Last night I wrote a really great post about what I learned at church, but before I saved it my browser had a fatal error and had to close. It vanished from the cyberworld. Bedtime was fast approaching though, so I decided not to write it again. Oh, well. I’m sorry you missed it. The post was about having peace through the Lord, Jesus Christ in the midst of wars, calamaties, trials, etc. Truly inspirational.

My 9/11 story is very similar to other experiences I’ve read. My older sister called me and told me to turn on the TV–that a plane had hit one of the towers of the World Trade Center. She knew I might be concerned since I had served a mission in New York six years earlier. My friend Peter from Queens, who worked at the WTC at the time, had taken me on a tour on one of my prep days and he had shown me the area that was being repaired from the 1993 terrorist bombing. To be honest, I wasn’t well-informed of the incident and I didn’t appreciate the significance of it.

As I watched the smoke billowing up from the tower on 9/11 morning, I thought the first plane crash was an incredible, unfortunate accident. But then I watched with the rest of the world as the second plane intentionally rammed into the other tower. NOOOOooooo! It was clear America was under attack. Just the two towers would have sent a clear message to the US, but thirty minutes later the Pentagon was hit by a plane, and thirty minutes after that another plane crashed into a field, short of its target. I was stunned, to say the least, and watched the replays all day, all week, all month as the media tried to explain the whys and hows of it all.

When the lists of victims were published I searched for my friend Peter. I haven’t found him on the lists, nor have I found him in an online directory. He was from Ghana, and his family was still there in 1995, so I’m hoping that he returned to be with them before 9/11.

I loved how the nation united in faith in 2001. Unfortunately I no longer feel the unity and I think the nation’s faith in God is wavering–it has generally turned to apathy and bitterness. How soon we forget to turn to the Lord.

I don’t want to forget, and I’m waiting for the day I can go back to New York to pay my respects to the victims and heroes of that terrible day.