First came the shock and the disbelief.

Then the feelings of raw horror set in, fueled by the television images that we couldn't get out of our minds.

Now we're feeling the full weight of our grief - grief that we are feeling as individuals, as a community, and as a nation.

Following Tuesday's horrific attacks, messages of grief began to pop up on the streets of New York. One small ink scrawling says, "Andy, and to all of those still to be found, we won't lose hope. God is with you."

On another piece of paper, written in orange crayon, are the words: "If whoever did this is so mighty, why is he hiding?"

Those are just some of the hundreds of messages left on rolls of poster paper, taped to the ground at a memorial for the victims of the World Trade Center attacks. According to the Associated Press, the memorial was started Tuesday afternoon with two pieces of poster paper laid down by Jordan Schuster, a 19-year-old sophomore at New York University. Schuster said he wanted to help, but lines at the blood banks were too long and police weren't allowing people near the rescue site.

He figured he could help by giving people an outlet, a place to express their emotions. ''A lot of people needed to get their feelings out,'' he said.

The emotions expressed in the messages range from sadness to rage. Some call for compassion, others for action.

"An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, leaves us blind and toothless," one message read. "Your justice is another's injustice. Please do not kill more innocents."

"Destroy the evil today," read another.

"God bless the victims," says another piece. "Please stop the hating. Please stop the killing." (Deepti Hajela, "New Yorkers Write Messages of Grief," The Associated Press, September 14, 2001)

Like the people of New York, we need to get our feelings out. We need to express our shock and our disbelief, our horror and our grief. We need to express feelings of sadness and rage, as well as to cry out for compassion and action.

That's part of why we're here today: To bring all of these feelings to Almighty God, and to turn them over to his Son Jesus Christ.

Jesus, you see, knew all about grief. In the Gospel of John, Jesus goes to the tomb of his dead friend Lazarus, and encounters the sisters Martha and Mary. When Jesus sees Mary weeping, he is greatly disturbed in spirit and is deeply moved. He begins to weep himself, prompting some onlookers to say, "See how he loved him!" (John 11:36)

What a powerful image this is: God's own Son, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, so overcome by grief over the loss of his friend, and by anger over the destructive power of death, that he breaks down in tears.

It's clear that dying is not something that our Lord doesn't care about. It is something that affects him so profoundly that he is overwhelmed by emotion and he cries. And just as he weeps over Lazarus, he weeps over last week's deaths in New York, and at the Pentagon, and in Pennsylvania, as well. These are the tears of Jesus the human, of course, but also the tears of Jesus the divine Son of God.

But then, suddenly, another group of onlookers speaks up and makes a less sympathetic observation: "Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man [Lazarus] from dying?" (v. 37). It sounds like a rather heartless and cutting remark, but guess what? It's a question that we ourselves have probably asked, in one form or another, at one time or another.

Think about it. Could not the God who created the universe have kept those planes from hitting the World Trade Center?

Could not the Christ who conquered death have kept the workers at the Pentagon from dying?

Could not the Spirit who inspired the apostles have helped those airline passengers to overcome the terrorists?

This is not a disrespectful or unfaithful thing to wonder. In fact, it's something that all people of faith are bound to ask at one time or another. Why do innocent people suffer? Why do bad things happen to good people? Why doesn't God protect us from violence and illness and death?

There are no easy answers. In today's passage, Martha follows this same line of thought when she says to Jesus, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died." She is confident that Jesus has power over illness, and that he would choose to use it to help her brother Lazarus. Jesus promises her, "Your brother will rise again," and she misunderstands him, thinking that he is talking about the final resurrection at the end of time. (vv. 21-24)

But then Jesus says something very interesting and unexpected. Instead of explaining to Martha that he is going to raise Lazarus in just a few minutes, he says, "I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?" (v. 25)

Rather than promising Martha a miracle, he invites her to trust him to work for new life. There's a big difference between these two. Instead of saying, "I'm going to step in and make everything okay," Jesus says, "Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live." He promises that the dead will rise, but he doesn't predict just how.

So what does Martha do, in response to this invitation? She says yes. She believes. She proclaims, "Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world." (v. 27)

The very same invitation is extended to us today. Jesus says to us, less than a week after the most devastating terrorist attack in history: "I am the resurrection and the life …. Do you believe this?" Do you believe that I am working for new life? Do you believe that I am the resurrection, the one who conquers death? Do you believe that I am leading you, right now, in so many ways, from dying to rising?

Personally, I have to say, "Yes - I believe this." Not that I believe Jesus is going to cause dead men and women to walk out of the World Trade Center rubble, as he caused Lazarus to emerge from his tomb at the end of today's Scripture story. Not that he is going to turn the grief of so many mourning Pentagon families into joy, as he did for Mary and Martha. But I do believe that he is moving us from dying to rising, in so many very powerful ways.

I see it in the expressions of sympathy and support from the leaders of Russia, something that would have been inconceivable 15 years ago.

I see it in the prayers of Islamic leaders, clergy who have joined the chorus of condemnation for those who assert that terrorism is somehow the will of God.

I see it in the people who waited hours to give blood, in the students who collected water bottles for relief workers, in the countless souls who have made monetary contributions to disaster assistance.

I see it in the American people - rich and poor, black and white, immigrant and native-born, old and young, Northern and Southern - highly diverse people who have suddenly discovered that none of these differences matters in the face of a national threat.

I see it in the one hundred people who came to Midday prayer on Friday to make a connection with God - quite an increase from our normal five or six.

I see it in all Christians who are simply determined to be the church of Jesus Christ. As our presbytery's Stated Clerk wrote in a letter last Wednesday, "As long as there are deeds of compassion to be done, we are not at all helpless. As long as there are victims to pray for, we are not at all voiceless. … If we let these horrific events cause us to abandon faith, then evil will indeed have triumphed."

After last week, we know all about dying. We've seen it on the news, in living color, gruesome shots of planes exploding into buildings, played over and over again. I believe that it was important for us to watch this, but now I believe that it is equally important that we not get stuck on it. It's true that if we let these events cause us to abandon faith, then evil will indeed have triumphed.

We've looked at dying. Now let's begin to look at rising. Let's look for signs of resurrection life -- in ourselves, in our community, in our world.

"I am the resurrection and the life," says Jesus to each one of us. "Do you believe?"

Let's now take a moment of silence to respond to this invitation.

Amen.