Do
More Than Remember
I
lift up my eyes to the mountains – where does my help come from? My help comes
from the LORD, the maker of heaven and earth. – Psalm 121:1-2
It’s funny
how great tragedy makes us cling to God. We ignore Him day after day, waiting
for more time and then we are faced with the reality of the troubling end. God immediately
moves to first place. Oh, how I wish we could hold tightly to that knowledge in
the days that follow despair.
We were a
different country in the hours following 9/11. We were a different people. We
loved God. We extended kindness to strangers. We met our neighbors. We focused
on family. Suddenly all that we held dear – our jobs, our bank accounts, our
social status – changed. We understood how fragile life is and exactly what we
can and can’t take with us when we die.
Twenty
years. That’s how much time has passed. It seems we’ve forgotten the lessons
from that day. We’re an angry people. We believe life is all about us. We hold
ourselves high, depending on our money and status to create a clear path to all
our dreams. We’ve once again relegated God to an afterthought. We are once
again an ungrateful people.
Oh, life
occasionally hands us a reminder. We understand the frailty of life when the
doctor tells us we have stage IV cancer and our days on earth are likely
shorter than we planned. We remember how quickly our world can disintegrate
when a phone call comes and we hear that someone we love has suddenly died. It’s
the Covid death of someone once healthy and strong. It’s the child with brain
cancer and the elderly person with dementia. It’s the layoffs and homeless, the
outcast and the orphan. All reasons to remember how fragile and alone we are
without God.
Most on this
day share photos and remembrance of our own 9/11 memories. But the Walton
County Sheriff’s Office went a little further. “What we must do is act; not
just remember. Let it rattle your soul, not just flood your feed. For every
post you put up, serve someone in your neighborhood. For every photo you share,
call a friend you haven’t talked to in a while. For every comment you make
today, find a 9/11 charity or non-profit and find out how to get involved. We must
be United. And not just today. But, every day. That’s how we honor those we
lost.”
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