Thank You

   I didn't know them personally. I didn't know their names, where they lived, or what they enjoyed doing in their spare time. I don't know if they had families or best friends or a dog who ran to greet them at the end of a long day. I don't know who wept yesterday or who weeps today once again to mourn their loss.  But I know that scores upon scores of real men and women entered those buildings that were burning on September 11 and many of them knew without a doubt even then that the odds were against them.

    Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures and times like these empower seemingly ordinary men and women to undertake the extraordinarily heroic. It is a documented phenomenon that occurs on battlefields. Who of us knew the battlefield would come to the Twin Towers in New York City, America's own backyard on a beautiful fall day in early September ten years ago? Who knew that what was heretofore unfathomable would become a terrible reality and one that haunts us to this day.
    The scripture teaches us that "greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his brother." There are many observations, many lessons, and many stories that have emerged from this latest day of infamy to burn itself into the psyche of America. Yet none strikes deeper than the story of the first responders who climbed up and up and up into those buildings that would all too quickly become their tombs, their final resting place.
      There are no words to touch this. Words just aren't enough to soothe a loss so great in the face of an even greater horror that imploded and reverberated around us. So I pray for the men, women, and children these heroes left behind. I pray that the grief these families will feel on this ten-year anniversary of 9/11 will not overwhelm any of them to the point of despair. I will pray for healing tears and a healing touch and for the healing for a wound that seems beyond the scope of most of us to understand, much less comprehend. But I will not forget. I will not forget.
    So one woman in a house in Tennessee hundred of miles from where the sacrifices of many were made will get out of her bed and get down on her knees to say thank you for the lives of those who gave their all that day. Your sacrifice gives us hope and we honor you.

photos  from flicker.com