Getting My Wings

If you're reading this at all it's a good bet you're well aware I'm moving to Rwanda in the fall.  If you didn't know that and want to know more please refer to the previous two posts on this blog.  They'll give you all the deets you can handle.  I promise.

I've never done a blog but even just in writing this far there is one thing I am well aware of and will be sure of which to take full advantage: I can be as informal as I want.  I can literall just have word vomit all over this text box and it's totally fine.  Why? Because it's my blog.  I can say what I like and most of this space will be taken as record keeping and external processing.  I'm a talker.  If you didn't know that you don't know me.  I need to say things to get through them well.  I need to talk before I talk if you catch my drift here.  What this blog enables me to do, particularly in lonelier settings, is have that outlet to put thoughts down in a way that is so much faster and kinder to my ADD/ADHD than writing by hand in a journal.  That has its merits but my goodness it takes forever.

Here's a story I never got to tell in any of my emails simply for the sake of brevity which I still managed to fail at accomplishing.  Whatever.  That's what this is for now.

The Monday after I met with Hilliary I called up my cousin Gordon to pray.  We do that fairly regularly and I really miss our normal Wednesday lunches we enjoyed together when I lived in Santa Barbara.  It would be tough for me to feel more blessed by our relationship than I already do.  But I've been wrong before.

Anyway, as we were praying and seeking the Father and what He had to say about all this Gordon said "I feel like God is saying...well, hold on.  Back up.  So my dad was the procurement officer on a navy carrier for a long time.  His job was to make sure that everyone on that whole ship had what they needed to do their job.  The thing is though that everything that happens on an aircraft carrier boils down to the hundred seats in that briefing room for the pilots.  The whole reason that ship exists is for those pilots to get out and do their job and so everyone else's job on that ship is to make sure those pilots can fly.  They are uniquely suited physically and mentally for that job.  They are highly trained and educated for it.  In other words, they do what no one else on that boat can because that's who they were made to be."  Then he said something that blew me away.  "Ryan, God is saying you're his pilot."

I took a serious time out right there.  When I was a little boy living in Long Beach, my parents would take me to the Long Beach Airport, which was right across the freeway from where we lived on Signal Hill, and let me watch the airplanes for hours.  I was obsessed by a single minded notion and dream of being a pilot in the Navy and landing on an aircraft carrier in the middle of nothing but water. I had airplane toys, I had flash cards, my cousins and I all had WWII bomber jackets, and I went to every airshow I could in Southern California.  I've seen the Blue Angels more than a dozen times.  I wanted nothing more than to be a pilot.  Eventually though the years wore away that dream.  My ears were a mess and my math wasn't good enough and I gave up the dream of being a pilot.

Now here's the crazy part.  Gordon didn't know any of this.  I had never told him.  Most of my closest friends don't even know about this.  How could he possibly have known how effective that word about God saying I was his "pilot" was going to be for me?  Answer: He couldn't.  The mathematical probability of that happening with that specific story happening by accident is just way too ridiculous to even think about.

After I told Gordon all this all he could say was "WOW".  I mean, what else was there to say?  We both shared such joy with the Father God in that moment.  God had not forgotten my dream, even if I did.  It may look a little different but it's the same.  If he says I'm his pilot, I'm his man.  He's got me for life.  The plane will be different, the place I'm landing will be different, but my position as "pilot" is no different.  I am uniquely qualified to reach these boys and minister to them.  I do not have other limitations that some people may have (i.e. I am single, mobile, flexible, and want to go), and I have the life experience to reach them about healing with their father's that many others do not.  I am the man for this job and I can say as far as I know that I personally know no one better equipped to serve these boys in the manner I am called to serve them.

With all this comes the part about the rest of the ship.  What a wonderful picture of the church.  An aircraft carrier, man.  A floating city (city on a hill???) that can go wherever it is needed and each person on that ship is gifted specifically to serve the mission of that ship (church).  I LOVE that.  God has gifted each of us differently.  That ship could not function without cooks (God forbid!!), mechanics, commanders, etc.  Those pilots mean nothing if the planes don't work or their bodies fail because there's no doctor around to help.  What I'm saying is this: As a "pilot" I can do nothing without the support of those around me.  Financial and prayerful support makes me able to "fly".   From now on you are my flight crew and as my friend Jim said, "you're deployed, now we just need you on station".  Amen.

The next couple months will hold a lot.  Let's hang on tight crew and see what the Captain wants to do and where He wants to take us!!