselves cloaked in the protection of our Gods absolution.

We must be reminded again that the basic original concept of our nation is based upon Christian theology and beliefs. It is time that we return to the basics that made our nation great and reexamine our faith and ask ourselves the question who are we? (Read the books Who Are We and Living Our Beliefs by Kenneth L. Carder, Bishop of the United Methodist Church of Mississippi)

We must let everyone know that our war is not with the various religions of this world. Americans wish them well and our past record of our support is well recorded by the history books of the entire world. Our war is with the elements of humankind that has volunteered to walk down the scale into pure evil.

In the Lords Prayer we ask God "to deliver us from evil." When prayers turn into action God has to rely on those disciples that are continuously walking in harms way down the scale toward the light.

We sometimes overlook the residual aspects of our Christian faith and to a degree it becomes part of our common heritage regardless of other individual religious beliefs.

To a degree it is inherited. It has become an indelible part of America that has seeped down to the present by the likes of the circuit riders of the United Methodist Church and their zeal to educate the populace of this great nation. Granted it will wane as generations pass but that will depend upon the nourishment given to it.

I think this explains why the fireman is going in while we are coming out. He has the courage and the faith to do it.

We are a people of hope simply because we know that our God has won the decisive victory over the principalities and the powers of sin and death. As we weep and as we mourn and as we contemplate the action and the courage of my aforementioned heroes and heroines we can be assured as long as we stand by Jesus Christ who is sovereign over all creation we need not fear.

Faith is the product of yesteryear. Hope is the promise of the present. May we have the faith and the hope to stand firm to our commitment to God’s promises. I have the faith and the hope that our present leaders know this and will act accordingly as they have the awesome responsibility to place our sons and daughters in harms way.

Love is the ultimate promise of the future.

Apostle Paul says it best in the poetic version of the King James version of the Holy Bible, Corinthians I, Chapter 13.

Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels,
And have not love, I may become as sounding brass,
Or a tinkling cymbal.
And though I have the gift of prophecy,
And understand all mysteries, and all knowledge,
And though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains,
And have not love, I am nothing.
And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor,
And though I give my body to be burned,
And have not love, it profiteth me nothing.
Love suffereth long, and is kind
Love envieth not; love vaunteth not itself
Is not puffed uip,
Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own
Is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
Rejoyeth not in iniquity, but rejoyeth in truth;
Beareth all things, believeth all things, endurith all things.
Love never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail;
Whether there be tongues, they shall cease;
Whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
For we know in park and we prophesy in part.
But when that which is perfect is come,
Then that which is in part shall be done away.
When I was a child, I spake as a child,
I understood as a child, I thought as a child:
But when I became a man, I put away childish things,
For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face;
Now I know in part, but then shall I know as also I am known.
Now abideth faith, hope, love, these three;
But the greatest of these is love.

Every part of my Christian faith tells me that America has a desire to repent of her many sins and shortcomings and I close my story with the following:

REPENTANCE

I traveled the rocky roads of moral bankruptcy as the gates of Hell loomed nigh;
My chariot was propelled by my own ego, and my brakes had ruptured discs.
I rested my weary, tortured soul in the satanic fantasies of evil minds.
I played silly games of hide and seek with sadistic trolls from Hell.
I was baptized daily in the luxurious pool of compromise.
I died each day at dawn, simply because I was too cowardly to live.
My cloak of good intentions was worn to tattered shreds.
I had purchased a burial plot in the valley of dry bones!
I shook with fear for my identity and wondered if Phoenix would fly again.
I wrestled nightly with Jacob’s angel and placed my birthright on hold.
The countdown for launch was over and my umbilical cord was still connected.
My spaceship was nearing home and I was unprepared to disembark.
I stood in front of a full-length mirror and stared at a picture of Dorien Gray!
I had played the role of a dazzling celebrity but I wondered; who the hell am I?

I still lived on the rim of ruin as I continued to play with my plastic yo-yos.
I shouted angrily to a distant God and sought blessings, but only for myself.
I place token offerings upon the altars of my, so-called faith.
And I expected usury rates on my meager investments.
Old acquaintances would suffer and die and I mourned not their passing.
The welcome mats on which I had trod were no longer there!
The murky mire on my boots left muddy tracks on Memory Lane.
I lacked the proper credentials as I tried to pay my respects to a friend.
I cried out in the stillness of his death and I repented in anguish.
My voice was not heard and I shed the most bitter of tears.
I wept, not for my friend; I wept for myself!
The price I had placed on friendship was impossible to meet.
In the silent sadness of reality, I found myself totally alone.
Too late, alas, I cried in vain, what is man without a friend!

I stood naked and ashamed upon the auction block of human degradation.
Job’s God was the high bidder and he paid dearly for my worthless hide.
I was introduced to this man called Jesus and I am eternally grateful.
As I cool my fevered brow beneath the shadow of his cross,
I bask in the delights of my own uniqueness as I walk in His likeness.
Our anguished hopes bind us together and we meet in mutual response,
Blending mind, heart and spirit into a refinement of divine purpose.
I am the created! He is the creator! And I bow to his sovereignty.
We stroll together into uncertainty and I fear not!
I drink from an eternal spring and I thirst no more.
I share with my fellow man, for I am my brothers keeper.
I reach for the unreachable and I search for the unsearchable
As I soar like an eagle while confined within the bowels of man’s genius,
For I walk with the Master and He has set me free!