E-Letters

Storms

By Jeff Andrechyn
May 28, 2009

In the world of success and failure, I would put my batting average at about 160. I am a utility player who is not going to make the hall of fame. I play hard with the fervent hope that the team will sign me next year, but even that looks doubtful most days.

One day while flying for a major airline I was going into New York City which lies just north of the 40th parallel and is usually impervious to tropical storms; the kind that frequent the Gulf Coast. Occasionally a system will muscle up the eastern seaboard ignoring its latitudinal boundaries and invade the busiest airspace in the world producing utter chaos.

We were flying a Boeing 737 into La Guardia when such a system laid over the city so powerfully it was producing counter rotations in the clouds (funnel clouds). Air Traffic control began to systematically close down the arteries leading into the airspace around the city.

Just as they were closing down our arrival corridor we shot the gap between two thunder storms converging on our route and we entered the hornet's nest of NYC and in no time it was pell- mell. Once we were in, there was no turning back. It was the first time in NY airspace that I didn't "request" heading changes to avoid weather, we simple "told" ATC what we were doing. At that point we were what I would call "navigating for life". The controllers had a rabbit in the hole and they now had to get it home.

I recall this scene so well because it's a picture of my life. I am traveling at high speeds with precious cargo and everything is in a state of utter chaos.

Situation desperate - outcome uncertain.

For all the storms I have weathered in my life, I wonder most days if I'm going to make it through this current one; they seem to intensify with age.

One time when David was on the run from Saul in the wilderness, God once again (for the 3rd time) delivered him from being captured. Saul then conceded not only that David would be King but he would be a good one. Later David turned to his men and said, "Someday Saul is going to get me. The best thing I can do is escape to the Philistines... and there I will be safe."

The gravity of the unholy trinity (the world, the flesh, and the devil) can catch us like an alligator and twist us down into murky waters where we can make bad agreements about who God is and who we are. We live as orphans instead of as sons in those waters.

If you live with the freedom God gives us, you will be hunted, and when it gets hot, there is always the temptation to descend the steps of safety and experience the cool but silent death of conformity. Instead of running free we choose to live in the basement of control and we preserve our reputations with bone-chilling accuracy.

Jesus and the disciples were heading back to Lazarus after he died and Jesus was telling them that He is the resurrection and Thomas said, "Let's go too - and die with Jesus."

How is it that we stand in the midst of resurrection and the storehouse of possibilities with Christ and we make agreements with death, or we are ready to welcome its relief.

Looking back now I know I was the one chosen that day for the mission into NYC. All the air traffic controllers conspired to give me freedom to maneuver at will (free flight) to bring that jet home, and all they were able to do was tell me what altitude I could descend to (there are some large buildings in NYC that can bring things to a sudden stop).

There I was, in the tragedy of life, over the chaos of NYC, fighting with zero visibility, and playing my role with everything I had.

Bottom of the 9th with 2 outs and I came up to bat.

For ten minutes I owned the airspace over NYC as ATC watched to see if we would make it.

We took the first pitch and put it in the upper deck of the short porch in right field.

Unbelievable.

Father looks on at this moment in time, at the role he had for me to play, and said, "Ahh perfect! That's my boy!"

When you have one of those rare victories in life and you are rounding third for home, it's then you can see all of heaven around the plate cheering you on the journey. I think these guys see the score board from a different angle then me.

I remember driving home that day thinking, "That was fun!"

Jeff.