American Missionary Fellowship

Saturday I was flying to Las Vegas to speak at South Hills Church, a great young church plant with exciting ties to American Missionary Fellowship. The airline had upgraded me to first class, and about halfway through the flight from Washington to Las Vegas, a young man ran down the aisle and tried to open the exit door to the plane before a group of us, led by one particular man, subdued him.

Our plane was diverted to Denver. The FBI came on the plane, and it made several news reports. What was amazing to me was how everyone disregarded the danger. We all just jumped up. The man had two bags and a fanny pack, and after we rethought the moment, we realized we had no idea what was in those bags. The community of good Samaritans who gathered around to keep the plane safe was untrained. None of us had ever had this happen before. But we all acted rightly.  It didn’t matter what color we were, what age we were, what kind of shape we were in – everyone in the first-class cabin worked together to bring the situation under control.

When the young man was subdued in seat 2B (I was in 1A), we began to talk to him to find out what his issues were. He was very, very scattered and almost incoherent.  I got down on my knee in front of the man and helped him calm down, asking him his name, talking to him, finding out a little about his life. He would be perfectly normal and then kind of flip out for a while.

It was an experience I will never forget. The plane landed and the FBI came on to take the man off the airplane. We were all screened and had to go to a different airplane. About five hours later, we were back on the airplane. The eight of us who were in first class were in our usual seats on a similar airplane, but something had happened to us. We had had an experience that brought us together, a community of crisis that was amazing. We began to share our lives together during the new flight. Even the flight attendants sat down and were more interested in who we were because of our shared experience.

I’m not trying to draw too much out of this experience, but it did cross my mind that one of the things that brings our mission together is our common focus on sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ. Those kinds of common work moments focus us in on what we are attempting to do. Our clear focus – our clearly articulated, laser-pointed focus – brings unity. It’s when we take our eyes off our focus and turn from Christ, Whom we serve, that we get disunity.

May we keep our focus and be a community of believers acting rightly for the glory of God.