9-1-1 a call for help; a cry to be rescued.  9-11 a day our Nation will never forget; when life as we knew it changed – perhaps never to be the same again.

September 11, 2001 began as always… rising early in the morning, walking the dog, throwing breakfast together for the kids, grab the purse, grab the keys, hurry please, car pool line at school, kisses good-bye, don’t forget your lunch, driving a little too fast to get to work… life as I know it.

Zoning out as I drove along… sometimes humming a tune, sometimes thinking right out loud… when the announcer on the radio jerked me back to reality. “An American Airlines passenger plane just crashed into one of the twin towers at the World Trade Center in New York City”… “Explosions, fire, smoke”… I don’t remember the rest of the drive to work, parking the car or riding the elevator to the fourth floor… But I do remember our office staff gathered around a radio listening, hoping… when suddenly we heard… “Another American Airlines passenger plane just crashed into the second tower”…  “We are under attack, our nation is under attack”…

As you became aware of these events, what were your first thoughts?  Did you wonder how this would affect the stock market?  Were you concerned how this would impact the business transaction you were frantically trying to close?  Or did you find, like most Americans, that all you really thought about or cared about was your family and how you just wanted to be with them… to hug them… and see with your own eyes that they were ok.  Did you find, like most Americans, that you desperately wanted to do something but realized aside from blood donations and financial donations, the only thing that felt right was falling on your knees in prayer? “Oh Lord, hear our cries, heal the wounded, protect those trying to save them, comfort those that mourn”… 

What happened on that sunny, September morning?  What went so terribly wrong?  Even my ten-year old son asked me, “Mom, why would God do that?”  “Honey,” I replied, “God didn’t do that – evil in the hearts of men did that.”   Yet, God will have the final word because He has the ability to take what man meant for evil and from the destruction create something of beauty.  Take a look around you.  It’s already beginning to happen…

• The only business that is booming right now is the “church” business.  People are flooding to churches for comfort and to seek answers to the questions that pull at their hearts.  Perhaps some are uttering prayers from lips that have never spoken with God before.  A door is opened to the Father and dialogue begins.
• Our priorities seems to have returned to proper order, or at least moving in the right direction… God first, family second… job somewhere down the line.  Yesterday I heard an amazing statistic… since this tragedy the number of couples choosing to reconcile instead of divorce has increased by three times.  Thousands of divorces are being pulled from court dockets. 
• Our society now has enormous respect for authority figures.  Images of firemen and police officers being pulled from rubble… laying down their lives with the hope of finding just one person alive.  Our nation stands and solutes those being called to serve our country, some will serve in lands far away… far away from those they love.  No more jokes about cops sitting around donut shops.  No more jokes about men and women joining the military because they just couldn’t make it in the “real world”.  These are our best… our finest… our heroes.
• Honor and respect has returned to the oval office. Our flag can be seen from sea to shining sea… on the back of fire trucks… on car antennas… on bicycles.  Prayer seems to have tiptoed through the back doors of our schools, government offices – even the White House.
• On September 11, 2001 a cry for help rose into the heavens and it did not go unheard.  The LORD said, "You can be sure I have seen the misery of my people.  I have heard their cries.  I am aware of their suffering. Exodus 3:7   Since that moment our Heavenly Father has been on a rescue mission of His own...  comforting the sorrowful, healing the wounded and perhaps His most challenging task – rescuing us from ourselves. 

On September 11, 2001 life as we knew it changed – perhaps never to be the same again.  Oh, how I pray that is true!