Stanley Praimnath, a high-ranking bank official in New York City, has regularly taken his Christianity to work -- even on Sept. 11, 2001.
Praimnath shared with Spirit One Christian Center's congregation Sunday how his Bible sat atop his desk on the 81st floor of the World Trade Center Tower Two -- even on that morning when "fireballs fell from the sky."
Praimnath didn't know that a terrorist attack had demolished the first tower when he went to work. He didn't know why his mother and three brothers were calling to make sure he was safe.
When he went to check things out downstairs, he didn't know whether he should follow the security guard's advice and return to his office because his building was "safe and secure."
And he surely didn't know that when he did return to his office a plane would be heading for him.
He dove under his desk -- exclaiming, "Lord, I can't do this, you take over!" --as the plane's wing crashed through his office.
The ceiling gave as upper floors crumbled. His desk, with the Bible, was the only one that stood, he said.
Rubble bruised him. Jet fuel that smelled like sulfur stifled him. The impact deafened him. He was buried up to his neck in debris, and when he broke through he found a wall had collapsed across the way out.
He screamed for help -- he wasn't ready to die. He wanted to see his wife and two daughters again.
A flashlight answered his call. Somebody was on the other side.
"We serve a God who is capable of the impossible," Praimnath said to the congregation. "We serve a God who hears, answers, intervenes on your behalf and delivers."
Praimnath said he pounded through the wall to his "brother in Christ."
"It was the only day skin color didn't matter," he said. "We were covered in the same ash. We didn't look any different."
The man with the flashlight and Praimnath had more than 1,600 steps to descend to safety.
Once they reached the ground floor they ran with all their might as police officers, firefighters and emergency workers cheered them to freedom "while they were dying," he said.
The two men reached nearby Trinity Church just as the second tower collapsed, he said.
Thaddeus Barnes, a member of Spirit One, said his "heart was pounding" through the story, which encouraged him to rely less on self and more on God.
Praimnath said he speaks across the country as a way to thank God for delivering him. At home he keeps a box marked "deliverance," holding his $110 pair of "lucky shoes," his tattered business shirt, medication from his injuries and the flashlight from that day -- reminders, he said, "if ever I get cold for the Lord."
Distributed by the Associated Press
