Note: This sermon was originally delivered in the aftermath of September 11, 2001.

On Monday I planned to preach about something else today. On Tuesday I knew that for the first time in twenty years, I would have to change the sermon. A lot of things changed on Tuesday ... probably more than we know. Whether or not the nation changes for the better in the days ahead will depend on our ability to see ourselves not only as a nation under attack but also under God.

Lord God, we gather this morning in churches all over the world, all of us more open than ever before to a holy word from You. Do now what only your Spirit can do. Speak into our souls. Amen.

As a pastor who has spent a lot of time in the emergency rooms of life, I am accustomed to the profoundly sad, numb feelings that arise from the soul in a crisis. All week it felt like the whole nation was in an emergency room. There is only one thing that we have been thinking about. Everything else, all other business, seems unimportant and even profane.

Like an anxious family stuck in the waiting room, we have had an insatiable thirst for news about what happened. "Have you heard?" we asked. "How did it happen? How bad is it?" Then, like a family that learns things are very bad, we know that we will never be the same again. We will recover, but the nation will never be the same again.

Sooner or later every individual ends up in the emergency room. Something happens that you were not planning on, something that permanently alters the plans you had. Maybe a loved one dies, a deadly disease is discovered, or a cherished relationship unravels. When that happens, you realize you will not leave the emergency room the same person you were when you entered. That is exactly where our nation is today. Wounded with a broken heart and certain only that things have changed.

As we leave the emergency room and make decisions about how we get on with life, let us remember that the nation is strong. It is strong enough to survive this atrocity. Actually, it is strong enough to do more than survive. It can become a different, better nation than we were on Monday. But that all depends on the choices we make in the days ahead.

The French Philosopher Paul Ricoeur has written about the creative possibility of "limit experiences." A limit experience is an experience that is beyond the limits of normal life. It's the one you spent most of life avoiding, dreading, defending yourself against, like death and separation. Beyond the limits of those things, we think there's nothing but emptiness, loss and anomie. But as Dr. Ricouer reminds us, there is more. There is also God whose creative love knows no limits.

Watching enormous skyscrapers crumble into dust is beyond the limits of comprehension. It doesn't matter how many times we watch the video, it's still beyond comprehension. As is seeing a gaping wound in the side of the Pentagon. And imagining how men can be so evil as to crash full airplanes into these buildings. And understanding how thousands could so easily die on our own well-protected soil. It's all beyond our limits.