Parachute

I wanted to share a story from a book called, Hell’s Best Kept Secret, by Ray Comfort. Read and consider:

        A man was sitting on an airplane. Unknown to the passengers, a terrorist hijacks the plane and it is about to crash. Halfway into the trip while high up in the sky, the flight attendant walks over to the man with a parachute in her hand. She asks him to put it on immediately. “Why should I put the parachute on?” asks the man.

        “Because it will help make your trip more enjoyable,” the flight attendant replies. “Plus, others are putting it on and you don’t want to be one of the only people that doesn’t have one on. Also, you never know what might happen during the flight, and if the plane goes down, it will come in handy.”
        
        So there the man sits trying to find a comfortable position in his seat, all the while wearing this parachute strapped tightly to his back. He sees other passengers who are not wearing their parachutes. They seem to be enjoying the flight, easily finding comfortable positions in their seats, even taking naps, while the man feels foolish with his on. In fact, some people sitting around him begin to point and giggle, and the woman sitting directly to his right frowns and firmly pushes his parachute off her side of the seat. Other passengers seem to only trust the parachutes they can construct and the gentleman across the aisle is frantically trying to tape together little drink napkins to create his own.

        The man begins to think to himself, “The flight attendant lied to me. Not only am I not enjoying this, but there are plenty of people who are not wearing parachutes and they seem to be having a great time. I am sitting here looking like a fool. What are the chances of the flight going down anyway..?”

Picture another scenario:

        The same man is on the same plane. The same flight attendant walks over to his seat and offers him a parachute. This time, however, when he asks the attendant why he should put it on, her answer is very different. “Our flight has just been hijacked by a terrorist. We are about to crash!!!” At that moment the parachute becomes a welcomed piece of equipment. Suddenly, not only does the man not care that the parachute is uncomfortable, he cares even less about how foolish he looks wearing it. He wonders why other passengers are continuing to refuse parachutes, and he frantically tries to convince them to strap theirs on. The comfort of the passenger takes a back seat to the life and death situation on the plane.

Here’s the explanation of the parable...

Satan is the terrorist. The flight attendant is one who offers the Gospel to a lost person. The passenger is you, the reader. The parachute is...Jesus Christ.

What does this story challenge you to do? What is God saying to you? To me? Are we all about our comfort or all about Jesus?

Stop...and consider...