“Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place.” 2 Corinthians 2:14 NKJV
Answer the question: Are you available and flexible to serve God?
New Year’s Eve 1944, Army Air Corps Serviceman Nate Saint attended a service conducted by John Zoller in Detroit’s Zoller Gospel Tabernacle. When New Year’s Day dawned 1945, Nate Saint’s ambition to be a pilot or aircraft mechanic in the United States changed into a desire to become a missionary in some foreign country.
Nate had written his father in Pennsylvania about his decision at the New Year’s Eve meeting. His father sent a Sunday School Times article titled “On Wings of the Wind” by missionary aviation pioneers, Navy pilot Jim Truxton and ex-WASP pilot Betty Greene.
Reading my parents’ copy of Sunday Magazine, an article by Charles Mellis Jr., a World War II bomber pilot, detailed how he and other military aviators had a vision to use small airplanes to fly missionaries and supplies into isolated jungle territories to further the Gospel. Learning that “Christian Airmen’s Missionary Fellowship” membership was open to pilots and those involved in official flight training, to qualify, I took my first flight training on my 15th birthday, August 29, 1946.
Pastor Charles Pedersen invited Mr. Mellis to share the story of CAMF at Grace Memorial Church. He challenged me to continue learning to fly, and learn international diplomacy, to ultimately open Brazil to missionary aviation.
As an official member of the organization, renamed Mission Aviation Fellowship, I received news about Nate Saint, who was opening Ecuador to jungle aviation.
Flying out of the MAF airport in Quito, Ecuador on December 30, 1948, a downdraft sent the airplane to the ground from 200 feet. The airplane was ruined, and Nate Saint’s back was broken.
Later that summer, my first target teen Ivan “Pete” Peterson and I conducted services 2 Sundays at our home church. Given an honorarium of $50 for the 2 Sundays, Pete said, “George, we can’t keep this.” My response: “Let’s send it to MAF to help get a new airplane for Nate Saint.” We asked our youth group to pray and help, too.
Listening to Nate from his hospital bed broadcasting over missionary radio station HCJB, our youth group heard him say, “Thanks, gang. You have bought the tail wheel for the new airplane.”
Mary and I married June 18, 1950. To continue flight instruction, I transferred to Bob Jones University, enrolling in their flight training program in August. Betty Greene came to Bob Jones to talk about MAF. On our first wedding anniversary in 1951, we met with Charles Mellis Jr at MAF headquarters in Los Angeles. We were shocked to learn I also needed to qualify as an aircraft mechanic. God used that news to change our course of action from mission aviation to youth evangelism. The Lord opened door after door for evangelistic efforts and youth ministry.
January 1956, Nate Saint flew a Piper aircraft with 4 other missionaries, endeavoring to reach natives in the Ecuadorian jungle. They were speared to death by the very people they were endeavoring to win to Christ.
The story of Nate Saint and the missionaries martyred in Ecuador has been documented in books, magazines, and movies.
Hundreds of youth, learning the true tale of Nate Saint and his companions, have dedicated their lives to take the Gospel worldwide and have presented their bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is their reasonable service (Romans 12:1-2).
Romans 12 continues: “For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function, so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another.”
In Vacation Bible School as a preteen, I personally flunked bird houses. My uncle tried to assist me, but he said, “George, you are as awkward as a hog on ice.”
So when I was told I had to be an aircraft mechanic to become a missionary pilot, I realized the personal truth of Romans 12:3 NKJV: “through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.” And Romans 12:6: “Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them.”
God can use you to serve Him when you are willing to “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ” personally, and invite others to admit they have sinned, believe on Christ, and confess their faith in Him to others.
You can triumph in Christ personally. Will you?