In honor of September 11

Everyone I have talked too has remembered exactly where they were on that day. I was in Mrs. Holz's class in fourth grade. We had just finished doing our warm up problems that we do every morning when the principal came on over the intercom and told all the teachers to turn on the news on the tv. Mrs. Holz did, and we were all confused when the screen was filled with live video of big buildings burning. Of course none of us had any idea what was going on and all the teachers were running around in the hallway talking to each other. I remember sitting in my desk and staring at the screen. Mrs. Holz's phone kept ringing off the hook and she would answer and we would all stare at her in silence just waiting for an explanation. But she gave none. After a few minutes, the principal came back on the intercom and explained that there had been a terrorist attack. A class full of nine and ten year olds had no idea what that meant and Mrs. Holz did her best to explain.
A bunch of parents came in got their kids that day and it was hard to continue with class as normal. I remember walking down the hall and we passed another class that had half the kids in it. My mom didn't come early to get me but I remember getting home and sitting on the couch with her watching the news. She asked me if I knew what happened. I said yes that planes had flown into the towers and that bad guys did it.
As I have gotten older, I have come to understand more that happened about that day. The question I most often find myself thinking is why? Why would terrorists hijack a plane and crash it into one of the tallest buildings in New York City?  Why would they end the lives of so many innocent people? How could you be so heartless to leave families without their loved ones? For many Americans, these are questions that will never be answered, that have reasons that we will never fully understand.

 

Being a Christian, I cant help but think why would God let this happen? How could God let thousands of innocent people die from such an unkind act. If God is who he says he is, then why didn't he stop this? That leads me to my next point. If God is so good, then why is our world filled with so much evil? The answer is unknown. What we do know is that God is greater than evil. An act that was probably supposed to tear our country apart, brought us so much closer together. After 9/11, it didn't matter if you were a democrat, republican, white, black, or brown; because we were all one nation under God. You watched as a terrible attack happened on your own soil, and all of a sudden, it didn't matter that your neighbor was as far to the left as you were to the right. Because you had both experienced the same thing. Our country started coming together. People cried together, worshipped together, mourned together. The United States became one nation under God.

God didn't "let" this happen. He had no control over this situation. Evil acts have absolutely nothing to do with God because he is only associated with good things. September 11 was not God's fault. You cannot blame God for allowing this to happen. You can blame the hearts of the terrorists who did not know God. Even when bad things happen, God shows up. He finds a way to put a comforting hand on the hurting. A few days after September 11, he let the United States know that he was looking after us when this was found amidst all the debris.

It is no coincidence that this huge metal beam was standing up higher than all of the rest of the debris around it. God brought people together on this day, he helped people find him and become Christians, and he silently made a promise to us that he was watching over us. It makes me so sad to think about all the families that lost their loved ones that day.I still do not understand what fully happened on that day or any of the days that followed. What I do know, is that it brought our country together and that we will never forget.

9/11/01