In 2001 He's Too Good To Me and I were going through some financial difficulities. Once you manage to drag yourself through the trials that are life you draw closer to one another. It passes down from generation to generation. Back to the beginning. Wonder who was angrier? Adam? Because Eve had succumed to temptation and eaten the fruit? Or Eve? Because Adam was not strong enough to stop her? Can't you just hear the conversation, "You should not have done it!" "Why didn't you stop me?"
Once they got over blame and anger and adjusted to their new life, I imagine they must have drew into each other.
On this day in September of 2001 I had left the house early to go pay a bill, scheduled turn off day. As I parked my car the news was reporting a plane crashing into the World Trade Center. No one was speaking of it in the store; it was, at that moment, just another sad tragedy that was happening far away.
While I was driving home the second plane hit. All at once my problems were small and I would now witness a nation drawing into each other.
I had left the girls at the house; Delia was 12 and I would be less than 2 miles away. No one had spoken of an attack on America in the minutes it took me to get home. There was confusion and rambling on the news and my heart was in a state of panic. I needed to get to my babies.
I remember watching all day, crying as I tried to explain to their young hearts and minds what I could not understand myself. I wanted my husband, Gregg. I wanted my mama and daddy, I wanted my sisters. There were people I loved, feared for.
When the sounds began of bodies hitting ground as desperate people chose another way out of that horror I no longer had the strength to stand. I remember sitting on the bathroom floor with a towel held to my mouth to stifle the sounds I could not contain, but I don't remember what I was thinking. Fear was mixed with a desperate need to stay calm. A sadness overwhelmed my heart that was so shattered for the pain of others and it was more powerful than anything I had ever felt. So I just sat there, cried, and prayed.
Adam and Eve, the first of us, God's creation to bring Himself joy. Their fear must have been the same, the unknown was before them. Not a very good comparison, I know, but what do you compare 9/11 too? Life changed forever for them, as it did for us in 2001. It had already begun to change for me, on Oct. 1, 1997, the saddest day in the history of my hometown, Pearl. I had babies at school, I had a sister there, friends and their children were there.
Generation after generation from the beginning - trials of life - anger, sadness. We were created to bring Him joy and look what we did to ourselves. Look at what He gave us and look at what we did with it.
Look at what God did then. Jesus.
In time we have gotten past some blame and anger, we have adjusted to a new life after September 11. That ability is another gift from above.
So, do we really have to remember?
I move through my days loving my husband, caring for my children, and treasuring my life. I pray to God when times are good for Him to prepare my heart for the bad times that are coming. Days like today, when my Daddy's doctor gives us news that's not so good, and surrounding all that - it's September 11.
So, for me, I have to remember.
My friend S. has to remember. Today I sit and watch her cry for those families and we remember together.
I remember with the help of words from a song I love, "In your eyes I see the pain, come soak this dry heart in healing rain ... Lift your hands, they can be held by someone greater - the great I Am."
That's Healing Rain by Michael W. Smith. Listen to it and close your eyes and don't remember the horror. Remember the families, lift your hands for them. Remember your families. And, with joy, thank God.
and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray, and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.
2 Chronicles 7:14
This post from archives.
