Hey everybody! I was gone over the weekend because a guy from our fellowship, SMSgt Brian Bischoff, who is part of our nation’s Air Force Reserves, took me to Seymour Johnson Air Force base in North Carolina where they hosted a “clergy day”. Clergy is me, I guess. What they did was, load a bunch of pastors into a KC-135 Stratotanker, and took us up on a mid-air refueling mission.
It was amazingly cool. Not so sure how cool it was for the Reservists who basically had to put up with what amounted to a tube of relgious pomposity hurtling through space….but for ME it was fun.
I got a chance to meet a guy named Erik Estep, who is a pastor with Village Church in South Carolina, which happens to be a Southern Baptist plant. We hit it off pretty well…at least from my side of things. He probably hasn’t quit grimacing about the Calvary Chapel jerk he had to put up with on the flight.
Anyway…here’s a video of my flight!
WONDERWHAT 
Hey Rob! Glad you got to see my new home (Raleigh area). Haven’t gotten to look at the video yet, but it looks like a good time.
Miss ya lots, bud.
Looks like Somebody had a blast. You deserve that kind of fun man.
its clear you did not give up fun for this lent season Rob. I am thinking about considering that my quest for next year depending on this years personal pledge success; although blogging may count as the already referenced failure.
Surprised to see you made it through security on the way out 😉 no worries. its hard not to step out of bounds on a US military craft of any sort as there are lots of regulations and no one knows them all. For anyone reading this blog, my advice if ever lucky enough to be granted a similar experience is – always to ask lots of permissions as folks never get tired of being asked and granting them If you can do this or that while a guest on a military craft. The crew seemed quite gracious as their officers and planners are continuously thinking up ingenious drills and training like ‘a planeload full of pastors’. Who would have thought of that. Congratulations and thanks to all involved in the exercise and my and all our gratitude to those in the uniform service of our country. Your sharing of yourselves leads to all our common richer life experience. God Bless America!
I bet I know how you got in trouble. It’s when you steped out of the airplane to get that exterior shot of the two jets together. Am I right?
Pretty cool experience! Were you scared, or just really excited? Peace.
Excellent video!
So… When are they doing the laity day?
How cool was that!!!!
If I could do THAT, just for one day I wish I were a clergy 😉
Would you have agreed to go if a definite jump was on the OPs Plan?