What If The Detour Is The Answer

A locked gate and a missed flight don’t feel like grace in the moment, but one true story from 1979 shows how a delay can become protection. We tell the account of Dennis Wheatley racing through the Chicago airport to catch DC-10 Flight 191, only to be turned away at the last second. He argues, he fumes, he storms off, and then the news hits: the plane crashes on takeoff and no one survives. That single “no” reframes everything he thought was going wrong.
Today we talk about the unseen “behind the scenes” realities we can’t access, and why frustration often comes from trying to control outcomes we were never meant to control. What do you do when traffic stops you, when a meeting runs late, or when prayers feel unanswered? We connect that daily stress to Paul’s hard-won contentment in Philippians 4 and offer a faith-based way to reframe delays as potential mercy rather than punishment. 

If you need Christian encouragement, a short daily devotional, and a calmer start to your day, press play and walk with us. Subscribe, share this with a friend who’s stressed, and leave a review. What’s a delay in your life that might be doing more good than you can see?

Transcript

A Missed Flight In 1979

Frustration Meets A Bigger Picture

Practical Ways To Trust Delays

Closing Encouragement And Invitation

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Good morning and welcome to Starting Right with Danny Mack. I'm going to be here every Monday to Friday to help you get a great five-minute start to your day. So grab your cup of coffee, sit back, relax, and let me help you start your day right. Back in 1979, there was a fellow by the name of Dennis Wheatley. He was on his way to catch a flight out of Chicago to Los Angeles. He had to board DC 10 Flight 191 and get back to deliver a speech later that day. But he didn't get there on time. Through a variety of circumstances he was late. And so he ran through the airport, trying to get to the gate, but as he turned the corner towards where the gate was, he saw it in the distance, them closing and locking it off. He ran up, begged the flight attendant to let him get onto the plane. They refused. He begged and he got angry, they refused. He tried to coerce them some more, they refused. And finally he got so mad he stomped away, going to find someone he could complain to. Twenty minutes later, news came through that the plane that he was to be on had crashed on takeoff, killing everyone on board. Instantly his anger and his disappointment turned to shock. And then later it turned to gratitude. He said he left the airport and checked into a room at the nearby hotel. He knelt beside his bed and he prayed, and then he tried to get some sleep. And then he did something a little bit unusual. Instead of returning the unused ticket for a refund, he decided to keep it and put it on his office notice board at home. It was his silent reminder because every so often he knew he would get annoyed at something. And at that point in time his wife Susan often comes by, takes him by the hand, pulls him over to the notice board again to look at his flight 191 ticket. Sometimes things just don't go the way we hope for. But that's often because we don't know what else is going on. We can't see what is coming ahead. We don't know what's going on behind the scenes, and we wind up getting frustrated when it doesn't go our way. We serve a God that knows our future. So there are times when we go to him and we ask for things, and he doesn't give them to us simply because he knows what's coming ahead, what we're going to have to face, what we're going to have to go through. Deuteronomy 31 and 8 says this The Lord is the one who goes ahead of you. He will not fail you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed. We get so worked up sometimes that we cannot see and understand that maybe, just maybe, there's a bigger picture here. And maybe, just maybe, God is doing something to protect us in the middle of the situation that we are in. The promise of God is that He is with us, He will not fail us. In fact, He will go ahead of us. I find it so comforting to know that God goes ahead of me. At the times when I forget it, I get very uptight. But when I remember it, I can relax, and I know that God is there with me every step of the way. Paul had accomplished this when he spoke about it in Philippians chapter four and verse twelve. He said, I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation. The truth is he could do that because he'd learned to trust God in any and every situation. So the next time you get frustrated because there's an accident on the freeway and it slowed down the traffic and you can't get to where you want to ahead of time. Maybe you should thank God that those delays that you had in leaving home occurred. Because if they hadn't, maybe you would have been in the middle of that accident. Maybe the next time you get frustrated because the answers aren't coming to your prayers as quickly as you want them to. You should thank God that they're not coming, because maybe there's something going on that you wouldn't be happy with at all if you got the answer in the time and in the way that you wanted it. Now more than ever with the situations around us, we need to put our faith in a God who knows the answer, who knows the end result, and he has that end result in his control right now. We can trust him that he is working out the best for us and know that he loves us so very, very much. Have a great day, my friends. Thank you for listening today, and I invite you to join me Monday to Friday right here on Starting Right with Danny Mack.