These are the words that every trainee wants to hear at the end of their training. It denotes the successful completion of their training and they are now officially part of the Cathay Pacific flight crew team. After starting training nearly six months ago, I desperately wanted to hear these words from a check captain and it would take the culmination of all that training to get me to the level of “checked to line” status.

After LFUS, or line flying under supervision, known as IOE in the U.S. (Initial Operating Experience) a progress check is given. If that is satisfactorily completed, it counts as the annual line check, and the new trainee is released to the line (the line being normal, everyday flying). If it doesn’t proceed well, a bit more training is given and a second progress/line check is given.

Unfortunately for me, my first progress check didn’t go the way I wanted it to. I messed up a few things that had to do with the function of the autopilot while in its approach mode. What was most disappointing is that I hadn’t flown as well as I had in the past, and when I needed to do well, I didn’t. Bummer! I was also scheduled to come home for Christmas upon passing my check. When I didn’t pass my check, I had to stay in Hong Kong over Christmas and leave Laura with her own family for the holidays.

I felt pretty bad for her because I had already graced her without my presence for Thanksgiving, and I was looking forward to being home for Christmas. So there I was, having not passed my first check, wasn’t going to be home for the holidays, not knowing what the future held for me, and the stress was mounting every day that passed. But wouldn’t you know that God was still sitting on his throne?

I clung everyday to the lyrics of a song by my mom’s choir that I had on CD, called The Anchor Holds. “I have fallen on my knees, as I face the raging seas, the Anchor holds.” Good words for me to remember and I had to ask myself, does my anchor really hold? Well, does it? It sure is easy to trust God in the good times, but what fun is that? How can God reveal himself to be sufficient for our lives in the good times? What reason is there to lean on God during life’s easiest moments and most carefree days?

Maybe I’ve lived a pretty charmed life, but the training in Hong Kong has truly been the most difficult thing I’ve ever tried to tackle, at least on the tumultuous scale of stress levels. After six months of hard work, half way around the world from home, without family, would I fall off the cliff and be sent home looking for another way to earn a living? Did I just waste half a year of my life? Would God bring me to Hong Kong, take me to the edge of the cliff, and pull me back from it, or shove me over the side? He could have done either, as his plans for our lives are best, whether or not we think so at the time.

I got hard at work in the simulator ironing out the problems that I had struggled with on my check. It was good that I didn’t pass my check with the deficiencies that I had with the autopilot because I wouldn’t have wanted to been out flying with these issues still lingering. It all clicked and finally made sense to me. My second check went splendidly, and with no problems, was ‘welcomed to the fleet.’ I was so excited I couldn’t stop smiling. The stress and turmoil evaporated off my shoulders and I was able to relax for the first time in six months.

During all this, I heard a sermon about how thorns in our lives can be used to humble us. After all this mess, I certainly had to check my ego at the cockpit door and to truly rely on God to get me through it all. I’ve learned a few good lessons from all this pain in Hong Kong, and one is that failure can teach us a lot about ourselves, and also show how much or how little faith we actually have in both ourselves and God.

When we get to a point where the stress is so high it becomes unbearable, we have to give up on self reliance and let God lead us forward. Honestly, this stress was nothing compared to an actual loss of a job, or being diagnosed with a terminal disease, or losing everything we hold dear in this life. There will always be someone who has it worse than me. However, it was still a good learning experience for me, and I will be a better person because of the lessons learned from failure.

God always proves himself faithful to those who love him. Even if my training deteriorated and I ended up getting let go by Cathay, I would still have to praise him because that would only mean he has something else in store for Laura and me. I would have to say what Job said, “Though he slay me, yet I will trust in him.” Would I want to deal with that type of stress? No way! But, being led through those dark valleys only makes us better, more humble servants.

As it is, I am now sitting in a first class seat, (copilots usually only get business class seats, but God was good to me today) at 39,000 feet in a 777-300ER, headed back to JFK, dining on a piece of steak and sipping a 2001 Red Chateau Lynch Bages wine that is wonderful (however, it isn’t as good as the wine that was served at this wedding). I’m headed home for a few days, to be with Laura, as a fully qualified 747-400 first officer, and right now, as I have Mozart playing in my noise canceling headphones, with my seat reclined and typing away, life is good.

I know that it won’t last forever, and that there is another trial just around the corner, waiting to stretch me farther, make me trust deeper, and die to myself even more, but for now, I am enjoying the moment of victory and success! Sipping wine here in my seat with the leg room and Mozart only reminds me of how good God truly is.

From Psalms 46, what I read the other morning before my check flight:

God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging. There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells. God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day. Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall; he lifts his voice, the earth melts. The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress. Come and see the works of the LORD, the desolations he has brought on the earth. He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth; he breaks the bow and shatters the spear, he burns the shields with fire. “Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth. “The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.