When God Sets You Up on an Airplane

For those who live in very restricted environments, it can be difficult to evangelize. God sometimes gives us a gift – a few hours with a captive audience! This story is told by a YWAM Frontier Missions worker from a restricted access country. They prefer to remain anonymous.

Three Gods?

“A few years ago, I was lining up to get on a budget flight in a Scandinavian airport. I had my three young children with me. Behind me was a young Muslim man. Behind him a young Scottish man. I’ll call them Ahmad and Alex.

“Ahmad was evangelizing Alex and saying things like, ‘You Christians believe in three Gods, don’t you! That’s wrong because there is only one God and you need to become a Muslim to worship him.’

“Alex was obviously a Christian and kept saying things like, ‘No, our creed says, We believe in one God.’ I listened to their conversation for a while. It was obvious Alex didn’t know how to counter Ahmad’s claims. I said to my kids, ‘Pray for me. I want to join in this conversation.’ I was starting to feel like God had set me up.

There Is Only One God!

“At this point, I turned around and said, ‘Listen, mate, don’t you ever say that Christians believe in three Gods, that’s blasphemy. There is only one God and we believe in him!’

“I now had his attention, so he tried another tack. ‘You say that Jesus is the Son of God. That’s not right. Our Quran says that God can’t have a son, so you are wrong. Jesus is only a prophet.’

“It was all the usual stuff I’d heard many times before.

“I told him, ‘In Al Imran Sura it says Mary was a virgin. Therefore, Jesus couldn’t be the Son of God. What did Muhammed mean? Muhammed was trying to turn his people away from paganism to the worship of the one true God.’

“Then I explained further, ‘At the time, the Arabs had fertility goddesses with shrine prostitutes. The children of these women were called sons of the god. Muhammed wanted the Arabs to know that Mary wasn’t a shrine prostitute – she was a virgin – and that Jesus wasn’t the child of a shrine prostitute. But that’s not what we mean by ‘Son of God.’

“He got the point, so we explored what it might mean – since Mary was a virgin.

God Wasn’t Finished Yet

“At this point, the line moved, and we got on the plane. I have difficulty walking so everyone overtook me on the tarmac. When we got into the plane there were no seats left together.

“I asked one of the stewardesses if there was any way my kids could sit together. There were three seats that were roped off and she let the kids sit there. I looked for a seat for myself.

“Right across the aisle was an empty seat. Next to it was the young Muslim man I had been talking to!

“For the next two and a half hours I went through the whole message of the Bible. I answered many of his questions about how the Bible ‘had been changed’. By the time we arrived, he seemed very interested in reading the New Testament. Knowing God had set this up, I prayed that he would do that and come to know Jesus one day.

A First Class Opportunity

“My second story is similar. I was on my way back to my home country for a few days. I needed to attend my father’s funeral. Unexpectedly, I was upgraded to business class. I thought, ‘that was nice and thoughtful of God to make my journey a bit easier!’

“Next to me was an Egyptian lady who was working for the UN. During the flight, she got out her Quran and started reading it.

“God said to me, ‘I’ve put you next to this lady because she needs to hear the gospel.’

“I said back to God, ‘Give me a break, I’m on the way to my Father’s funeral. I don’t want to talk to her!’

“In the end God won, of course, and I obeyed.

Understanding Sacrifice

“I got out my Bible, read it for a bit and started a conversation. The lady told me that she had read the New Testament, but that Jesus didn’t need to die for God to forgive sins. I told her that when Adam and Eve first sinned God sacrificed an animal to cover their shame. That’s why for God to forgive, there needs to be a sacrifice. She had read the story but disputed that God sacrificed an animal.

“I showed her the passage in Genesis 3:21. Suddenly, I could see that the ‘penny had dropped’ and she understood why Jesus needed to die. She promised to read the Bible again.”

The harvest is ripe in the Muslim world. People are searching for answers. In these days, we often hear of those who have had dreams of Isa (Jesus). Are you open to allowing God to use you to speak life and truth to those who are seeking?

Whether we see the results immediately or sow seeds as this YWAMer did, it is a great privilege to be used by the Lord to spread His message. As ordinary people make themselves available, God does extraordinary things through them!

One simple act of obedience, like this person’s on the plane, can lead to thousands of people coming to know the Lord. Do you want to find out more about how God is using ordinary people to have an incredible Kingdom impact? How He could use you? Sign up today for a FREE LIVE Online Training on June 12th or 13th. Click here to find out more!