After all that has happened in the past two and a half weeks, a Boston University psychologist was quoted in the Los Angeles Times as saying, "Don't be worried just because you are worried." As Doug and I talked with many of you members and others outside of the congregation, we have heard an honest anxiety about the future and that of our children. Many of us are worried and we are worried about our worrying. I know that I have been going through my day-to-day routines with one ear on the news and one eye checking over my shoulder unsure what might happen next. It is not a pleasant way to live and certainly a new way for most of us in the United States though not unusual to people in many other countries. Psychologists say the frustration, fear, and sadness that many Americas feel since the events of September 11, are normal, healthy emotions in reaction to all that we have experienced even if we did not personally know someone who died that day. We are afraid to get on an airplane. There has been such a drop in those who fly that airlines have laid off thousands of workers. The Marin Airporter that we have come to rely on to get us to SFO cut back drastically on runs last week though they are now adding some back to their schedule. As we think about how our country is addressing the new issues and how things will change in our future, we wonder how we can explain this to our children. We have enough difficulty trying to explain the situation to ourselves. We grieve not only for loss of lives but for the loss of our sense of security that we thought was there on Monday, that was gone on Tuesday morning.

The truth is that statistically speaking our lives are not in much more danger now than before. In fact, maybe less since more safety checks are in place and more precautions are being taken. The risk of death from flying is still one in several million, much greater than a car ride out there on Highway 101, yet our fear of the unknown, of what might happen based on what we all witnessed, has left the airports empty and people searching for alternatives. We want a safe place, a safe way to journey through life without worrying about what will happen next. We thought that being lucky enough to be born in the United States or of having the opportunity to relocate here, that we were safe from war or terrorists. That happened somewhere else. On September 11, we learned that nothing is certain. No place in the world is completely safe, even the United States of America.

Almost three thousand years ago, a Hebrew psalmist wrote to those who also longed for a safe place and who shared his faith in the One God. Psalm ninety-one is the psalm for today on the three-year lectionary cycle planned long ago and used in most Protestant churches. When I read it in preparation, I was stunned by the importance of its message for us. "You who live in the shelter of the Most High, who abide in the shadow of the Almighty, will say to the Lord, ‘My refuge and my fortress; my God, in whom I trust.'" "My refuge and my fortress." The psalmist wrote from the depth of his own personal experience of a radical trust in a personal God, not a god who is distant and removed from real lives of human beings. He believed that God would deliver persons of faith from the snare of the fowler, that is, from the surprise trap of the one who wants to harm you. He assured those who listened to him that with God's wings to shelter and protect us, we would not fear the terror of the night or the weapon that flies by day or the plague that stalks in darkness or the destruction that wastes at noonday. In the last three verses, God speaks with full assurance saying, "I will deliver, I will protect, I will answer, I will be with you in trouble…". What more could we possibly want? The words are beautiful, assuring, and yet…

We want to believe it. We want to have this kind of radical trust yet we know that there were many faithful people on the airplane flights and sitting at desks in the Pentagon and the World Trade Center. Their lives weren't saved. Their bodies were not protected. Where was God that morning for them?

The truth is that God doesn't promise us miracles or magic. People have sometimes worn phrases from Psalm 91 on bracelets or necklaces in hopes they would be kept from physical harm but the God we know from scripture or from our own life experiences is not a good luck charm. Even Jesus spurned Satan when he was tested to use this psalm to challenge God, to use God, to control God to save his life in a situation that could only mean certain death. Do you remember the stories in both Matthew and Luke when Jesus was asked to prove God's existence by asking God to save him as he jumped off a cliff? He refused to do it quoting, instead, from the law in Deuteronomy, "Do not put the Lord your God to the test."

More important are God's words from verse fifteen. "I will be with you in trouble." God's words through the psalmist do not say, "No trouble will touch you." Instead, "you will not fear, the terror of the night…or the destruction that wastes at noonday." Though you may experience it, you will not be afraid because I will hold you in my wings and you will find refuge. Nothing can separate us from God's love which is offered to everyone.

As I heard of the stories last week, there was a sense of this kind of protection, deliverance from fear in some of the messages left on answering machines. Did you notice? Lauren Grandcolas, a young woman who lived in San Rafael, who some of you may have known, left a message for her husband, "Jack, I love you. There is a little problem with the plane, but I'm fine, I'm comfortable." She sounded calm, but she seemed to know the end was near. The last thing she said was, "Please tell my family that I love them."

Of thirty-year-old Sean McNulty, his friend said, "He was the type of person who would have been helping other people. We think that he wouldn't necessarily have been the first to make it out the door."

Retired FBI counter-terrorism chief, John P. O'Neill, made his way down from his office on the 34^th floor of the north tower, called his son and a friend at FBI headquarters to say he was safe, and then rushed back inside to help evacuate others. He was not heard from again

Finally, there is the story of Bay Area man Thomas Burnett, Jr. on Flight 93 that crashed in Pennsylvania. On his third call in the final forty-five minutes, he told his wife that the passengers had taken a vote about fighting back against the hijackers. He and several men planned "to do something about it." Tom's priest says that Tom was a very determined person. "He believed God gave us free will to do evil or do good." For Burnett, the choice was easy.

Lauren, Sean, John, Tom: I didn't know these individuals but they all seemed to have a presence that kept them from panicking, that guided them in those last few moments even though they were in the midst of trouble that threatened all they had known of life. God promises to be with us holding us, comforting us, giving us strength in all circumstances that life might bring whether due to the evil choices of others, to our own mistakes, or merely to chances that happen in life. Scripture does not promise us that, "God gives us only the hardships that we can handle." We hear it said but the truth is that there are times when Life gives us more that any human being can expect to handle. In God's love we are invited into radical trust. We are assured that there is a safe place, not necessarily from the events but from the fear that paralyzes us, that with God we are not alone, that God walks with us in life caring and loving us, offering us comfort and refuge.
The events on September 11 changed forever the future for many children, spouses, and family members. We empathize with them deeply because most of us have known loss in our own lives whether the extended illness and death of a parent or sudden loss of spouse or child; the shock of a relationship ended or years enduring the denial that love was gone; our own future ripped away from us by our own mistake or by illness or circumstances beyond our control. Some of us have known the incredible ways that we suddenly feel God walking with us when we thought we were completely alone, surprisingly we feel at peace though nothing of the circumstance has changed. It can come in the form of a phone call from an old friend or a new friend ringing the doorbell or a stranger grabbing our hand in the midst of a crisis and saying, "Follow me. We are leaving the building now!" Another human being can bring God's presence to us or we might feel that assurance as alone we open ourselves to a divine conversation by praying a prayer from our hearts, "God, my refuge and my fortress, what shall I do now?" Suddenly, we realize we can go on even if it is just for the next fifteen minutes, the next hour, or the next day.

Even in the most horrible situations, God and humans made in God's image can bring good out of evil and we have seen incredible examples of love and sacrifice in the past two weeks, people providing refuge for others in the midst of trouble: long lines at blood banks, volunteers leaving jobs and families to provide water and food to aid workers, people of all ethnic and religious backgrounds coming together to pray, and many reaching out to those who might be targets of hate crimes, protecting and expressing support, love and concern. Anti-terrorism scholar Steven Block of Stanford University said last week, "It would be the ultimate victory for the terrorists if they succeed in transforming our society from free and open to closed and paranoid." As we weigh the delicate balance between freedom and security in the days and months to come, may we live not in fear but by "choosing life" knowing that God is with us: God, our refuge and our strength.

Let us pray…