Daily Wisdom 09-06-2002 Ground Zero

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Ground Zero

Recently I went to New York City and, like literally thousands of others that day, I visited Ground Zero.It really is nothing much to see, just a great hole in the ground-something like a construction site. What it symbolizes is much much more.

If you have never been to New York, there are so many people all seemingly rushing to get somewhere that you cannot possibly get to in a hurry. It has been said that New Yorkers are not the friendliest people in the world. But what I saw at that big hole in the ground was something else.

Picture if you will a steady stream of every ethnic persuasion you can imagine. It seemed as though every country was represented and every language was being spoken. It all merged into a blur on the way down the street and into the fenced enclosure, past the security guards.And then it started to happen, so slowly at first that you had to be observant to notice, but it grew until all were aware of it.

The silence.

It seemed as if all that great mass of humanity became aware of the same fact that we were intruding on hallowed ground. Hardly a word was spoken as we filed, closer and closer to each other, down the fenced walkway to catch a glimpse of the spot where the World Trade Center stood less than a year ago.

Some stood silently as if they were paying some expected penance, some cried silently-and you could catch a tear in the eye of the roughest of them along with the gentle- some brought an item to add it to the others placed there before it, but there was not one person who remained unaffected by the sight and what it represented.

For this was the site of the first attack on freedom most of us had ever seen. And it came not in some far away country in some past time but right here not long ago. Perhaps the ones who understood best were the ones who dressed differently than I did and spoke another language better than English. There were two things that caught my eye as more poignant than the rest. One was a cross on the far side from the hole, a simple cross, built out of two beams that once held up a portion of the building, now they helped to illustrate the faith of those who lost, and gave their lives in this place. Now these simple beams hold up goodness and life and faith and the greatness of the Lord in all things in the face of those who seek to destroy it.

The other image burned into my mind lay behind the hole on the other side of the barricades on a street still strewn with fire hoses and debris - and still closed. It sat there almost forgotten and unseen by most.

A fire station. Windows boarded up and emergency notices half worn off in the months since that day. A firehouse, battered and forgotten for now but still standing, is what brought the tear to my eye. There were no firemen in it now - I hope they are still with us somewhere, quietly doing what it is that makes this country the greatest in the world. Some of the fabric of America just going about the day.

Those two images epitomize the heart of America and give fair warning to those who seek to destroy her louder than all else.

Give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free. God bless America.