"The Groan Heard Round the World!"

Maybe your day is going great. Maybe you've just gotten some good news, and you're on cloud nine. Count yourself doubly blessed, because today there are many who will not have a good 24 hours. In fact, if you hear it as a sound, this day may hold a collective groan for our nation, due to the fact that today is the 5th anniversary of the September 11 attacks. Today many try to make it through their days without breaking down, for today is the memory of a lost loved one, lost while the world looked on and mourned for so many who would not make it out of the tower, whose plane would never reach its destination. Today pilots climb into their cockpit seats, feeling just a bit differently about their day to day jobs. Firemen and policemen recall their fallen comrades. Today flags fly at half mast, media outlets memorialize, reminding us to remember that which we wish we could forget. Today is a day of groans, many audibly, but most so deep that they never reach our lips, but rather they exist in a much more difficult place, the recesses of our hearts.

There was another groan, deeper than deep, lonelier that loneliness itself, on a hill 2,000 years ago This groan came from a heart that was about to burst, for it held within it every groan of mine, every groan of yours, every groan of everyone. It was the groan of sin...our sin...my sin...your sin. And it was for a brief but terrible span held within the heart of the God-man. Jesus, the one whose groan was heard round the world. A prophet named Isaiah said hundred of years before Jesus death that he would "bear our sorrows". The groan on the cross was a groan for all the brokenness humanity has ever felt and ever will feel. If we think September 11 is hard for us, multiply the groan of this day by every day that ever was. Collect all the groans of starving children, lonely widows, battered spouses. Collect all the groans of nightmares, fears,tears, hurts, and broken dreams. Collect them all, pile them together, and hang them upon a tree. Then take God and hang Him up amidst all of these groans. Mix a righteous man with all the unrighteousness of the world. Is it any wonder the sky darkened and the ground shook.

But He groaned for you. He groaned for me. What then is today a day for? Yes, it is for mourning, but it can be for so much more. A groan can give way to a cry. The groan of Jesus turned into a shout of victory, for this man, cut down by whip, nail, and thorn, cut down by death itself, could not be held down by this death. So our groan turns to a cry. A cry for help. A cry for deliverance from our groaning. Third Day, in their song, "Cry Out to Jesus" reminds us that mourning can indeed turn to dancing, a groan of despair can turn to joy, because God was willing to groan, deep within His heart of love, that His love would conquer all of our groaning.

To everyone who's lost someone they loveLong before it was their timeYou feel like the days you had were not enoughwhen you said goodbye
And to all of the people with burdens and painsKeeping you back from your lifeYou believe that there's nothing and there is no oneWho can make it right
There is hope for the helplessRest for the wearyLove for the broken heartThere is grace and forgivenessMercy and healingHe'll meet you wherever you areCry out to Jesus, Cry out to Jesus
For the marriage that's struggling just to hang onThey lost all of their faith in loveThey've done all they can to make it right againStill it's not enough
For the ones who can't break the addictions and chainsYou try to give up but you come back againJust remember that you're not alone in your shameAnd your suffering
When your lonely And it feels like the whole world is falling on youYou just reach out, you just cry out to JesusCry to Jesus
To the widow who struggles with being aloneWiping the tears from her eyesFor the children around the world without a homeSay a prayer tonight

(c) 2005 Consuming Fire Music / ASCAP. All rights administered by EMICMG Publishing. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

The groan heard round the world. Yeah...today is hard. But take heart...and cry out to Jesus.