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One of the most unusual evangelistic meetings that I've ever conducted took place in the Moscow airport. We were on our way to Siberia for evangelistic meetings when the airlines told us that our flight was delayed for three hours. Then we were told it was delayed for another three hours. We kept being told the same thing for three days and nights.
We camped out at the airport and slept on top of our luggage. We were dirty, tired, and almost exhausted. After two days my interpreter, Vladimir Daniella said, "Sammy what's in Siberia that's not here?" I responded a little bewildered to his question, "What are you talking about Vladimir?"
"Were going to Siberia to preach to people who need Jesus," he said. "There are people in this airport who need Jesus. We can't get to Siberia right now. Let's hold our crusade right here."
"Here? Now?" I said.
"Sure why not?" He responded. Come with me. Well I followed along sheepishly. When we arrived at a large group of people Vladimir said, "Ok Sammy, you preach."
I began preaching. I saw tears running down people's faces. Vladimir then said, "Sammy you must ask people to come to Christ." I challenged the people listening to come to where I was standing and pray with me. Many got up off their seats and came to where I was standing and asked Christ into their hearts.
After we'd finished our mission we were finally able to leave on our flight to Siberia. However, when we landed, there had been a snowstorm and all of the roads were closed, and we had no way of getting into the city. That was no problem for Vladimir. He witnessed to everyone in the airport. He finally came to me and said, "Sammy, I have good news. The operations director for the airport has called a helicopter to come and get us."
It wasn't long before the helicopter arrived. We rushed into the helicopter and were followed by twenty other people. Vladimir immediately went into the cockpit to share Christ with the pilots. He came back and sat beside me after a few moments and quietly said, "Sammy, when the helicopter lands the pilots will leave the door closed for ten minutes and you can preach to everyone."
We held an evangelistic meeting right there in the helicopter. Vladimir was a new Christian. I learned a great lesson from him - a lesson about simplicity of faith. The apostle Paul once wrote, "but I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpents cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ." Vladimir has a simple and pure devotion to Christ. What about you? Have you lost that simplicity and purity in your devotion to Christ?
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