Safe Landing

July 6, 2013: Asiana flight 214 made a crash-landing at the San Francisco airport. Two died and many were injured. Experts are investigating the cause, but it seems clear a connection with the pilots' failing to fully switch on the navigational landing controls may be at the heart of things.

Misunderstandings
It may look like I'm straying off-topic, but this morning my thoughts fell on an often pondered dilemma—why does wrong often look or feel so good and good seem sometimes so unexciting. It isn't always so and for some it isn't quite as strong a pull as for others. But why does the enemy seem so in favour of our having fun and being happy, and God seem so often against it?

My reading for this morning included this verse, which triggered all this:

The thief [Satan] comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. ~Jesus

Instead of the pitchforked, red, torturing creature of modern depiction, the enemy is described in the Bible as beautiful, an "angel of light," one of the greatest of angelic beings, but also one like a lion crouching to devour (us) his prey. So in summary, he can appear attractive but with your and my destruction as his aim.

(Authenticity test: the enemy has taken countless lives, but never once offered his own for you.)

James in his letter to the church wrote:

16Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. 17Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.

Using Proper Navigation

And what does this have to do with an airline crash? 

In flight, I imagine there are many times an inexperienced pilot must feel tempted to doubt his navigational equipment. When entering storms or dark clouds, uncertainty must creep in about the direction or altitude. Should you follow your own feelings and instincts or trust the controls? It is even possible, as with flight 214, to believe you are trusting the controls only to discover in a fiery crash that you never fully switched them on.

Landing the Plane

Doing what feels good or makes us happy is like ignoring the navigational system and choosing to fly on our instincts. The cost is greater than what affects you or me. The hurt jars many who depend on us. 

James knew how deceptive feelings are when he reminded his people not to be "deceived." Real and lasting good is from our Father, who does not change with modern ideas and fades. He truly desires what is for our best (that we may have "full" life), but we must trust His navigation of our way Home even when it doesn't feel right. Trusting anything else will lead to wounds, separation, destruction and loss.

Let's daily check who is in control.

Remembering A Kind Man

June 20th: I had a Skype chat with a Board Member of the ministry where I work. We were testing out the service before he spoke with the President and Chairman the next day. He told me of the horrible smoke in Singapore due to the fires in Indonesia. He mentioned he had had a doctor's appointment.  They said he had a couple leaky valves, but nothing for which they'd risk surgery.

He chatted for quite a while, and I had to remind myself to relax and just enjoy the conversation without worrying about work. He and his wife had tickets to fly here in about three weeks, but I rarely would have one-on-one time with him.

July 15th: Our friend had to have a triple by-pass surgery, instead of being here for the Board meeting the 16th. We found out only several days beforehand. But surgery went very well.

July 17th: Some complications started in his lungs, but nothing too alarming.

July 18th:

10:25 AM— From a co-worker: "He came out of High Dependency ward today, but his heart went into fibrillation at 6pm and his pulse rate was very high.  He was nauseous and was unable to eat and looked and felt unwell. He is back in the high dependency ward." 

5:40 PM— From his wife: "He collapsed three minutes ago. Docs have resuscitated heart but he may not make it." 

9:18 PM— From another friend: He's "with the Lord." "He didn't make it."

____________

And minus that one breath and one heartbeat, he is gone forever as we know him.

"I will go to him, but he will not return to me."

That's it. The ceasing of a normal physical "habit" of heart and lungs, and you no longer are as we have known you. You don't just resign from the Board. You disappear.

I'm new enough with death to be haunted by it. 

Tonight, I've pulled up his last emails to me. I've thought of the time I stayed in an apartment in South Africa with him and his wife and some ladies. I remembered how patient he was when twice I blew the fuse, darkening the apartment with my high voltage devices. 

Another friend reminded me of this past March of when he had spent a day driving us around—paid for all five of us to roam through some orchid gardens in Singapore, took us to a special Chinese restaurant for lunch, and wandered for hours through the Little India shops with us. Mr. Patience. 

I pulled up Skype tonight too. It was the last place I had seen his face, while I said I looked forward to seeing him and his wife in a short amount of time. 

Skype said he was just "offline."

I wonder. Is that all death is? You're still "out there," you're merely "offline" to the rest of the world. 

Jesus called it "sleeping" before He raised a good friend, who had been four days in a tomb. Although He used the term, eyewitnesses testified to seeing Him "weep" and noted how much "He loved him." He wept minutes before He brought him back to life. Why?

Truly, I leave it to the theologians and scholars to wrestle with the reasons. I stand with the people and note: "Could not this man who opened the eyes of the blind keep this man from dying?" 

And with Martha I say in faith, that I believe there will be a resurrection of the dead. 

25Jesus said to her, "I AM the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, 26and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?" 

We live with it. Death. 

Death has been named the "Grim Reaper." It's pictured as a figure in black waiting to steal you away in a black horse-drawn carriage. 

Innately, we understand it's an enemy. One to whom those we love and we ourselves will almost all succumb (barring Jesus appearing to call us directly to Him).

Scripture reminds us we're like "grass that the wind blows over," and we're gone. Song writers ponder our status as "dust in the wind."

Same old song, just a drop of water in an endless sea 

All we do crumbles to the ground though we refuse to see 

Dust in the wind 

All we are is dust in the wind  

~Paul Simon and Ivana Kindl  

So what's the point?

Life is short. We know that! It's short for me, and it's way too short for those I love.

Am I living the way I want to be remembered?  Not just at my memorial service, but if they should tell my story a hundred years from now? Is it all about me or is it of use in God's greater story?

I don't have a lot of time to invest.

Nor do you.


Goodbye, Mr. Hwang. I'll look forward to seeing you at Home. Soon.