Not so long ago, my family received a telephone call that prompted us to switch on the TV and watch the World Trade Centers burn. The flames were licking a hole into the first tower when the second plane came careening out of the sky and slammed into the other tower. The news reporter yelled, and the air shimmered with hot, smoky fear. Who could do such a thing? Tears burned my eyes as I watched black clouds billow, and as the buildings collapsed like mammoth fountains that have just been shut off, our blithe confidence collapsed with them. In their place, we erected towers of terror, disguised as American determination. We lengthened airport security lines, stooped to racial profiling, and marched into Iraq to strike at the center of the rattlesnake nest. Yet while we kept the reign of terror at bay on physical American soil, the towers of terror remained in our hearts.
One would have expected these towers to crumble on the day that America got her retribution. Ten years after 9/11, I huddled in front of a television once more, watching the crowds of elated people celebrating the death of Osama bin Laden. My heart rose with their cheers, but then it sank like a shriveled balloon. Why so much joy over the death of one man? I knew why: hundreds of burnt corpses testified to this man’s destructive schemes. Yet we had only added one more corpse to the pile. Justice may be necessary, but the common people of America must be able to do more to end fear than cheer over a corpse. We may have eliminated one enemy, but hundreds more are lurking around the corner to take his place, making the cheers of a few years ago a hollow memory.
These enemies could be anywhere—not just in a cozy den in Afghanistan—and they might not even plan to be our enemies yet. Hundreds of the Middle East’s brightest students pour into American colleges and universities and then pour back out again to their own countries, where they throw themselves into helping their country’s cause, whatever that might be. I got to visit some of these students two years ago at a college perched in the mountains of West Virginia. My sister had instructed me in nearly half a dozen things not to do with my feet or hands when visiting a Muslim from another culture, so as we chatted awkwardly over tiny teacups of bitter coffee, I felt like my hands and feet were dangerous limbs I should cut off to avoid giving offense and getting strangled. But as the hot liquid shot down our throats, I warmed to the shy smiles that offered it. And while they repressed laughter as I spilled handfuls of rice into my lap from eating with my hands, the laughter was good-natured. These students were opening their arms in hospitality and extending their hands in friendship. They were far away from home and wanted friends—American friends. This is a desire common to most of the Muslim students I have met, voiced more recently by a Saudi Arabian girl in Connecticut who asked me, in broken English, “Will you be my friend?”
Unfortunately, many Americans don’t get to see or hear such heart-melting pleas because they are either too busy or too afraid. To them, every Arabic-speaking man looks like the next Osama bin Laden, and every woman wearing a hijab looks like his bloodthirsty wife. They envision the smoke billowing from the World Trade Centers, build their towers of terror higher, and don’t see the lonely Muslim student on the other side. Instead, they flaunt their false confidence by “partying it up”: sleeping around, getting drunk, and shedding every extra fiber on their bodies that they can without getting expelled or arrested. Every one of these acts screams against the moral fiber of every respectable Muslim. Forget the rabid radicals! If I visited from a hospitable Muslim culture and stood ignored, watching these everyday atrocities, I might march back to my country and cry, “Death to America!” too. I’m not saying that I know this has happened, but one can only teeter on the brink of a violent religion for so long before losing one’s balance and falling over the edge. As Americans, we don’t want to be the ones to push them.
What of those radicals who have already fallen into the bloody Islamic pit? Many of them are far away where only the military and secret governmental forces can deal with them. Such radicals live only for the sword and probably won’t stop until they perish by the sword. But many more Muslims are clinging to the cliff side or wandering in the dusky zone near the edge, and they are just everyday people like us. They look like that Turkish couple who just moved in around the corner, that girl with a head covering in the grocery store, or that handsome Arab student speeding by on his motorcycle. These are the people we can save from the pit. While the army is cracking down on terrorist groups in Afghanistan, American citizens can prevent some of those terrorist groups from ever forming. By showing love and hospitality to the Muslim next door, we might be tugging them away from the twilight zone that obscures the precipice of insanity. As we grasp their hands in friendship, we might be saving them as well as ourselves. It’s much harder to hate a nation comprised of friends.
Of course, it’s nearly impossible to make friends with people who have already sworn to make you their enemy. As Americans, we know this only too well as ISIS gains strength like some Frankenstein monster. Two burning towers are seared into our memory, and we naturally quake in our self-constructed tower of terror, tempted to lash out at the innocent Muslim student standing behind it. Yet when we watch these world events and feel paralyzed by fear, we can still do something: show love to that Muslim student. We have heard that “perfect love casts out fear” (1 John 4.18, English Standard Version). Now is the time to test that statement. Perhaps when we stretch out our withered hands to the neighbors who wear the same skin as our enemies, our paralysis will vanish. Perhaps as we invite them into our homes, we are supporting the troops who have to calm those who were never invited. Perhaps as we hug these people to our hearts, the towers built inside from the choking ashes of 9/11 will crumble.
We may never see a world free from enemies until Christ returns. But maybe someday, when we switch on the TV to see the latest tragedy, we won’t retreat to a tower of terror but of love, and this love will help us to destroy terrorists by rendering their acts useless. They may be able to kill the body, but they cannot kill the soul that dwells in love (Matt. 10.28). Only when we enter this new tower will the reign of terror end.
One would have expected these towers to crumble on the day that America got her retribution. Ten years after 9/11, I huddled in front of a television once more, watching the crowds of elated people celebrating the death of Osama bin Laden. My heart rose with their cheers, but then it sank like a shriveled balloon. Why so much joy over the death of one man? I knew why: hundreds of burnt corpses testified to this man’s destructive schemes. Yet we had only added one more corpse to the pile. Justice may be necessary, but the common people of America must be able to do more to end fear than cheer over a corpse. We may have eliminated one enemy, but hundreds more are lurking around the corner to take his place, making the cheers of a few years ago a hollow memory.
These enemies could be anywhere—not just in a cozy den in Afghanistan—and they might not even plan to be our enemies yet. Hundreds of the Middle East’s brightest students pour into American colleges and universities and then pour back out again to their own countries, where they throw themselves into helping their country’s cause, whatever that might be. I got to visit some of these students two years ago at a college perched in the mountains of West Virginia. My sister had instructed me in nearly half a dozen things not to do with my feet or hands when visiting a Muslim from another culture, so as we chatted awkwardly over tiny teacups of bitter coffee, I felt like my hands and feet were dangerous limbs I should cut off to avoid giving offense and getting strangled. But as the hot liquid shot down our throats, I warmed to the shy smiles that offered it. And while they repressed laughter as I spilled handfuls of rice into my lap from eating with my hands, the laughter was good-natured. These students were opening their arms in hospitality and extending their hands in friendship. They were far away from home and wanted friends—American friends. This is a desire common to most of the Muslim students I have met, voiced more recently by a Saudi Arabian girl in Connecticut who asked me, in broken English, “Will you be my friend?”
Unfortunately, many Americans don’t get to see or hear such heart-melting pleas because they are either too busy or too afraid. To them, every Arabic-speaking man looks like the next Osama bin Laden, and every woman wearing a hijab looks like his bloodthirsty wife. They envision the smoke billowing from the World Trade Centers, build their towers of terror higher, and don’t see the lonely Muslim student on the other side. Instead, they flaunt their false confidence by “partying it up”: sleeping around, getting drunk, and shedding every extra fiber on their bodies that they can without getting expelled or arrested. Every one of these acts screams against the moral fiber of every respectable Muslim. Forget the rabid radicals! If I visited from a hospitable Muslim culture and stood ignored, watching these everyday atrocities, I might march back to my country and cry, “Death to America!” too. I’m not saying that I know this has happened, but one can only teeter on the brink of a violent religion for so long before losing one’s balance and falling over the edge. As Americans, we don’t want to be the ones to push them.
What of those radicals who have already fallen into the bloody Islamic pit? Many of them are far away where only the military and secret governmental forces can deal with them. Such radicals live only for the sword and probably won’t stop until they perish by the sword. But many more Muslims are clinging to the cliff side or wandering in the dusky zone near the edge, and they are just everyday people like us. They look like that Turkish couple who just moved in around the corner, that girl with a head covering in the grocery store, or that handsome Arab student speeding by on his motorcycle. These are the people we can save from the pit. While the army is cracking down on terrorist groups in Afghanistan, American citizens can prevent some of those terrorist groups from ever forming. By showing love and hospitality to the Muslim next door, we might be tugging them away from the twilight zone that obscures the precipice of insanity. As we grasp their hands in friendship, we might be saving them as well as ourselves. It’s much harder to hate a nation comprised of friends.
Of course, it’s nearly impossible to make friends with people who have already sworn to make you their enemy. As Americans, we know this only too well as ISIS gains strength like some Frankenstein monster. Two burning towers are seared into our memory, and we naturally quake in our self-constructed tower of terror, tempted to lash out at the innocent Muslim student standing behind it. Yet when we watch these world events and feel paralyzed by fear, we can still do something: show love to that Muslim student. We have heard that “perfect love casts out fear” (1 John 4.18, English Standard Version). Now is the time to test that statement. Perhaps when we stretch out our withered hands to the neighbors who wear the same skin as our enemies, our paralysis will vanish. Perhaps as we invite them into our homes, we are supporting the troops who have to calm those who were never invited. Perhaps as we hug these people to our hearts, the towers built inside from the choking ashes of 9/11 will crumble.
We may never see a world free from enemies until Christ returns. But maybe someday, when we switch on the TV to see the latest tragedy, we won’t retreat to a tower of terror but of love, and this love will help us to destroy terrorists by rendering their acts useless. They may be able to kill the body, but they cannot kill the soul that dwells in love (Matt. 10.28). Only when we enter this new tower will the reign of terror end.
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