The faith of Too Beamer

[Guest guest]

The Faith of Todd Beamer " I don't think we're going to get out of this thing.

I'm going to have to go out on faith. "

It was the voice of Todd Beamer, the passenger -- and Wheaton

College graduate -- who said " Let's roll " as he led the charge against

the terrorists who had hijacked United Flight 93, the one, you

will remember, that crashed in the Pennsylvania countryside. The whole world

knows how brave Beamer and his fellow passengers were on September 11. But

this week we learned more fully what buttressed that bravery: Faith in Jesus

Christ. Todd died as he lived, a

faithful evangelical believer.

In an article titled " The Real Story of Flight 93, " Newsweek reveals gripping

new details from the actual transcripts of the now-recovered cockpit voice

recorder. " Todd had been afraid, " Newsweek relates. " More than once, he cried

out for his Savior. " After passengers were herded to the back of the jet,

Beamer called the GTE Customer Center in Oakbrook, Illinois. He told

supervisor Jefferson about the hijacking. The passengers were planning

to jump

the terrorists, he said. And then he asked her to pray with him.

As Newsweek relates, " Beamer kept a Lord's Prayer bookmark in his Tom Clancy

novel, but he didn't need any prompting. He began to recite the ancient

litany, and Jefferson joined him: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be

thy name. " ........... As they finished, Beamer added, " Jesus, help me. " And

then, Beamer and his fellow passengers prayed a prayer that has comforted

millions down through the centuries -- the prayer that wrote in a time

of great anguish:

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want . . . Yea, though I walk through

the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. And then the famous

last words: " Are you guys ready? Let's

roll. " We now know from the cockpit voice recorder that Beamer and other

passengers wrestled with the hijackers and forced the plane to crash into the

ground, killing themselves but foiling what was believed to have been the

hijackers' plan to fly Flight 93 into the Capitol or the

White House.

As Christians, we know that God can bring good out of bad. In Todd Beamer,

the world witnesses a faith that held up in the extremity of fear. A faith

that is even now comforting his widow and two young sons.

Beamer told NBC's Dateline, " You know, in the Lord's Prayer, it ask

us to forgive our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against

us. As Todd prayed this prayer in the last moments of his life,

in a way, said, " He was forgiving those people for what they were

doing, the most horrible thing you could ever do to someone. "

It wasn't Todd Beamer's job to fight terrorists. He was just a

passenger who along with several others did what he didn't have to

do but foiled a terrible evil that might have been done to his country.

As Flight 93 hurtled towards destruction, Todd Beamer could not have known

that his quiet prayers would ultimately be heard by millions -- that the

story of his last acts on earth would be a witness to the Lord he loved and

served and a lasting example of true heroism.

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