We Remember

Today marks the 6th year anniversary of the September 11th attack which occured in 2001. Thinking back on that horrific day, I cannot believe it has been so long. I remember the day like it was just last week. I woke up that morning in my comfortable house in California, about to begin another day of school. I turned on the radio to listen to music as I often did as I got ready. The radio DJ was saying something about a plane hitting a building in New York, but they always play phone pranks on that station. I turned to another station just to be sure. Again, they were talking about it! I ran into the bonus room of our house and flipped on the television. Every channel was saying the same thing. A plane had been hijacked by terrorists and hit the World Trade Center in New York! I was in complete disbelief. This stuff doesn't happen... not here... not to us! We weren't at war. We were living our ordinary lives, going about the usual buisiness. I ran to get my mother and tell her the news. We ran back to the t.v. together to watch the coverage. Minutes later, the terrible news emerged that another plane had crashed into the buildings! Would this horror never end?! It seemed the whole world was going to end at that very moment. The pain people felt and the cries of terror and grief seemed to reach across the world. Firefighters, police officers, and civillians alike banned together as a human race to reach out and help in anyway they could. There was no distinction between race, gender, or beliefs. Everyone was simple a human being in need of comfort. An amazing swell of patriotizm arose in the nation. People wept when the National Anthem was played, it seemed even those who had forgotten God were turning to Him for comfort and understanding. It was like the country was waking up after a great slumber.
I look back and see this time that was terrible because of the lives lost and the pain suffered, but wonderfully patriotic. Although I knew that sense of patriotism would fade over time I wonder if people forget about the day for 364 days of the year and remember only on the anniversary. And will that eventually fade until we no longer remember at all? Was the time of turning to God only limited to times of tragedy? Will our Nation ever realize the need for the Savior who came and bled for them, or will it take another terrible occurance to turn them to Him? I hope that this is not the case. I hope we will remember...




"Ah! What a sign it is of evil life, when death's approach is seen so terrible!" ~William Shakespear~









"Men's evil manners live in brass; their virtues we write in water." ~William Shakespear~












"The heart bowed down by weight of woe to weakest hope will cling" ~Alfred Bunn~










The following is a song that I sang with my college choir right before the September 11 attack. We visited Ground Zero the summer of 2001 and there was a wall where we could write messages to families who had lost loved ones. I don't know if the wall is still there or if they painted over it during the construction... but these are the words I wrote:


O Love that will not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in thee; I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow May richer, fuller be.

O light that followest all my way,
I yield my flickering torch to thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in thy sunshine’s blaze its day May brighter, fairer be.

O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain,
That morn shall tearless be.

O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from thee;
I lay in dust life’s glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.

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