10 Years

September 11, 2001.

I remember exactly where I was and what I was doing that morning, much as previous generations remember where they were and what they were doing when they heard of JFK's assassination. I can't believe it has been so long, and yet such a short time. It is indelibly etched on our minds as a country. It still saddens me greatly to think of it. I tear up listening to Alan Jackson's "Where Were You When the World Stopped Turning" or Darryl Worley's "Have You Forgotten?" and I'm thankful for these artists' use of their gifts to memorialize what it felt like that day and afterwards (whether I fully agree with them politically or not).

Current events can be a discouraging topic. I tend to bury my head in the sand, maybe hoping irrationally that if I don't ponder the issues they'll go away. I don't pretend to have all the issues sorted out, and one must remember that cliched phrase "hindsight is 20-20." What was the right response to this attack, what was the practical response, when should we have ended the wars or should we have begun them in the first place? But thoughts of 9/11 remind me that I never want to grow fully apathetic. I never want to forget.

I read Lisa Beamer's book Let's Roll years ago about her everyday hero of a husband and his and other passengers' actions that day over Pennsylvania. I am thankful for her testimony of God's love and I pray that she's staying strong these many years later. I pray God's healing for all those affected, that they might remember this day in a good way. I pray that for the entire country. I pray (while I know this with certainty) that God worked good, and is still working it, in the lives of all of us as a result of this tragedy. We don't know the big picture, but one day we will.

1 Corinthians 13:12- "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known."

Philippians 1:6- "And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ."