I’d gotten salt water in my eyes that morning. As a homeschooling five year old, it was a standard beach trip. We’d been out early, watched the sun rise over the ocean, and come back for breakfast. My parents flipped the channel to the news out of habit. I remember feeling the sting of the salt water in my eyes as my mother rinsed them with saline. My father’s voice boomed from the living room, “Kay! Come quick.”
The urgency in his voice is not something I would ever forget.
I looked in the mirror at my bloodshot eyes, unable to ignore the sting. The sound of my parents’ voices drew me to the living room of the condo. I looked to them for a sign, trying to understand what could possibly be more important than the burning sensation that I was experiencing. I turned to the television and watched the replay: planes crashing, buildings burning…and tumbling in on themselves. My brow furrowed; I didn’t get it. It was just a movie; why would this upset them. They quickly deferred my attention.
To this day, I remember seeing the twin towers collapse. I’m certain that, though I was young, that memory is embedded in my mind for the rest of my life. Someday, I’ll tell my children about 9/11; just like my dad told me about the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated; just like my grandfather told me about the mountain of shoes outside the concentration camps in Germany.
One thing is for certain: the evil in this world is pervasive, dark, and seemingly unstoppable. In times of great struggle, my faith in Christ is my strength. When I am overwhelmed by incapacitating fear and heartache, He is still God. When children are murdered, when people jump from burning buildings, when men pull triggers, my God is still God. When I see unimaginable tragedy in ISIS footage, I can become grief stricken. When I remember 9/11 now, having lost my own father, I hurt with the women who lost their daddies that day.
Another thing is for certain: one day every tear will be wiped from our eyes and we will see beyond the pain. Every moment of agony will be vanquished and replaced with unending, all-consuming joy. That joy will be in Jesus, who, knowing full well the evil that was nailed through his hands and his feet would be banished to the depths of hell, will bring us into eternal peace. I live in that hope today, remembering those who lost and gave their lives on September 11th, 2001, but believing: “that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.” Romans 8:38-39
