The Layover Life

I’ve spent a decent amount of time in airports.

In the years of traveling back and forth from Kenya to the United States for school and carrying on a cross-continental romantic relationship, I’ve had the privilege of experiencing the phenomenon of the layover. Some airports aren’t made for them; you just want to get through as fast as possible. Others, like the big hubs in the Middle East and Asia, are built for the layover experience: playgrounds for kids, sleep and shower pods, endless food courts and shopping, and even tropical gardens to wander through. They’re designed to make the process of waiting enjoyable, even forgettable.

Somewhere in those many hours of waiting for the next flight, I saw a picture of the Christian life.

The Problem With Layovers

The tension that defines the layover experience is that you’ve left one place behind but haven’t yet arrived where you’re going. And the longer the layover, the more you need to adapt: finding an affordable hot meal (or two), a quiet corner to catch a nap, and maybe even a place to shower and freshen up. You learn the rhythms of waiting and even come to anticipate the “layover routine.”

Still, layovers carry an inherent discomfort.

The seats aren’t built for deep rest. The crowds at the airport change constantly; the background noise never stops. Sometimes the announcements come in a language you don’t understand, and you feel the disorientation of being in a place that isn’t home.

And then there are delays. The screen flashes “Delayed” or worse, “Canceled.” The frustration builds as you wonder when the flight will finally leave.

That’s the thing about layovers. You can enjoy them, even find moments of beauty, but they aren’t made for permanence. You can’t fully unpack. You can’t plant roots in the terminal. At some point you just want to move on.

The tension that defines the layover experience is that you’ve left one place behind but haven’t yet arrived where you’re going.

I think about Mehran Karimi Nasseri, the man who remained in Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport for 18 years.[*] Eighteen years in the in-between—a life spent in a terminal not built for living. It’s a tragic reminder that we were never meant to stay in the layover forever.

Learning to Live in the In-between

You don’t have to fly to know the core of the layover experience. Life itself often feels like a series of layovers, a string of “what’s next?” and “almost but not quite.” Never quite at home, never quite settled, never quite arriving.

As a therapist, I often reflect on how people navigate life’s uncertainties. Modern approaches such as acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) and dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), both rooted in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), shift the focus in a significant way. Rather than trying to eliminate every uncomfortable thought or feeling, they invite us to first accept that life will bring uncertainty, pain, and change, and to respond by choosing, day after day, to live by the values that matter most, no matter what comes our way.

For Christians those values are anchored in a much bigger story. We know where the flight is headed. We know how the story ends. And so we learn to live in the in-between with both honesty and hope.

Sojourners and Ambassadors

Scripture has always described God’s people as sojourners—travelers who understood the transience of the layover experience (Heb. 11). Noah and his family knew the feeling on the ark. The Israelites knew it in the wilderness, carrying tents from place to place. Even in Jesus’ day, under the shadow of Rome, the people longed for a kingdom that would finally last.

But we’re not just sojourners. We’re ambassadors (2 Cor. 5:20). Ambassadors live away from home, but they carry its message, its character, its values, its direction. As ambassadors for the kingdom of heaven, we point others to true north. We represent where we’re headed, even as we wait.

That’s what the boarding pass in your pocket is for (1 Peter 1:3-6). It’s not just a reminder that you’re leaving; it’s proof of where you’re going and an invitation to help others find the Way there, too (John 14:6).

[*] A. Donkin, “‘The Terminal Man’ Lived in a Paris Airport for 18 Years. I’ll Never Forget the Weeks I spent With HI,”. The Guardian, Nov. 23, 2022,. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/23/terminal-man-lived-in-paris-airport-18-years-ill-never-forget-weeks-with-him.