John Stanko

I am in Johannesburg speaking at the Women You Can Do It! Businesswomen Leaders Conference.  I am sitting in a session fighting jetlag, so I thought I would write this update to help me stay awake.  I had a great trip over here and had several faith reminders along the way.  Let me explain what I mean.

Years ago I met a man named Julio and we became close friends.  Julio lived in Colombia, South America and had great faith.  He would go to an airport, believing God wanted him to go somewhere.  The problem was that Julio had no ticket or money!  Yet he always got to where he wanted to go.  He infected me with that faith.  One particular experience really taught me a valuable faith lesson.

On one occasion, Julio asked me if I would bring down some supplies when I came to see him.  I agreed, and he told me I could pick up the boxes when I got to Miami.  In Miami, I found out the supplies were in 17 boxes!  I called Julio and said that there was no way I could do this.  I reminded him that the airline policy only allowed two pieces of luggage per person.

Julio told me to take all the boxes to the airport and tell them the supplies were the work of the Lord.  If the person said it could not be done, then I was to ask for the next person in rank above him.  I didn't sleep the night before, convinced that I was going to be stuck at the airport with 17 boxes plus my luggage.

When I got to the airport, I unloaded all the boxes and proceeded to go through six airline employees who said it couldn't be done.  Finally, the "big boss" came out, looked at the boxes, heard my story and said, "Okay, we'll take them all, free of charge."  I was astounded.

So the other day, I was packing to come to Africa and knew I had too much weight.  I had clothes for orphans, books for leaders and files for my work, along with all my personal belongings.  Then I remembered that trip through Miami with those 17 boxes.  I decided to trust the Lord and pack everything, thinking that it wasn't the end of the world if I had to pay excess weight fees. 

I got to the airport with my traveling companion and four bags weighing 275 pounds.  Airline regulations allowed 200 pounds.  Both agents who helped us allowed our bags to go through and didn't charge us any money.   Now I am working on how I can get all that luggage into Zimbabwe at no cost.  If God did it once, He can do it again.

Do you have any past faith lessons that you need to recall today?   Are you not trying to do something, convinced that it won't work?   I want to live in my luggage faith not just when I travel, but every day.  That will enable me to do things I didn't think possible, which is to be practical application of faith in our lives.