Flying Lawn Chair

“Great peace have those who love Your law, and nothing causes them to stumble.” [Psalm 119:165]

In July of 2007, Kent Couch settled down in his lawn chair with some snacks, a BB gun, and a parachute. Attached to his chair were 105 extra-large helium balloons. With a satellite phone, an altimeter, and a handheld GPS in his pocket, Couch headed up into the Oregon sky.

Nearly nine hours later, the 47-year-old gas station owner came back to earth in a farmer’s field near Union, Oregon, about 200 miles from home. Couch said, “Every kid holding a helium balloon thinks about it. I don’t know about girls, but I think most guys look up in the sky and wish they could ride on a cloud. When you’re lying in the grass on a summer day, and you see the clouds, you wish you could jump on them. This is as close as you can come to jumping on them.”

This was actually Couch’s second flight. In September 2007 he got off the ground for six hours. When he used a BB gun to pop the balloons, he began to descend too quickly and had to parachute to safety. Couch’s wife, Susan, called him crazy but added: “It’s never been a dull moment since I married him.”

This time Kent was better prepared to control his decent. Attached to the chair he had several plastic bags holding five gallons of water each to act as ballast. After lifting off from Bend, Oregon, at 6:06 a.m., he drifted east at about 25 mph. Couch said he could hear cattle and children below, and he said he even passed through some clouds. “It was beautiful – beautiful,” he told reporters. Around 3:00 p.m. he popped enough balloons to set the craft down in Union, which caused quite a stir. Kent remarked about his flight, “The best thing is the peace, the serenity.”

It seems people everywhere are looking for peace and serenity, but do you need helium balloons to find it? The Bible says that those who love God’s law will have great peace. And Jesus promises His followers, “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:27). If we are obedient to Jesus and trust in Him, we will receive the peace of God in our hearts.