As a child I remember my parents and other adults speak of what they were doing the moment they heard that President Kennedy had been shot. In what was still the infancy of television news, Walter Cronkite announced to a stunned nation that President Kennedy died in a Dallas Hospital early in the afternoon of a crisp November day. Radio announcers reached millions more with the news. The moment of generation would forever remember is the morning of September 11, 2001.

Similar to the weather in New York City, the morning that day was bright and beautiful in Memphis, Tennessee. I was in my first term as a Tennessee State Representative. As was my weekday morning routine at the time, I got up, ate breakfast and dropped my then two-year old son off at our church daycare before driving to work.

What made this morning unique for me was I had just received notice that I needed to confirm my airline reservation for my flight to Washington, D.C. for the morning of September 13. For on that afternoon, I had been invited to a briefing in the East Room of the White House, along with about 50 other state legislators to hear then President Bush discuss economic issues facing state governments.

Needless to say, that meeting never took place.

Making my way south on I-240 in Memphis, I had my car radio tuned to WREC – 600 AM news, when I heard a plane had hit the World Trade Center in New York. It was about 7:55 a.m. central time when the news hit the airwaves. Although it seemed strange to me, like many others who were hearing that same news report, something didn’t seem quite right.

Just minutes from my office, I found the nearest exit and turned around to drive home. I called my wife to check in and make sure she had heard the news. Within ten minutes I was home and had just turned on the television, watching the north tower billow with smoke from the impact of that first plane.

And then it happened again; just a couple of minutes after 8 a.m., – moments after I had turned on CNN – a second plane hit the south tower. Our nation was under attack.

Thirty-five minutes later a third plane hit the Pentagon and about twenty minutes later the south tower begins to collapse and Flight 93 crashes into a field in Pennsylvania. Unbelievable. Shortly before 9:30 a.m. central time, he north tower collapsed – gone.

I look back on this tenth anniversary with millions on other Americans, thankful that we are a stronger nation, even in the mist of continued economic uncertainty. Personally, I have much to be thankful for.

Yesterday, on September 10, 2011, I spent most of the day with my daughter celebrating her 8th birthday. I’m thankful that she and my now 12 year-old son live in a nation where freedom, dignity and honor still prevail.

Is our nation still facing uncertainty in the face of continued terror threats? Absolutely. It still amazes me that our country hasn’t been attacked in even more damaging ways in the past decade.

Yet in the face of such uncertainty, we need to rest assured that the one certainty we have is our belief and faith in God and that His son, our Savior, Jesus Christ, will one day come and make this fallen world perfect again.

To answer the question that was sung by Darryl Worley, the great country artist from my home county, “Do You Remember,” yes, we all remember and forever will.

Today is good. My birthday girl, who got her first cell phone as a gift from her Daddy called me this morning to tell me she loved me and had doughnuts for breakfast. And, I get to go to church this morning and thank God for his continued grace and mercy even though none of us deserve it.

It’s a great day to remember a lot of things.