The World Has Been Overcome

I'm never sure what to say on this day.  I remember along with everyone else, recall sitting in my sophomore speech class when the news came of the first plane hitting, then onto dance where we listened over the radio as a second followed it.  Friends around me called parents and teachers didn't stop them.  A girl I knew was in tears because her father was in the air and she hadn't heard from him.  Our youth group gathered to pray.  I sat glued to the TV almost every day after school watching as fire fighters and others tried to stop the ever spreading disaster, as people lost their lives, as my friends and acquaintances either found relief in making contact with someone in potential danger or lost a piece of themselves a midst the fire...

...and I waited to cry.

In a way I felt disconnected and the lack of tears made me feel guilty.  Yes I was horrified, yes I was sad, yes I prayed…but that pain, what I saw, it never really got inside of me.  After a few days the emotion finally set in, but somehow it still felt off.  I hadn't lost anybody; I didn't have a right to cry, to mourn.  Still I did, wondering if this was true sadness or something the musical montages and media coverage and speeches and prayers had conjured up.  Emotions are easy things to rile and ought often to be distrusted.

Even now I feel somewhat guilty in even talking about the event, like it wasn't something that actually happened to me, as if I’m perpetrating a fraud by trying to connect with it.  So I didn't know what to say today, but I didn't feel right leaving it alone and ignored.  Those that died should be remembered and mourned, those who lost should be comforted, bathed in prayer.  In many ways for me it is learning to mourn with those who mourn (Romans 12:15), learning to listen and hear and care more about loving those who are weeping  than about stirring up emotions in myself.  It’s hard to make sense of this day no matter what you lost twelve years ago and my prayers are with the mourners, with our leaders, with our nation, and I rest on the promise Christ left with us in John 16:33, “In this world you will have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.”