Weeping, just as Jesus wept when faced with the news of his friend Lazarus death. God cries over every misguided and destructive action of those he created. Because it eloquently affirms that God, the ruling power of the universe, is for us and inclines toward our help, Psalm 46 has been a source of strength, consolation and hope to believers throughout the centuries in ancient Judah, to Martin Luther in the Protestant Reformation, in the lives of countless Jews and Christians who humbly look to God for help in trouble. In fact, Psalm 46 suggests a spiritual exercise that calls us to imagine the worst possible thing that could happen to us, as a way of preparing ourselves to say in the midst of the crises that will inevitably come, We will not fear. We think at this moment we have seen the worst that can happen.
Fearful days lie ahead for the American people.
We are still mourning, grieving, in shock. We have not yet recovered the bodies of the majority of those who are missing. We are only now beginning to put some semblance of life back into order, getting planes back in the air, opening financial markets when so many of those who made financial transactions their living are gone. Some sort of military retaliation will occur, as it must, to prevent a terrorist activity of this magnitude from occurring again in any peace-loving nation on the face of the earth. As we have in the week past and will again today pray for the victims, the survivors, the rescue workers who died in the line of duty as well as those who tirelessly continue to toil, the reservists who are being called up, let us also pray for ourselves.