Where Have They All Gone??

The morning of 9-11-01, I know exactly where I was and what I was doing. I was having a brain MRI in Jax and had just walked out from the test when Darrel and I stepped in front of the TV in the waiting room office, our eyes glued to the scene before us. The terror of that day was unfolding before our eyes.

Within 24 hours, it seemed that half of Americans were sporting their shirts with the American flag on them, they were proudly displayed on the fronts of our homes and on every other car you passed on the street, were those car flags waving in the breeze as they drove by. Those plastic things that the car flags were mounted on went like wildfire and I would imagine that we broke record numbers in the sale of American flags at that time in history. If you were an American, you showed your pride and support of the USA by displaying our nations flag.

Today, for the first time in a while, I saw a car go by me that had 2 American flags flying on it. I had to stop and wonder where are all the flags that had been so proudly flown just 8 years ago gone to? Have people forgotten what happened because we are not in the middle of a crisis right now? Have we become complacent about our pride in our country? Do we only show THAT much support when there's a terroist attack or global crisis? There was absolutely NO doubt how much we were all behind our country in the months after that attack. We proudly and boldly let everyone know we loved our nation and we stood behind her. I don't know about you but it makes me a bit ashamed of myself and all of us Americans for not showing everyone how we feel about our country ALL the time, not just in the tough times.

As I picked this over in my small brain, I began to think about how it seems it's the same with our Christian faith. So typically just after a crisis in our lives, we are gung ho for Jesus! We realize our need for Him and we realize what He has done for us and so we're glad to tell others our godly story about Him. But not long after, when the fire of doom and despair has been put out in our life and things are back to normal, we forget Him and what He did for us. Soon, just like the abundance of flags disappeared, our boldness to talk about Him disappears and we're no longer displaying Him proudly.

It is time for us to proudly and boldly display Christ everywhere we go. There would be no way you could know if someone was an American if they didn't have our flags flying on their cars. As for us, how can people tell we're Christians if we aren't displaying a Christ-like behavior consistently?

"For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain." Phillipians 1:21

THIS should be an exemplification of how we live each day of our lives. Then and only then will people be able to KNOW FOR SURE WHO we stand for.