9/11: We Must Never Forget

At the age of 15, my father sat in a movie theater near Los Angeles in December of 1941. The feature was suddenly halted and every serviceman in attendance was summoned to duty. Japan had just bombed Pearl Harbor, a little known name to Americans back then. It would become an infamous place on the map, and the occasion an infamous day in American history. The moment is vivid in my dad's mind each time he tells the story. He usually ends the account with, "We must never forget."

In 2001, we had just sold our home in North Carolina, looking to relocate to Tennessee and, in the mean time, were staying with Brenda's parents for a few days in Mobile, Alabama. We gathered around the living room TV after the news broke that the first tower had been struck. We continued to watch in disbelief as the awful truth slowly unfolded and world changed before our eyes. Brenda and I mentioned how, just a few years earlier, we rode the subway to the Towers on a trip to New York and took the iconic escalators that led many to their doom. It was a helpless sight to see the jumpers, and to realize that thousands were trapped with no recourse but to wait and pray for rescue. It was a terrible day-- one that could make a happy-go-lucky person become cynical and bitter.

I was just 3 years old when the world changed back in November, 1963. As Kennedy lay lifeless in a Dallas hospital, the people of this great country reacted in much the same fashion as on 9/11, my elders tell me. What was once a post-WWII climate of positivity and economic prosperity--with babies being born in record numbers, new home building and interstate highways creating a single nation out of scattered regions-- instantly became a more fearful place as Kennedy faced-down Kruschev, close to home, during the Bay of Pigs debacle. When Kennedy was struck down a few years later, it ushered in a new brand of fright: America was vulnerable to attack from within it's own borders. Whatever the case, the fact is, we Americans are vulnerable. We seem to forget, over time. When our economy is on an upswing, and our bellies are full, the threat to our freedom becomes a hazy memory from the past.

This weekend, as we sit around the TV to take in all of the 9/11 tenth anniversary remembrances, we must also remember that a dark world exists outside our comfy homes. I'm not trying to be morose, just speaking the truth. Our naive tendency is to believe that good dwells in all humanity. I will say now that, outside of the Spirit of God, evil dwells in the heart of man. In the Bible, Jeremiah 17:9 says, The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? (NIV)" Where there is an opportunity for power, humans will do whatever it takes to gain the upper hand. Therefore, we must never forget that dreadful day when the planes crashed into the Twin Towers, the Pentagon, and into that lonely field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. We must never forget--because if we're not careful, it could happen again.

We must remember the rescuers and the fallen this weekend . The many souls who perished in the flames and rubble will forever be honored in our hearts and in history. Like my dad says, "We must never forget."