A very special ceremony....

Well it is finished! Last friday S.M.A.T. concluded the one year airframe and powerplant mechanic training course with a graduation ceremony for me and my 21 classmates. What a special year it has been. The graduation was held at a local church that two of my classmates attend. Aside from honoring the graduates of the A&P course, we watched a video that my classmates nominated me to make about our year. It included some short interview clips of what my classmates liked about this past year, as well as video and photos of projects we've done and fun times we've had. The video appears above. It's about 13 minutes long. Also our class nominated my classmate Joe to give a short message during the graduation. It was short and very good. His message was a message we have heard many times this year, and no doubt need to hear many times throughout our lives. That is that ultimately what is important about what we do is not the technology. It is not the airplanes and the flying. But what is important is the people, and God's word. Remaining close to Christ and to the people in our lives is the most important thing. And that is the reason we do what we do, no matter if you're a missionary pilot or an accountant. The highlight of the graduation ceremony for me was our keynote speaker, Steve Saint. If you've seen the movie End of the Spear, or if you've heard of the story of the 5 missionaries who were killed in Ecuador back in the fifties, Steve is Nate Saint's son. Nate was the pilot for the five missionaries. Steve had a key role in the making of the movie. He helped tell the story to the producers and they also asked him to find and restore an exact replica of his father's airplane, which happens to be a very very rare airplane that is almost impossible to find and buy. They also surprised him by asking him to fly it in the movie. So when you watch the movie, it is Steve Saint flying the Piper. During the filming of the movie, Steve actually got to land the plane on the "Palm Beach," which is the littlesandbar that his father was killed on. But Steve's message to us was similar to Joe's. "Palm Beach," he said, was not about sand, or airplanes. So many people he said visit there just to see where this great thing happened. When he asks them, "Did you meet any of the people," they often say "oh yeah, I think we saw a few of them." "You went to palm beach and didn't meet any of the people who live there?" Steve would muse. "You went to Palm Beach and walked right by Palm Beach." It wasn't about sand, it was about people. It was about the Waodani people that God used what happened there to bring his love to. The people are what is important. They are the reason. He said several times..."Palm Beach was about people, not about sand." In the same way our lives are about people. It was a very good reminder for me and my classmates, that as we spend so much time learning to become pilots and mechanics to serve in missions, to keep our hearts set on the real reason we are there.

Kelly and Joe's wedding getting close!

I made a pilgrimage with some of my classmates out to the Oshkosh air show this past weekend. For the unfamiliar that is the world's biggest airshow. It was amazing! It is hard to describe with words so I am going to see what I can do to get a little video up here soon of what goes on at Oshkosh. Below are some engagement photos of my twin Kelly and her fiance Joe. The wedding is in October and we are getting excited!

Wow...the days are already getting shorter! Holly has been here for two months. There are like twenty some days left of maintenance school. I am amazed at how quick time flies. In the famous words of JP Harris....life is like a roll of toilet paper. The closer you get to the end, the faster it goes! Here at school we have been working to wrap up work on our engines. My teammates Matt and Jeffrey and I are working at assembling all the parts. There is much care and time involved in the process.
Our school is facilitating a "school field trip" to the Oshkosh airshow in two weekends. For the unfamiliar that is the world's biggest airshow and most airplane junkies dream of going someday if they haven't. It will be very educational as well as a chance to talk to some of the aviation missions. Many of them set up booths at the airshow. There will be dozens of educational seminars which I am excited about.
We've been busy this past week with Heather's stepmom Jean and younger sister Madison visiting. They were here over the fourth. We had a lot of fun with them. Here's an album with some pics of their visit (as well as a few others).



We had a visitor at school from JAARS this week. JAARS is the aviation department for the Wycliffe Bible Translators who are trying to get the bible translated into every language on earth. He flew with some of our students to give them input on how they are doing in preparation for mission flying. I do not have enough experience to fly with him yet. That's what I will be working on after August 10 when the maintenance course is over. But it was very neat to talk to him about his 30 years of mission flying experience. There are some very tough decisions that face missionary pilots. There can be life or death medical situations happening when flying weather is marginal, making some very tough go or no go decisions. Safety and decision making are crucial for mission pilots.

Community

My school gives students the neat opportunity to share a devotional presentation with the class. Last week I took the opportunity to present on the topic of community. We have a neat community among our students here and their families. I opened it up for some students to comment on what they thought was important about living in community with each other and what that entailed. Then I shared a few things I thought was important about it. The main point I made is that each person is created with a need to be known deeply by other people, not just on the surface. We are made with a need for intimacy....or "in-to-me-see." There is something powerful that happens when we spend time with eachother and get real with eachother about the things that really goes on in our lives "behind the curtains." When we are loved and accepted even after people know how we really are, an amazing sense of healing, comfort and unity comes. God definitely intended this to happen in our marriages, but he also calls us to these sorts of relationships with others. I put together a video presentation for the class with some bible verses about this that are commonly known as the "one another verses." They are set to the backdrop of some fabulous photos that my classmate Matthias took. Many of those photos were taken around the school. There are some pictures of some of my classmates that appear a few times. A little "web version" of the video appears below.