September 11 As Seen Live While Overseas

Last week I tried to write a column about 9/ 11. But it wasn’t right. I’ll admit that it’s easy to fall into the trap of hating the haters; becoming like them to the point of judging everyone not like us. That’s sinful and wrong. Yet, the after-image of 9/ 11 burned deeply into my memory. We watched it live on TV in Africa as it happened.

My wife and I were living outside of Johannesburg in South Africa when the Twin Towers were brought down. We were there for gospel ministry, teaching workshops for pastors and supplying Bible training. This was fulfilling a lifelong dream of my wife and myself. I had just dropped off my rental car that afternoon about 4 PM and was brought back to our apartment by a friend. Lana greeted us at the door, unlocking the bars of the security gate outside the regular apartment door and saying, “Come inside quick! Something happened in America!”

Our apartment had 220-volt electrified razor wire topping a six- foot exterior wall and an armed guard checking cars at the gated entrance. It was the “cluster formation” for housing commonly used by South African city- dwellers. Whites made up one of the eleven South African tribes such as Zulu, Xhosa, etc. Ethnic wars in African nations displaced ex- soldiers. Many formed gangs and migrated south looking for plunder. Home invasions became common. Farmers were murdered. Bloody car- jacking’s targeted whites. We learned not to stop at intersections where crowds stood but to slowly roll through with windows up and doors locked. One black man in a gospel meeting in our apartment one week was killed by robbers at work the next week. These were the daily news items we lived with - a continual assault on our souls. And I’m not telling you the worst of it.

Apartheid was over but murder simmered in many hearts. Hence the extra security whites and foreigners used. The grocery store? A guard with a rifle in a tower in the parking lot and a guard at the door with a shotgun. The mall? The only time I saw in a retail shop a personal self-defense flame thrower. Soweto? Don’t go there as a lone white man; only with a black pastor. Gangs had a slogan: “one bullet; one white man.” A priest was killed for his cell phone. Besides American missionaries, many internationals on business lived in Johannesburg, Durban, and Cape Town. We savored the fragrant food aroma wafting from the apartment of the Indian electrical engineer next door.

In our apartment alone on 9/ 11, Lana had felt prompted to turned on the TV, something not usual for her during the day. The TV station aired one channel in English with unappealing programming. But someone had flipped the switch to carry a live feed of CNN news coverage showing the first Twin Tower, smoke billowing, after it was hit. Shocked, we sat down and began watching. Soon the second plane crashed into the second tower as we watched. What was happening that morning in New York City, we witnessed live in Africa the same afternoon.

So much has changed in the last 15 years. But of this I am sure, the world needs the good news of Jesus Christ more than ever. Like I told one Jewish man, “You ought to be praying that Christian missionaries succeed in Middle Eastern nations.” He said, “Why do you say that?” I answered, “Because it’s not Christian terrorists who are trying to kill you.”