NYC miracle: Shoshy’s story


On September 11, 2001 I said my first prayer. My son was a police officer with the New York Police Department. As I sat watching the Twin Towers burn, at first I thought that he was fine since he worked a desk job at One Police Plaza. But what if he went over to help? “Please God,” I said, “if you’re listening… don’t let them go in there. You can take my car, my house, take anything you want, but don’t let them go in that building. He doesn’t even have a baby yet, God!”

Finally, I was able to reach his wife, who told me that a bunch of people from One Police Plaza went over to help. I hung up and turned back to the TV just in time to see the first tower fall. I thought the worst, of course.

It wasn’t until about 8:30 that evening that I heard from the police department that he was on his way home.

But that almost wasn’t the case.

My son was heading into the World Trade Center when his lieutenant said, “We need more equipment before we go in there.” They turned away from the others and went back to their van. They were spared! And nine months later he and his wife had a beautiful baby girl. Our miracle child!

I believed there was a God and he answered my prayer on September 11, but what to do? The most logical thing was to go to church, so off I went. But people there seemed to be just going through the motions, like they felt they had to be there. I went less and less.

One day, I received the news that my estranged husband had died. He had written me once in a while from Arizona and let me know that he was “saved” (whatever that meant) and that he was praying for me and the kids. My inheritance was a Bible full of Arizona sand. I thought I may as well read it and give church another try. Still, not much changed. Something was missing and I couldn’t figure out what it was.

Then one day I was watching a history show on TV. It was about the history of execution and towards the end, the narrator said, “Now for the most famous execution of all…” I had no idea what that could be. Well, I found out it was Jesus of Nazareth. Watching this segment, I was overcome by an awful feeling of guilt. The other stories didn’t bother me, why his? Listening to the account of Jesus’ death, I found myself asking, “why did he have to do that?”

Suddenly, I realized for the first time that Jesus was God! No wonder people talked about him. I knew from that day on things were going to be different. I owed him big time. But what now? Where do I go?

A few weeks later the Passion of the Christ movie came out and I went five times! I was fascinated by it and what Jesus had done. I needed some more info, so I hit the internet and just happened to come across Thelife.com. I checked out different articles and finally saw a button that said, “Discuss Jesus” That was my first introduction to a chat room.

Here were the people that I had been looking for, people excited about their relationship with God and not afraid to answer my questions. After about four months they were talking about how we could know for sure that we were going to go to heaven when we died. I asked, “How?” Right there in chat they explained that it was simply by inviting Jesus into my life… so I did it right there and then.

Rosie, one of the people in the chat room who was like a mentor to me, just happened to have a friend that was the pastor of a church that she thought, would have just what I needed. And it was.

I’m learning to forgive others and myself. I’m learning to be thankful and I’m learning what true happiness is. Best of all, I’m getting to know and love the Person who heard and answered my first prayer on that fiery September 11 five years ago. A lot has changed since 9/11. Not the least of all, me.


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