It’s one of the funniest lines—that never gets a laugh.

I refer to the safety demonstration from a flight last week:

• This aircraft is equipped with six emergency exits...
• Your seat cushion may be used as a flotation device...
• Smoking in the lavatories at any time is prohibited...

Then the flight attendant rattles off this disturbing scenario: “In the event of a sudden loss in cabin pressure, oxygen masks will drop down automatically.  Reach up and pull the mask to your face—and breathe normally.”

Think about it.  What could possibly cause a “sudden loss” in cabin pressure?  A bullet through the fuselage?  A blown out window?  A severed tail?

There simply is no scenario that would result in a sudden loss of cabin pressure  that would allow any sane and sober person to “breathe normally.”

But if sanity and safety are to be restored in the middle of a crisis—in the air, on the ground—or in our spiritual lives—breathing normally is exactly what we must do.  Consider:

• There seems to be no end to Coronavirus, despite the efforts of the world’s greatest scientists. But breathe normally:  “The Lord will protect you from all evil; He will keep your soul” (Psalms 121:7).

• The election finds us tense—and getting tenser.  But breathe normally: “Behold the nations are like a drop from a bucket and are regarded as a speck of dust on the scales” (Isaiah 40:15).

• Our history is being rewritten—and none of it for good. But breathe normally: “For God will bring every act to judgment, everything which is hidden, whether it is good or evil” (Ecclesiastes 12:14).

• Our culture has traded truth for narrative and facts that “don’t fit” are discarded.  But breathe normally: “The LORD is my strength and my shield; My heart trusts in Him” (Psalms 28:7).

• In many cities, our streets are in flames.   But breathe normally: “Which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?” (Matt. 6:27).

• Our nation and our world reject and ridicule the very name of Jesus.  But breathe normally: “Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him” (Revelation 1:7).

Feeling a sudden loss of cabin pressure?

Breathe normally.

“The Lord reigns” (Psalms 93:1).

Amen and Amen!