I sat down in my seat, 21 A, the window seat. I’m not real thrilled about the window seat, I’d rather have the aisle, but hey – at least I’m not in the middle seat. The guy who IS in the middle seat comes. I say hello, ask the usual first barrage of questions – where you headed to? Is St. Louis your final destination or are you going on? What puts you on the flight today? Business? Something else? Even though I’m not usually one to chat throughout the flight, I do like to try to be polite and make a connection before we take off. But this guy isn’t having it. 
One word answers, cagey body language, and frightened glances out of the window beyond me tell me that this guy is afraid of something. He is either running from the law, has a shoe bomb, or…..much more likely….he’s afraid of flying. Sure enough, as we start building up speed on the runway to take off, he grips the arm rest like he’s trying to hang on to the wing outside, not sit in a seat inside. I sort of want to tell him that I’m a pastor and that I just preached last weekend about how trust is an important thing, and that how my trust of the pilot is a little like my trust in God. But I don’t think I’m leading him to Jesus on this flight….in fact, I think his fear is exactly that he’s going to see Jesus in a little while.
I start reading my book, and the author makes a point about “play”. The author makes the argument that we think our lives are too important to play, but that when we start thinking that way we doom ourselves to failure. The point the author is trying to make is all over my seat mate’s face. I can sit there, read my book, listen to that album on Spotify that I downloaded, look out and appreciate the clouds a little, pray a little. All he can do is worry about what it looks like when one of the engines catches on fire. The difference is trust.
In this case, the difference is trust in the pilot, the airline mechanic, the air traffic controller, and whomever. But in life in general, I feel sometimes like I’m sitting next to people that are squeezing the arm rest because they don’t trust God, they don’t trust the people in their congregation, they don’t trust their pastor, they don’t trust much of anyone. Maybe that feels that this makes them hyper vigilant. They’re right. The guy next to me is also hyper vigilant, but he’s not having very much fun. In fact, you might even say that the difference here is in my lack of trust in myself. I’m not a pilot, I’m not an airline mechanic, and I’m also not the God of the Universe.
I wish I knew this guy’s name, because I’d like to remind myself of him when I get into those moments when I’m squeezing the arm rest. Maybe his name is Tom. I’ll call this “Tom’s Law”. Tom’s Law is simple, life is better when you trust. Maybe that trust gets broken by humans around you sometimes, but it’s still better to trust. Stop squeezing the arm rest, folks. Let’s start trusting in “the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.” And let’s see if maybe we can have a little more fun.