Fly Like An Eagle

I stepped to the edge of the scaffolding ready to fly down to the floor of the water tank and get some more paint. The paint was a heavy, gooey sealant and my paint tray ran out quickly. It smelled so strong that we were working in shifts to come out for fresh air. But I must have been in long enough that I was beginning to hallucinate. It was an exhilarating feeling to think of how I would glide down and land right by the paint can. But as I held onto the scaffolding I somehow realized that I wasn’t safe flying, that I needed to climb down. Then I came to my senses a bit more and decided to climb out of the tank before I lost all sense of reality. I called for help and the ground crew came up top and climbed in to pull out the other two. They had been in longer than me and were pretty far gone. When they got them out on top of the tank I told the rescuers to hold them down and not let go. Otherwise they would try to fly off the tank.

That was the biggest event of the summer at Prescott Pines Camp that year. After the scare was over we would sit around and talk about the desire to fly, and the emotions of power and freedom that it evoked. I wondered why it was that so many people dream of flying, and why flying is such a common sensation when hallucinating. Is the desire to fly symbolic of man’s desire for freedom, or is it a foreshadowing of something real, yet to come.

In the Bible there are a few accounts of people moving in the sense that we call transporting. Enoch and Elijah were caught up to be with the Lord, similar to how Christians will be caught up at the Rapture. Then there is the unique account of Phillip being transported by the Spirit after talking to an Ethiopian eunuch about Jesus (Acts 8:39). And I am sure that when we leave this life and enter the heavenly eternal we will be free from the limitations of time and space, and transporting about will be common. But flying is different.

The Wright brothers pursued the desire of flying. For over a hundred years now man has been able to fly, but artificially. It began with the exhilarating desire to escape the confines of two feet firmly planted on the ground. But flying has become quite utilitarian for most, a means of getting from one city to another in less time. There are a few, though, like my good friend Tex, for whom flying is still a thrill.

I remember reading a book when I was young, Jonathan Livingston Seagull. It was forbidden by our church leaders, which made it all the more exciting to read. It really made me think about the freedom we have in the Spirit, a freedom too seldom realized. Joseph Bayley wrote a similar story, a brilliant parable about a Christian who could fly. He went to a school for flying and was told to quit flying around and showing off. Everyone at the school studied aerodynamics, but no one flew. He finally gave up flying, too, and walked.

When I get to heaven I look forward to flying. Not just transporting. I want to enjoy the view, and be thrilled by the power and dynamic of gliding, swooping, diving, taking off, and landing. I wonder if that is not prophetically alluded to by the prophet Isaiah, an eternal reward for waiting upon the Lord.

“They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” (Isaiah 40:31) The first phrase might also be translated, “Those who hope in the Lord will exchange their strength…” Teach me Lord, to wait and to hope.

I fear that those in an eternity apart from knowing and loving God will not enjoy the freedom of flying, but rather an eternity of being bound by the restraints of time and space, and by the chains of selfish desires never relinquished. Heaven and hell – eternal freedom or eternal bondage.



High Flight by John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds...and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of...wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.