Travel Plans

Jesus reviews his travel plans with the disciples.

Last year, Timothy Merrill, senior editor of Homiletics, was in Shanghai, China, on a red-eye flight en route to Delhi, India. Boarding began about 20 minutes late, but by 9 p.m. he was in his window seat -- in coach, of course.

But the Boeing 777 did not leave the gate in Shanghai until 3 a.m. -- six hours later! Then, there was still a seven-hour flight ahead of him!

This, he said later, was the definition of "grueling." In the United States, keeping passengers in a plane more than three hours on a domestic flight (four hours on an international flight) is illegal. But in other parts of the world, well, it's different.

Perhaps this doesn't come close to matching your own horror story. Maybe you've been stuck between two 300-pound linebackers who chugged Jack Daniel's mini-bottles, lined them up on their tray tables and then played with them as though they were toy action figures. Perhaps your story involves someone who hurled their breakfast on you. Perhaps it's the time when you sat...