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Remembering 9/11

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I’m sitting in a great coffee shop in North Bend. Aroma, smiles, laughter, friends. People I know, and people I don’t know, stream in and out as they live out the adventure of life. As I order my favorite drink, a chai latte’ with 2 shots of espresso, I am not worrying about the potential of airplanes or bombs shattering the moment and stealing earth of her most precious commodity, people, but neither were the people in New York worried about atrocious acts of evil on September 11th.

So then, we remember…

we pause and breathe a little deeper, breath is life, and life is precious and vulnerable…

a thought, a prayer, a plea…

we remember of life and loss, of beauty and ash, of heros and goodness…

It is a good thing to remember.

Remembering launches causes to fight for justice;

to love the hurting;

to hold the marginalized;

to name evil and pray that we would be catalysts for good and God.

While we never forget the pain of a day like 9/11, the reality of its darkness also reminds us of the good that poured out through so many people. Ordinary people who became like Wonder Woman and Superman. Of Civil servants who endangered and lost their lives in the salvaging and protection of other lives…

They speak a message that we still need to hear; every human life matters, every human life has value.

May we continue to become people who live each day with redemptive hearts choosing to eliminate evil, injustice and anything that would set itself up against God’s good intentions for life. We were created to be life-givers, divine image-bearers who are able to rise above baser animal instincts toward a greater ethic of love and oneness.

A friend of mine posted a great quote today that captures this well:

“What separates us from the animals, what separates us from the chaos, is our ability to mourn people we’ve never met.” -David Levithan

Here is a great video from the Skit Guys…take a moment and watch it, and send out a prayer…

Skit Guys – 9/11: On That Day.

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Sometimes It Just Seems To Be Too Much…

Groundzerounderworld460 As I was spending some time praying this morning, I was, as many of you were, thinking about the events that happened on this day 9 years ago. Images were easily retrieved replaying the live news feeds of chaos in New York as two planes were evilly commandeered to become statements of hate when they were forced into the two towers.

Lives were taken…anguish created…questions reverberated…

I prayed today over those who are gone, but mostly for those who remain, and that I would live in such a way that my life might, in some small way, replenish slivers in the vortex of loss, disillusionment, and pain that exists, at least for those I encounter along the way.

Sometimes it just seems to be too much…sometimes the awareness of humanities wickedness or her apathy  just seems to be too much…sometimes it just seems as if we have dug to deep a whole for ourselves and will never get out…

This is when we need to realize that we have been graced by God to live an incarnational life. A life where we don't simply "do religious or good things", but a life that becomes a portal to allow God's goodness to flow through…there is a big difference.

Today is a day to choose to love and not to hate, to be honest with God, and to be honest with ourselves.

I read and ruminated on the following prayer today, and it spoke to where my heart had parked on this day of remembrance for 9-11. Pray through it and note the transition to be the answer of what we pray for..

_________________________

Sometimes, Lord,

it just seems to be too
much:

            too
much violence, too much fear;

            too
much of demands and problems;

            too
much of broken dreams and broken lives;

            too
much of wars and slums and dying;

            too
much of greed and squishy fatness

                        and
the sounds of people

                                    devouring
each other

                                                and
the earth;

            too
much of stale routines and quarrels,

                        unpaid
bills and dead ends;

            too
much of words lobbed in to explode

                        and
leaving shredded hearts and lacerated souls;

            too
much of turned-away backs and yellow silence,

                        red
rage and the bitter taste of ashes in my mouth.

Sometimes the very air seems
scorched

            by
threats and rejection and decay

                        until
there is nothing

                                    but
to inhale pain and exhale confusion.

Too much of darkness, Lord,

            too
much of cruelty

                        and
selfishness

                                    and
indifference…

 

Too much, Lord

            too
much,

                        too
bloody,

                                    bruising,

                                                brain-washing
much.

 

Or is it too little,

            too
little of compassion,

too little of courage,

            of
daring,

                        of
persistence,

                                    of
sacrifice;

Too little of music

            and
laughter

                        and
celebration?

 

O God,

make of me some nourishment

            for
these starved times,

some food for my brothers
and sisters

            who
are hungry for gladness and hope,

that, being bread for them,

            I
may also be fed

                        and
be full.

 

~Amen

_____________________


Honesty with God leads to a transformation of your soul…when you change, your world changes and you change your world, bit by bit, moment by moment.

This prayer was penned by Ted Loder in one of my favorite books of prayer called "Gorilla's of Grace" If your looking for some great prayers of the heart check it out.
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May the memories of this day in history cause us all to "Remember, Repent, and Return to God" because when we try to run this world separated from the God who made it, we becomes creators of loss instead of recipients of life.

Monty