The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - Becoming Jesus on the Plane (An Evangelization Story)

Episode Date: January 10, 2025

Opportunities to evangelize can be found anywhere, even on an airplane. Jeff Cavins describes a time when he took the opportunity to share Jesus with a fellow passenger on an airplane. Jeff explains that we are never “off the clock” as evangelizers and encourages everyone to be on the lookout for opportunities to share the love of Jesus with others. Snippet from the Show You’re either going to go through life only studying and reading about the faith or you’re going to get out there and put this faith into practice. Email us with comments or questions at [e-mail]. Text “jeffcavins” to 33-777 to subscribe and get Jeff’s shownotes delivered straight to your email! Or visit https://media.ascensionpress.com/?s=&page=2&category%5B0%5D=Ascension%20Podcasts&category%5B1%5D=The%20Jeff%20Cavins%20Show for full shownotes!

Welcome to the Jeff Kaven show, where we talk about the Bible, discipleship, and evangelization, putting it all together and living as activated disciples. This is show 412, evangelization stories number two, becoming Jesus on the plane. Welcome, my friend. Welcome back. It's good to talk to you again. And if this is your first time, tuning in. welcome it's good to have you we talk about scripture we talk about discipleship we talk about evangelization how to share christ with other people and to grow in holiness ourselves kind of the complete package very focused and very uplifting so and thank you by the way for the messages you're sending me i appreciate them very much hearing your stories and and how the show has affected your life is encouraging to me as well and most of the things that i'm sharing

sharing on this show. I share because I've been encouraged, you know, I've been encouraged by what the Lord is doing in the world today and the stories I hear from other people. And every once in a while, we're going to take just a break and we're going to do evangelization stories. I did one, what was it, show 404. That was a little while ago. That one was entitled, The Car and the Ice Storm. Today, we're going to talk about becoming Jesus on the plane. And by the way, if you want notes to the show, We'll get them to you. They're free. All you got to do is text my name, Jeff Kaven's.

One word, Jeff Kavins, and you can text it to the number 3-3-7-7. Okay, on the evangelization stories, I'm going to lay a foundation before I get into the story. And the real goal of this is to help you to see or get some understanding of how other people are sharing Christ out there in the wild. Today's on an airplane. Last time was on an icy storm on the way to, uh, male clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and a lady was stopped on the side of the road. That was a fun one. And the Lord surprised me in that one, too. A new car starting ministry, you might say. And so I really want to tell these stories so that you get an idea of maybe you

could do it, you know, and I don't say that maybe, like I doubt, maybe you could do it in that the opportunity might come up in your life. You know, we really take our call from Matthew 28, is 18 through 20, and I'll put it in the show notes for you. Jesus came and said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me, go therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you and lo, I am with you always to the close of the age. That's good news, especially if you're going to share Christ with people. It's nice to know you're not alone. You're not abandoned. You're not out there on the

playing field trying to share Christ with Jesus in the stands with his thumbs up like go get him no he's with you he's empowering you if you've been confirmed in the church you you receive the power of the holy spirit for the purpose of being an authentic witness with boldness and power and not ashamed of the gospel so that's good news so i want to ask this question when you're faced with a situation where you think you can say something to someone or do something or give something or provide a service of some kind, do you do it or don't do it? Do you do it or don't do it? And for me, when I see the opportunity come up, I always ask myself, Lord, what would you do in this situation? And if you would do it, well, I'm your body. Let's do it.

Let's game on, you know. And from that point on, I have to trust the Lord. You're either going to trust the Lord or not, you know, you're either going to go through your life just reading and studying and believing and talking to a few people, or you're going to get out there on the field and you're going to put this faith into practice. That is what I'm hoping you will do. That's the great adventure. That's what makes the difference in our lives. It really does. I think back to Matthew 14, then he made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray. And when evening came he was there alone but the boat by this time was many furlongs distant from the land beaten by

the waves for the wind was against them and in the fourth watch that's from three in the morning to six in the morning in the fourth watch of the night he came to them walking on the sea but when the disciples saw him walking on the sea they were terrified saying it's a ghost and they cried out for fear but immediately he spoke to them saying take heart it is i have no fear now here's the deal peter answered him lord if it is you bid me come to you on the water he said come so peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to jesus but when he saw the wind he was afraid and beginning to sink he cried out lord save me and jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him saying to him oh man of little faith why Did You Doubt? Now, we don't want to leave off with. Why did you doubt? Let's back up a little bit. He got out of the boat. He was the only one. He got out of the boat. And that's what I'm trying to get across here is either you do it or you don't. You can sit in the boat and tell people all about what you believe or you can get out of the boat and demonstrate the love of God, the compassion, mercy, and kindness of God as you reach out. So you want to give them what you have. That's what you're doing. You're passing this on to

others and my favorite story for that is Acts chapter three where Peter runs into a guy who's begging at the beautiful gate in the old temple area of Jesus time and he's begging and so Peter who apparently doesn't have a lot of money and doesn't have a lot of Bitcoin or any Venmo on him he says I have no silver and gold to this guy but and here's the key but I give you what I have. The guy might have looked at him, you know, he got sandals, he got some clothing and carrying around a couple of books or something, you know, and he's got his iPhone with him. He says, I'll give you what I have in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.

Oh, this is what he has. See, in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, he has that. Walk! And he took him by the right hand and raised him up, and immediately his feet and ankles were made strong. In leaping up, he stood and walked and entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God. That's the example. That's the example right there. You just do it. If you have a peace in your heart, God wants you to extend mercy and kindness and healing and new life to people, then do it. So what if I fail? Well, what did you do when you failed in other areas of life you got up and you went on didn't you you know i don't think there really is any failing there you know i've i've shared christ with a lot of people who didn't respond in any way really i don't look at

that as a failure you know one man this is what paul said one man plants and other waters but god causes the increase i might be a planter today i might be a waterer today but god causes the increase so i don't have to have the increase every time i open my mouth or extend my hands so remember what Luke 137 says it'll be in the notes for with God nothing will be impossible now I looked up that word nothing and I actually have several books I can look up words and online for with God nothing will be impossible guess what that word means it means nothing for with God nothing will be impossible when I come back we're going to talk about this becoming Jesus on the airplane and an incident that took place a few years ago and I was sort of thrown into it and I had to make a decision, get out of the boat or stay in my seat and say nothing. You're listening to the Jeff Kaven show. I'm Father Mark Mary Ames with the Franciscan friars at the renewal. My brothers and sisters at the service of becoming saints and falling in love with Jesus and Mary in the Most Holy Rosary. The team here

at Ascension Press have put together the Rosary in a year podcast. Each day, we're going to have a 10 to 15 minute episode where we're just going to work through the basics of the rosary. Who is How do we encounter Jesus? Who is our lady? What does it mean for us to be in relationship to her? We're going to go through the Hail Mary, the Our Father, each of the different mysteries. And then we're going to bring in some saint writings on the mysteries

and some sacred art that speaks on the mysteries and all of this to help enrich our prayer, to renew our prayer, to help us fall in love with Jesus and Mary and to fall in love with the rosary again. If you want to join us on this journey, you can begin by going to ascensionpress.com forward slash rosary in a year to download the prayer plan and by listening and praying with us through the rosary in a year podcast. All right. Look forward to the journey with you. Welcome back.

We're talking today about evangelization stories. This is number two, right? Number two, becoming Jesus on the airplane. Okay, so when I share the story with you, realize that this is not a setup story. It's not something that I was anticipating. It's something that came to me on a plane ride back to Minnesota. from Indianapolis and I wasn't looking for it. It just suddenly appeared and I was actually tired. I had, well, so what I do? Yeah, I did a conference that day in Indianapolis.

I think it was South Bend, if I'm not mistaken. And that's a whole day of seminar. It's the whole Bible. I go through the whole Bible from like eight in the morning to four in the afternoon. And so I got to the airport and man, I was tired. And I fly a lot so I get upgraded and I was sitting in first class in the very first row. and next to the window. So the seat next to me on the aisle was open.

So I picked up a Mac users magazine that I had picked up at the newsstand. And I was just, you know, kind of calmly reading that and looking at new software and hardware that's coming out in the Apple world just for the fun of it. And then the flight attendant gets on the loudspeaker and says, we're going to wait about 15 minutes. We've got one more passenger. And you could hear the, you could hear the people. oh, I wrote my connection Alaska. I tried this before.

I'm going to, well, you know, it was really something, you know. I didn't enter into that at the moment, but people were obviously, I could hear one guy behind me. They never did this for me. Well, okay, well, we're doing it for someone. We don't know who it is. So about 15 minutes later,

in comes about a 19, 20-year-old young lady who's huffing and puff and she's been running to the gate. And as she makes, their entrance onto the airplane the whole place starts clapping it's like it's like uh in kindergarten when you spill your your lunch everyone claps you know it's like real mature everyone's clapping and uh you could you could hear some people saying it's about time you know so anyway she she uh comes in yes where she sits she sits right next to the disciple of jesus that's right she sat next to the disciple of jesus that's right she sat next to the disciple and that's me that's you be good to start thinking of ourselves a little bit

differently don't you think she didn't just sit down next to anyone she sat down next to the disciple of jesus who isn't on a time out right now because that's 24-7 so she sits down i kind of looked over at her and she takes a deep breath and i resumed reading my my magazine and we hadn't taken off yet we're kind of taxing and I hear next to me this and I looked over and she's starting to cry and I thought, huh, I wonder what's going on. You know, I mean, as a as a in-tune, lively dynamic Catholic here, I want to make sure I, you know, get an idea of what's going on there. Maybe I can help out in some way. And so she starts crying kind of low-key and I looked over at her and I thought, I thought, well, you know, what do most of us do it? Let's be honest about it. And there's nothing

wrong with it, by the way. I'm thinking to myself, well, I'm just going to offer up a Hail Mary for, you know, kind of under my breath, real quiet. And that's what I thought I'm going to do that. And I think that's a good thing to do. And you should do that. But if that's all we're going to do, I think the gospel would have been kind of clear about that's it. You know, just when you see a problem, do a Hail Mary or Our Father, Glory B. know, or anything. So she's sniffling there and I said my little prayer and I'm reading it. And then all the sudden, as we're taking off, she starts crying. I mean, crying. And people are looking over at her. And I looked over at her. And I'm thinking, oh my gosh, but what do I do? What do

now? Get this. I've been walking with the Lord for nearly 40 years at this point. And I'm asking myself, I wonder what I should do. Isn't that something? Can you imagine Peter after 40 years, which he didn't do 40 years walking with Jesus, but after 10 years of walking with Jesus, can you imagine him running into a situation saying, oh, what do we do? What do we do? You know, well, he probably knew what to do because he spent so much time with Jesus. And so I'm asking myself, well, what do I, what do I do? And so I looked over at her and she had her hands, both hands over her face crying. And I mean, she was almost wailing at this point.

And so I said to her, excuse me, excuse me, I'd like to help you. And she didn't do anything. And I thought, okay, I tried. You know, go back to my magazine. I did my thing. You know, I tried. Apparently the Lord doesn't want me to talk to her today. You know, maybe it's something she needs just to deal with herself.

So she continues, I couldn't sit there anymore. I couldn't sit there and just listen to this. I had to do something. I had to do something. And so I said again, I want to help you. What's going on? I would love to help you. I really would.

And it was at that point that she told me that she had just got a call an hour or two before the flight from Washington State, Seattle. Her brother, her only sibling, had just died in a car accident, and she was on her way out there. Probably to identify him because her parents, she said, were on a cruise in Alaska at the time. And she was broken, and I thought, oh my gosh, this plane does not know what they were clapping for. It's a broken young girl 19, 20 years old, weeping because she just heard that her. brother died. And I thought to myself, well, what do I do now? What, what can I do? Is there a certain prayer? Is there some kind of backward Latin prayer in scripture reading on top of something? And I'm just kind of joking with you. But you know what I mean? We're looking for a formula here. There's got to be

something I can do to straighten this whole thing out. And she'll look at me and say, ah, okay, okay, I get it now. Thank you for being here. But you know what? When you're in a situation like that, and you're faced with someone who is completely shattered and broken, all they need at that point. They don't need a lecture. They don't need a bunch of Bible verses. They don't need catechism verses. They don't need something in Hebrew. They need Jesus to do what?

To be with her. That's it. To just be with her. And so I thought, what do I do? And I felt like the Lord was in my inside of me. and my rib cage was like a prison and he was grabbing us in grabbing my rib cage from the inside saying let me out let me out to love her and i thought well lord if i'm the body i'm the body of christ let's do it so i leaned over again and i and i said what's your name she said sarah and i said sarah i said are you a christian and she was sobbing still crying she said i'm catholic

and I said, so am I. I said, Sarah, now I have a chance here. I have a choice. I have an opportunity. This is where you go forward, stay where you're at or go backwards. I want to go forward. I know you do too. And so I said, Sarah, look at me.

Look at me. And she didn't. Her hands were still over her face. I said, look at me. Sarah. And then I touched her by the arm and moved it about an inch. I said, Sarah, look at me. and she brought her hands down for the first time, sobbing, a mess.

And she looked at me. I said, listen, Sarah. I said, I'm so sorry. But I want you to know that on this flight, you're not alone. I'm your brother in Christ. I am your brother in Christ. I too am a Christian. And I will be with you on this flight.

I will be with you. And she brought her other hand back up to her. I held her hand, her left hand with my right hand, and I held it. And she put still crying with her right hand over her face. And I just looked forward and I began to pray very quietly, just began to whisper. Come for her. Jesus. And after about 30 seconds, 45 seconds or so, I started crying.

I started crying. I didn't even know who she was, but she was my sister. and I was there and all I could do was bring her Jesus. He started to just cry. And you know what it was? I was carrying her cross. I was entering into her suffering. I was carrying it with her.

And I held her hand for almost 40 minutes or so, something like that, and just praying for her. It was a powerful transformative event in my life. When we finally landed in Minneapolis, I had a chance to talk to her for about, 10 minutes before we landed and I talked to her about a book that I wrote on suffering when you suffer and I was going to send it to her and send one to her parents and I got her information and I was able to send that to her. When we landed and we got up to the gate, the door opened and she ran out

to get her next flight and I was numb. I walked out and I stood outside there and I thought, wow, this is amazing. Wow. And all of a sudden somebody takes. pat me on my back on the shoulder and I turned around and it was an old friend of mine who was on my show Life on the Rock for I don't know two or three times and the evangelist Jesse Romero he was on the back of that airplane he'd I didn't know that he goes hey brother how are you and I said Jesse you won't believe what just happened and I told him and as I was telling him all of a sudden someone came running up to my side and it was that girl Sarah and she gave me the biggest talk she ran back. Gave me the biggest hug and she looked at me and she said, she said, thank you,

brother. And she left. And I stood there and God changed me. God impacted my heart. I did nothing heroic. I did nothing complicated. I did nothing that would cause me to stand up and say, look at this. All I did was to be Jesus for her. That's what she needed. No, no explanations, no, you know, reading and reciting this or that. She just needed to know she wasn't alone and that Jesus was with her. And so, you know, a lot of us are on airplanes and we have opportunities like this. And I just encourage you to ask the Lord, ask the Lord to prompt your heart when opportunities come up and get out of the boat. Are you scared?

Sure. That's why Jesus said more than anything else. Be not afraid. Don't be afraid. Why would I be afraid to walk around with Jesus who carries lambs on his shoulder? Why would I be afraid of that? Oh, because he's going to send you out. And that's what happened to me that day where I became Jesus on the plane.

I'd love to hear your stories. Go ahead, send me the Jeff Kaven Show at ascensionpress.com. Love to hear your story. The Jeff Kaven Show at ascensionpress.com. Let's pray. in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Lord Jesus, thank you so much for the life you've given us in the power of confirmation, the new life in baptism, and the mission you've called us to, O Lord. Give us strength, give us courage, oh God. Oh, thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord, for the move of the spirit in our lives. May we this week be open to being used, and may our eyes be wide open for opportunities in our lives. Jesus name amen. Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. I love you my friend. I love you. Can't wait till next week.