By Ronald E.
George Jr. at the Fayetteville Baptist Church
The phone line from Flight
93 was still open when a GTE operator heard Todd Beamer say: 'Are you guys
ready? Let's roll'
Two of the hijackers were in
the cockpit with the door locked behind them. The man with the bomb stayed in
the back of the plane, near Beamer's group. With him were others who placed
cell-phone calls from the plane, Jeffery Glick, 31, a sales manager for a
technology firm, Thomas Burnett Jr., 38, a California businessman, and Mark
Bingham, 31, a former college rugby player from California. Beamer mentioned
Glick by his first name in the call to Jefferson, Lisa Beamer said. Toward the
end of his conversation with Jefferson, Beamer said the plane appeared to have
changed directions a few times. Later, it would be determined that it had
flown west from Newark to near Cleveland, then turned back to the southeast
toward Pittsburgh.
Beamer
became anxious. "Oh! We're going down!" he shouted at one point.
He paused, then said in a
calmer voice, "No, we're OK. I think we're turning around."
Beamer then told Jefferson
that he and the others had decided to "jump on" the hijacker wearing
the bomb. Jefferson could hear shouts and commotion and then Beamer asked her
to pray with him. They recited the 23rd Psalm. He got Jefferson to promise
that she would call his family, then dropped the phone, leaving the line open.
That's when Jefferson heard what Lisa Beamer believes were her husband's last
words: "Let's roll."
Then there was silence.
Jefferson hung up at 10 a.m. EST, realizing that the plane had gone down.
Officials said it crashed at 9:58 a.m.
Although
it's not yet clear what Beamer, Glick and the others were able to do, they are
being hailed as heroes for forcing the plane down in a remote strip mine area
in Stoneycreek, Somerset County, about 80 miles southeast of Pittsburgh.
"When the plane started to fly erratically, he said he knew he wouldn't
make it out of there," said Lisa Beamer, who is expecting their third
child in January. Lisa Beamer said reports of her husband's heroic role had
"made my life worth living again." Jefferson kept her promise and
called Lisa Beamer at 8 p.m. Friday. "It was the best thing that I
could've gotten [Friday]. It totally changed the mood around here," Lisa
Beamer said.
Jefferson, reached by
telephone yesterday, declined comment. She said GTE's parent company, Verizon,
may issue a statement tomorrow about Beamer's call.
Lisa Beamer said the call she
received from Jefferson had lifted her family's spirits.
"We all knew what kind
of person Todd was. We know he's in heaven. He was saved," Lisa Beamer
said. "Just knowing that when the crisis came up he maintained the same
character we all knew, it's a testament to what real faith means.
The
purpose of this message is to invite people to get ready and to roll on in
their spiritual lives.
Scripture
Text: Isaiah 43:14
The Lord
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, says: “For your sakes I will send an
invading army against Babylon. And the Babylonians£ will be forced
to flee in those ships they are so proud of. 15 I am the Lord,
your Holy One, Israel’s Creator and King. 16I am the Lord,
who opened a way through the waters, making a dry path through the sea. 17I
called forth the mighty army of Egypt with all its chariots and horses. I drew
them beneath the waves, and they drowned, their lives snuffed out like a
smoldering candlewick. 18“But
forget all that—it is nothing compared to what I am going to do. 19For
I am about to do a brand-new thing. See, I have already begun! Do you not see
it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness for my people to come home. I
will create rivers for them in the desert! 20The wild animals in
the fields will thank me, the jackals and ostriches, too, for giving them
water in the wilderness. Yes, I will make springs in the desert, so that my
chosen people can be refreshed. 21I have made Israel for myself,
and they will someday honor me before the whole world. 22 “But,
my dear people, you refuse to ask for my help. You have grown tired of me! 23You
have not brought me lambs for burnt offerings. You have not honored me with
sacrifices, though I have not burdened and wearied you with my requests for
grain offerings and incense. 24You have not brought me fragrant
incense or pleased me with the fat from sacrifices. Instead, you have burdened
me with your sins and wearied me with your faults.
Are
you guys ready? Let’s roll!
Remember
whom it is that calls! God, the maker of heaven and earth, calls to you today.
Remember
what He has done in the past and
present! Review and remember the
past. God has brought you to
where you are and He will take you to where he wants you to go.
Remind
us about what has happened in the past.
What happens when the people of God don’t show up?
September 11, 2001 is what happens when the people of God turn their
heads from the obvious evil we all face.
No one wants to have their world shaken up, but isn’t it better to
shake things up now for the better than wait for them shaken up by the devil
as we experienced on that horrible Tuesday in September.
Something
new?
It will be new to you and new to us.
He is about to do a brand new thing.
Restructure
our thinking to allow for it to happen. According
to Herb Miller of the Parish Paper: he says that we believe in the Great
Commission, but we say our church is about the right size.
What would we be willing to do to have a revival?
Don’t be satisfied with the way things are.
We
Revive
what the Lord’s Spirit can do. Start
where you are to call on his name and get ready to go where He will take you.
“C. P. R. Christ,
People, and Relationships” (from George Coleman) can all be revived in your
life, your church, and your world. Ask
for His help to roll on.
Refurbish
the place. Why
is it that most churches continue to have new people, but yet their numbers
never change? To be able to reach
more people we will have to take a serious look at the things we are doing and
why we are doing? For
Example: A lady always cut the
Christmas ham in half before she baked it.
No one knew why until they asked.
They found that her mother said her mother had taught her to cut the
ham so that it would fit in their small pan.
Why can’t we get a bigger pan? Could
it be better?
Renew
the old. The
Spirit that led the founding fathers to create the Fayetteville Baptist Church
is alive and ready to be renewed in us today.
Refocus
the vision.
Why are we here? Herb Miller said
in his Feb. 2003 Parish Paper that Appalachian people were more feeling and
nostalgic than they are thinking and planning.
I want to challenge that thought today.
We have thought, we have seen, and now we are planning to go into the
21st century with a new vision of who we are as the people of God
of the mountains. With God’s
direction and help we can help ourselves to experience something new of the
Lord.
Let’s
Roll. When
Todd Beamer and friends on board flight 93 decided to rush the hijacker, he
took a great chance and made a great sacrifice. Who knows how many lives they saved by helping to take down
that hijacker? Someone took a
chance. Are we willing to take a
chance? Are we ready to make the
sacrifice?
Where
are you going? Where does the
Lord want you to go? What does
the Lord want us to do? Where
does the Lord want us to go? Are
you guys ready? Let’s roll!