“The length of our days is seventy years—or eighty, if we have strength; yet their span is but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away….Teach us to number our days aright.”

Psalm 90:10, 12
One of the four planes terrorists took control of on 9/11 was flown directly into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. Pastor Tom Joyce was a captain in the U.S. Navy and stationed there at that time.

With his co-workers he’d watched the television footage of the events at the World Trade Center, and now he was looking out the window trying to process it all. He was about to pray to the Lord when the third hijacked plane came flying directly towards him. “This is it,” he thought. “This is how my life will end.”

While 189 people died at that site, Tom Joyce survived, and he helped rescue several others. He used the stories of multiple rescues from that day as a talking point for sharing with others about the Great Rescuer, Jesus, who laid down His life—not as a terrorist seeking promised riches in the afterlife, but as the One who saves us from sin and death, the One who has our days numbered.

We don’t know when our last breath will be, but God does. And He bids us to come to Him now while it is still called today.



Scripture Focus

Psalm 90:1-12

Insight

“My life is in your hands,/ My heart is in your keeping./ I’m never without love,/ Not when my future is with you.” (Kathy Troccoli, 1994)

Bible In A Year

  • Ecclesiastes 7-8
  • Psalm 66
  • John 6

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