The pictures quickly made their way around the world—pictures of an aircraft lying upside down in the snow just beyond runway 23 at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport. On February 17, Delta flight 4819 landed hard, shearing off the right wing and flipping over before finally sliding to a stop. Remarkably, despite the crash and subsequent fire, all of the passengers and crew escaped. Equally remarkably, few received significant injuries.
Canada’s Transportation Safety Board recently released their preliminary report on the accident and there was one detail that struck me as especially significant and thought-provoking—a detail that teaches an important spiritual lesson.
As far as I can tell, everything that went wrong with flight 4819 went wrong in the last 14 seconds. The details are technical and I needed a pilot friend to explain them to me, but essentially the first officer reduced the engine’s thrust too much and too early—at 153 feet above the runway instead of just a few and at 14 seconds before landing instead of just one or two. The plane responded by slowing to such a degree that it began to descend too quickly and could no longer respond to the pilot’s controls. Thus, what should have been a gentle touchdown was instead slamming a 73,000-pound machine into the ground.
Here is what stood out to me: The flight lasted some 8000 seconds and all was well until 7986 of them had passed. The pilots delivered on well over 99% of their job and to that point they had done everything well. But then they monumentally messed up and a poor decision led to terrible consequences and very nearly to a deadly catastrophe. So even though you could make the argument that the pilots were 99% successful, I say they failed completely. Why? Because their job was not to get their passengers to within 150 feet of the runway and within 14 seconds of a safe touchdown. Their job was to get them gently to the ground and safely to the gate. To fail so catastrophically at 99% of the way through the flight was to fail to such a degree that it would have been better if they had not set out at all.
Even though you could make the argument that the pilots were 99% successful, I say they failed completely.
I am allowing this situation to be a reminder to me that when it comes to my life and ministry, I am capable of making a shipwreck of it (or a plane crash, if you prefer) before the end. Even though I may have set out well and be doing okay today, this does not necessarily mean I will finish strong. In fact, I could even blow it after 99% or 99.9% of my time is complete. It is as possible to crash and burn with 14 seconds left as with hundreds, thousands, or millions.
Hence, I know I need to pray all the more that God will keep me to the very end, not to almost the end. I need to continue to examine myself until I see his face, not until I am content with my own progress. I need to continue to love, meditate upon, and apply the gospel until I’ve touched down safely in that land where I will finally be far beyond all peril.
