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Days 7 and 8 – What Do They Serve For Lunch In Corinth?

Posted in Christian Missions, Traveling Thoughts, tagged , , , , on November 8, 2011| 6 Comments »

Mark and Sherrylee with Alex and Eleni Merrilytos overlooking Corinth.

We did not see the Parthenon! We did not see the Acropolis or the Agora! We did better than that!

We met the church in Athens, in fact, churches: a Greek-speaking church, a Bulgarian-speaking church, and an English-speaking church. In addition, we broke bread with Russian Christians, American Christians, a wonderful group of women from the Philippines who work in Greece, one brother from Nigeria, and one from Ghana.

The Omonia church of Christ in Athens is a church with open front doors! And the world is coming in! Alex and Eleni Melirrytos are the Greek couple who minister to all these groups.. There are other leaders who work very hard in all of the larger ethnic groups, but they are the responsible servants of God!

The congregation has existed for many years and has gone through lots of different phases. The current phase is challenging! The neighborhood has deteriorated badly. Other evangelists have led this church in years past, but have gone. The current economic situation in Greece has resulted in many of the foreign members of this church returning to their own countries or to other countries to find work.  And, of course, the inevitable personal situations have accumulated here as they do almost everywhere, always being heavy baggage to carry for those who live with the consequences.

Sherrylee and I fell in love with this church! It’s authentic! The people are devoted to God and to one another–and they are talking about forgetting what is behind and pressing forward. Paul would be proud of them.

The Greeks are dramatic! They can talk loudly—almost shouting—and their body language is BIG, and they can be all talking at the same time!  And ney means “Yes,” but sounds like “No”! We laughed so hard because we could never tell if they were mad or just loving on each other!  Alex and Eleni were the worst—and the BEST!

They took us to see Ancient Corinth on Monday—a little over an hour away from Athens by car, but probably three to four days walk for Paul and his entourage. That hour driving gave us time to talk about all the possibilities for LST in Athens, especially what the challenges might be.

What a beautiful setting on the sea. No wonder Paul stayed in Corinth so long!  Of course, there are only small areas excavated, still you can believe you are walking on the same street Paul did when he went to buy groceries. The Bema, or Place of Judgment, mentioned in Acts 18 has been identified and is being restored, so we could see where Paul stood before Gallio, the proconsul of Achaia.

Alex sneaked me down a back path to the ruins of the theater which are really closed off to the public, but we wanted to see the place discovered in 1929  where Erastus’ name and title are inscribed. This is almost certainly the Erastus mentioned in Romans 16 who was the director of public works.

What do you think they serve in ancient Corinth for lunch? Gyros, of course! What were you expecting???

After a pretty late lunch, we went to Cenchreae, where there is precious little left of Phoebe’s hometown, mostly just ruins of a church being swallowed by the sea.  But almost next door is a beautiful camp hotel where Christians in Greece gather once or twice a year for Bible study, retreats, and warm (probably dramatic!) fellowship. We are definitely going to try to get an invitation to be on their program!

Almost 2000 years ago, right here in Athens, Paul said,

From one man he created all the nations throughout the whole earth. He decided beforehand when they should rise and fall, and he determined their boundaries. His purpose was for the nations to seek after God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him—though he is not far from any one of us. (Acts 17:26-27)

I’m thankful for every Christian in Greece and am praying for every person from every land that God has brought to Greece so they could seek Him and perhaps find Him!

Maybe you will be one of those people someday, coming with LST to Greece to talk to people about the unknown God and His Son Jesus!

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Day 2 – Proximity to God!

Posted in Traveling Thoughts, tagged , , on November 1, 2011| 3 Comments »

Today we stood on Mount Carmel in Israel, the home of King David’s wife Abigail and the place where Elijah did battle with the prophets of Baal (1Kings 18). It’s a great story of face-to-face altar combat, with Elijah talking smack to the false prophets and then destroying them—literally.

What did surprise me though was what could be seen from the top of Carmel. Looking southwest you can see Caesarea, which is located on the Mediterranean coast of Israel. Turning just a bit to your left you can see the mountains of ancient Samaria. Continuing in the same direction, Mount Gilboa rises above the valley, yes, the place where King Saul fought his last battle, then fell on his sword (1 Samuel 28-31). Without even moving your feet, but just by shifting your eyes to the left you see “the hill of Moreh” where Gideon did battle with the Midianites (Judges 7) and then Mount Tabor, where the judge Deborah sent Barak into battle (Judges 4).

One more slight turn in the same direction and you see the modern city of Nazareth nestled in the mountains above the plain of Jezreel.  The trees block your view further north or the list of geographical sites associated with biblical history would just keep going on, I’m sure.

It’s not that one can see these sites at all, rather that you can stand in one place and see all of these places at one time! 

I wonder if Elijah, while waiting on Mount Carmel for the prophets of Baal to get through with their empty incantations and gyrations, looked around and thought about all that God had already done to show Himself to people.

Imagine Jesus, Joseph, and Mary on their way to Jerusalem, walking down from their mountain home in Nazareth into the valley of Jezreel and Joseph pointing to this mountain and that mountain and this river and that rock and this pillar and over there—teaching Jesus the history of Israel every time they turned a new corner on their journey.

Perhaps God picked such a small and insignificant piece of His Creation for this very reason—for proximity, so that the very mountains He created could tell the stories of His marvelous ways!

 

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Day 1: Arrival

Posted in Traveling Thoughts, tagged , , , on October 31, 2011| 3 Comments »

What is the first image you see when you get off the plane in Israel?

The whole transatlantic trip yesterday was quite uneventful—which is exactly the way you want it to be.  Sherrylee and I had arrived at the airport in DFW two hours early, and it paid off. When we got to the ticket counter, we checked on the possibility of upgrading to business class in exchange for mileage. The airline agent was very helpful, but it took over an hour to make it happen, but it did!

The ride across the Atlantic was a little bumpy, and the movie selection was not exciting (Captain America  and Green Lantern). I did finish the book I was reading Moneyball, which I found fascinating. The book is so detailed that unless you are a hardcore baseball fan like I am—and, yes, I’m still wearing black for the Texas Rangers—you probably want to stick to the recent movie release Moneyball with Brad Pitt. I haven’t seen it yet, but it has been highly recommended to me.

We arrived early in the morning in Frankfurt, rested for about four hours, stored our winter suitcase in the hotel luggage room as planned, and then headed back to the airport to check in on El Al, the Israeli national airlines.

I’ve been fascinated with El Al, since all the trouble of the 70s and 80s, with hijackings. During the 80s, there was actually a small bomb in the Frankfurt airport which was left near the El Al ticket counter, so for thirty years now I have had a mental note not to spend any time near their counters in foreign airports.

El Al has the reputation for the highest level of security, but I have always been thankful for security, so other than waiting in a couple of more lines, the extra security was just as it should be—effective!

The loading/unloading ramps in many airports now have lots of advertising. I love the Chinese bank that puts pictures comparing cultures: a squid in one culture is YUK and another YUM!  A cricket in one culture is GOOD LUCK and another culture A PEST! But that was not what was on the ramp when we walked off the plane in Tel Aviv!

I expected perhaps a picture of Old City Jerusalem, or a menorah, an ancient church, or the Dead Sea—something representing the deep, deep religious and cultural heritage of this country.

No, the first image on the wall across from you as you exit the plane is a big golden BUDDHA! In Thailand, yes, but not Israel!  Because it was all written in Hebrew, I don’t even know how the picture was being used, but the incongruity was unnerving!

Fortunately, I found equilibrium again after meeting our tour guide Nabil and our driver Omar. Before we were even outside of the airport, Nabil turned and said, “Are you a Christian?”  I said, “Yes.” I returned his question, and he said, “Yes, I am a Roman Catholic, born in Jerusalem.” Apparently his family has been Christian as far back as he knows. Today I want to find out what it is like to grow up Christian in Israel.  Nabil went on to describe himself as a Palestinian Arab Roman Catholic Christian with Israeli citizenship.

Do you know the word syncretism?  If I had internet connection now—which I don’t—I’d link you to the definition, but its basic idea involves the blending of diverse cultural or religious elements in a particular culture.  This may be the word that explains Buddha and Nabil—I don’t know yet, but that is one of the things we will watch for on this trip.

It’s 4am, and I’m sitting in the bathroom because I’m jetlagged and don’t want to wake Sherrylee up by turning on the light.  I think I’ll go back to bed and see if I can catch a couple of more hours of sleep before we start our tour of Galilee today!

Shalom!

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Eight Hours Until Departure!

Posted in Traveling Thoughts, tagged , on October 29, 2011| 1 Comment »

Eight hours until departure—that is, six hours until we leave for the airport! Sherrylee and I are pretty well packed for our twenty-seven-day trip—just our toiletries to add after showers this morning!

We have two carry-on suitcases, one school-size backpack, and one purse to carry on the planes. In addition, we have packed one “winter” suitcase because we are going to be in relatively warm countries for the first two weeks, but the last thirteen days will be in northern Europe where it will definitely be winter. That winter suitcase has Sherrylee’s boots and our winter coats.

The winter suitcase is possible because we have a seven-hour layover in Frankfurt on our way to Tel Aviv. We like it that way because when you land in Frankfurt at 7am, it is really only midnight “body time”. So we have taken a dayroom at a nearby hotel where we can sleep for five hours before flying on. The added benefit is that I will put our winter suitcase into their luggage storage for free and then pick it up when we come back through two weeks later.  You can store luggage at the airport as well, but it costs something like 5 Euro per day per bag. I’d rather apply that 60 Euros to a few hours sleep and a hot shower!

Last Minute Decisions

Do I take my computer or just my smartphone?  I do have a phone that will work wherever we go, and we use T-Mobile because it is a very common carrier in and around Europe, so taking my phone is a given.  You do have to watch how you use it though because it is expensive to do two things with it: make phone calls and use the internet!  We use it primarily for unavoidables or emergencies. I don’t answer it if I don’t recognize the person calling. I’m not going to pay 2-3 dollars to hear some pre-recorded telemarketer!

But I do use it to scan my email each day and see which ones need to be addressed quickly! I used to carry my laptop computer for this, but if email were all I needed a computer for, I would leave the computer at home.  I don’t like the extra hassle at the airports, the problems with logging in at hotels, nor the weight in my backpack.

BUT, just for you I am taking it this year, so that I can blog more easily! I tried last year using hotel computers, but did you know that many countries have different keyboards—a real pain! And often, at least in the hotels where we stay, there are only one or two computers and they won’t let you tie them up for an hour at a time.

To help avoid lots of computer time though, I have been downloading several apps to my smartphone (Android) especially for this trip.  Kayak is a great search engine for travel, so that is now mine! I also downloaded Priceline’s app because I still have to make hotel reservations for the last part of our trip in Europe.  I love to get 4-star hotels for 50-75% off!! I’m using Pageonce to track our flight information. With these apps, I don’t have to pull out the computer and try to get online in airports or at poorly wired hotels. I can do most of our travel arrangements with my phone, if need be.

I also bought a Garmin for this trip because we will be driving all over western Europe for the last 15 days. If you rent one from the car rental place, they cost you about 10 Euro or $15/day, so I figured I could buy one and get the European maps for it and pretty much break even.  Navigation systems are time and nerve-savers when you are driving in foreign countries—and they all speak English!

Last-minute To Do’s!

Here’s my list for the next few hours:

  • Get about $500 cash from the local bank—all in newer $100 bills.
  • Pick up the cleaning!
  • Leave the car with at least ½ tank of gas.
  • Call my Mom again and make sure she has our itinerary
  • Update itinerary and distribute it to our families
  • Check-in online before we go to the airport
  • Email contacts at our first stops and just verify that they will meet us.
  • Update our personal finances so that there are no bad surprises about our checking account while we are on the road and they are hard to fix!

That’s it!  It’s 7:45 am, time to wake Sherrylee up! Ben will pick us up and take us to the airport in exactly five hours.  If there is any time, I may try to go to Kellan’s flag football game!

Let’s have fun on this trip! Pray that we have great conversations about spreading the Word everywhere we go! I’m really excited because we have three firm appointments in Israel and Jordan to talk about LST—and maybe another one!

This is the day the Lord has made! To Him be the glory!

 

 

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Why Sunday Is Not On Your Travel Itinerary!

Posted in Christian Culture, Traveling Thoughts, tagged , , on October 26, 2011| 5 Comments »

I have a feeling that many, if not most Christians do not plan to go to church on Sundays when they are traveling. Sometimes we haven’t, but most of the time we try to and I’d like to tell you why.

First, why don’t Christians go to church when they travel? Here are my top ten reasons:

  1. Don’t want to take the time away from travel, sightseeing, or relaxing.
  2. Don’t want to take the time to find a church.
  3. May not like the church you find, so then you will have wasted two hours.
  4. Don’t want to take Sunday clothes.
  5. Don’t like going to church with people you don’t know.
  6. You might bump into teaching, worship, or something that makes you uncomfortable!
  7. You might get invited to lunch or something else that would just take up more time.
  8. They might expect you to come to Sunday night or Wednesday night services and that would just be more time out of your schedule.
  9. They might not have anything for the children and we’d just have the kids on our laps for the whole time!
  10. It is not a salvation issue, so why should we?

As I said, we have used some of these excuses ourselves over the years, but we have also been blessed many, many times by finding a church and breaking bread with Christians on Sundays. Maybe I can give you some hints that will encourage you to look for these blessings as well!

  1. If it is part of your travel plan, then you are more likely to follow through. If you don’t plan to find an assembly of saints on Sunday, then you will not. Write it in to your travel itinerary from the beginning—just like tithing from the first fruits.
  2. Do a little research about the available churches. On a recent trip, I spent no more than thirty minutes on the internet, looking for churches of Christ in an unfamiliar city. I looked for things like location and time of services.  If churches are too far away or they start too early or late, then I look for alternatives. These are not deciding factors, but not unimportant.
  3. Try to learn the intangibles from the website.  Is this an open church or pretty closed? Is this a church involved outside of itself? Does this church have only traditional worship?  Almost all of these questions can be answered by looking at a church’s website.  If the church doesn’t have a website—well, that says a lot right there.
  4. Arrive at least 5-10 minutes before services begin, so you can meet a few people. Not only will you meet some nice people, but you will likely find a connection with some church or some person that you both know.  We recently went to church in Savannah, GA that was completely new to us. We didn’t find any relatives, but we did find out that the preacher was a cousin of a missionary that we had worked with in Kiev, Ukraine!
  5. Expect to give, not just to receive.  I find more and more truth in Jesus’ saying that it is more blessed to give than to receive. When we give concern, friendship, our fellowship in communion, our common worship, prayer, then we are blessed! If we attend only to receive, we can still be blessed, but maybe not as much!
  6. Communion is too important to miss! If Jesus thought that breaking bread was important, then….it doesn’t really make any difference what I think.  I must need that fellowship and koinonia often!  We always look for an opportunity to break bread with Christians!
  7. Worshipping with other Christians teaches us the breadth of God’s kingdom. Not every church building, not every worship style, not every sermon has to be the all-time best or even as good as the ones at home.  Being gracious is being Godly!

And your children will only complain about it if you do!  Spending that time with Christians on Sunday is a great discipline for teaching children to put God first—before vacations, before sleeping late, really FIRST!  And that is worth a lot!

Sometimes it just doesn’t work out—we used to call this being “providentially hindered!”  Sometimes we have to miss meals, and  sometimes we have to miss sleep, but we are healthier and feel better if we don’t.

Don’t miss the spiritual feast awaiting you when you travel!

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Five More Tips for Planning Your Overseas Trip!

Posted in Christian Missions, Traveling Thoughts, tagged , , on October 22, 2011| 3 Comments »

A week from today we leave on our overseas trip. What should I be thinking about after having finished most of the items on the big checklist I gave you in the last post.  Just one big thing left to do before we get to the things that can only be done at the last minute:  Go back over your big check list to make sure you really did everything you checked off—or that you forgot something that should have been on that list.

Some of you Readers, especially Randy,  made some excellent suggestions of actions that should have been on the first check list that I gave you.  It’s hard to think of everything at once.  Here is what you have added to my list:

  1. Check for visa requirements. This should be done at the same time you are checking on your passport for the first time. If you need a visa where you are going,  it can take up to a month to get; for other countries perhaps only a week; and for many countries you can just buy it at the border. Most visas are pretty easy to get, but some are not. Be very exact in filling out their forms and following their instructions. If you have any doubts about how to fill out the forms, you may want to use a visa service. Their prices are not unreasonable.  And, lastly on visas, sometimes you have to send your passport in to have the visa inserted into the passport, so you can only start the visa process after you have a passport. You must plan ahead for this! Also, always use a mailing procedure that allows you to track where your passport and/or visa is in the mail.
  2. If you are taking anything electrical (phone chargers, computers, etc), you will need a plug adapter at least and you may need a voltage transformer.  Fortunately, most of our gadgets and computers are built to transform their own current, so you just need a plug adapter. I recommend that you take nothing that has to heat: curling irons, travel irons, hair dryers.  Our experience is that they are likely to burn up no matter how careful you are—and they may burn your clothes or your hair!!  Buy one in the country where you are going to be!
  3. Speaking of phones, if you are taking your phone, especially if you have a smartphone, check for both call rates and international roaming charges where you are going.  There are many ways to make cheap calls—which will have to be another whole posting—but the one that you might miss is that all that internet usage that you enjoy in the States for a package price could cost you per MB in other countries. I have heard stories of hundreds of dollars of charges just for checking your email on your phone. Check this out before you go!
  4. Double check your itinerary.  For me that means printing out the confirmation pages from every flight and hotel I booked and every car I rented. I can’t tell you how often some little discrepancy has popped up—maybe because I changed our plans in the middle of booking things or maybe just human error—but it is so much better to catch those mistakes and fix them before you have to stand in front of a counter in a foreign country and try to work it out with someone there!

Have I ever told you about the time we had a flight booked from Antalya, Turkey to Frankfurt, Germany, via Istanbul.  It was scheduled to leave about 10pm—in foreign countries many flights leave and arrive in the middle of the night! We got to the airport in plenty of time—which I always recommend because things go wrong—and this time, we got there and could not find the counter where we should check in. We searched in the international terminal and then went to the domestic terminal. All kinds of people told us where to look, but we never found the counter where we should check in. The clock was ticking too. Our scheduled departure was less than an hour away!!

After trying to communicate with a number of people whose English was sketchy, we finally were informed that the airline that we had booked with no longer even flew out of this city! We had a worthless ticket to Istanbul! Our only alternative was to buy another ticket to Istanbul and connect with our flight the next day to Frankfurt.

This whole fiasco probably took two hours to work through and on a scale of problems was a fairly minor one—which is the only kind I wish for you in your travels!  But if you travel much internationally, you will eventually have these kinds of experiences.

–which brings me to my last piece of advice as you get to the final countdown for your trip!

5.  Get yourself into the frame of mind that things will not go as you planned them! Count on it! So you can either be flexible and take it as part of the experience, or you can wind yourself up, yell at the people who do you wrong, complain about how you were jerked around and cheated for the rest of your trip, and make yourself and others quite miserable.  And if you are a Christian and doing this, you should have stayed at home! You are not representing well that Name you are wearing.

If you tend toward the wind-up side of things though, you might want to consider fairly comprehensive travel insurance.  It might provide you with a little peace of mind. A good website that allows you to compare many plans is www.insuremytrip.com .

Soon—before you leave—I’ll give you a list of things to do during the last twenty-four hours before you go!  No, you are not procrastinating, but there are some things that just can’t happen any earlier.

Don’t begrudge preparation!

I love the quote from Abraham Lincoln on preparation: “If I had eight hours to chop down a tree, I’d spend six sharpening my axe.”

 

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Ten Tips For Overseas Trip Preparations!

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on October 19, 2011| 1 Comment »

We are leaving in ten days for a four-week overseas trip. Between now and the time we leave, we have three days of activity at the Global Missions Conference and a five-day visit with our kids and grandkids in California. That leaves today and one day next week to get ready to go.

Sounds impossible, but it can be done with a little planning, so here’s my checklist. I thought I’d share it with you just in case you needed to make an extended trip on short notice or with an unusually short amount of time to prepare.

Let’s start with the things that must be done at home before you can leave:

  1. Stop your mail. Go to www.usps.gov and give them the information and that’s all you have to do! Your mail will be waiting when you return . . . which leads to the next item!
  2. Make arrangements for all recurring bills and payments that will come while you are gone. You don’t want to come home to cut-off notices or threats to ruin your credit.  I have put everything on some form of autopay where possible, including all our utility bills, our water and sewage, gas, electricity, telephone.  If you have any credit cards payments to make, go to your account online and set it on auto pay for the minimum amount each month just to make sure you are never late.
  3. Call any credit card companies and let them know of your travel plans. There is nothing worse than using your credit card once overseas and having it blocked by the company thereafter as part of their fraud security.
  4. Check the weather where you are going, so that you will take the appropriate clothing. It is so very hard to wear a heavy winter coat to the airport in DFW, when it is still 80 degrees every day!
  5. Check your passports TODAY and make sure that they are valid for at least six months beyond the date of your return! This is a fairly new requirement that even seasoned international travelers may not know!  You are also certain then where your passports are.  And carry a second form of picture ID, like your driver’s license, even if you don’t intend to drive.
  6. Take care of pets and/or houseplants.  What about your yard? Make the necessary arrangements with friends or professional services so that you don’t come back to either a jungle or a desert!
  7. Make sure you have enough of all prescriptions for the entire trip. Carry this medicine in original bottles, so it is easily identifiable as prescription medicine.  Also make sure you have an adequate supply of contact lenses and solution.  You probably should carry a copy of your lens prescription with you.  Purchase any OTC medicines you intend to take. In some countries you can find any drug over the counter; in other countries, you can’t even get aspirin without a local doctor’s prescription.
  8. Reduce or replace everything liquid you think you need to take! Shaving cream , toothpaste, deodorant, perfume, men’s cologne, liquid makeup, nail polish remover, cough syrup, nothing liquid can go in a bottle more than three ounces, and ALL of your liquids have to fit into one quart-sized plastic baggie.  And no big cans of hairspray!
  9. Decide about luggage!  The size and number of pieces you need depends on how you pack. We are going to be gone for three weeks, so we will pack for one week—does that make sense? We will pack into carry-on-sized suitcases, knowing that we will likely be forced to check our luggage on every flight except the Atlantic crossing.
  10. Determine how you are going to pay for daily expenses while traveling?  Cash? Travelers Checks? Credit Cards?  I used to use travelers checks but haven’t in years. ATMs have made getting local currency much easier, though not always safer. You have to be a little careful when and where you get cash out of ATM machines; nevertheless, you should make copies of front and back of all your debit and/or credit cards that you are going to carry with you and leave one copy with someone at home and take the other copy with you.  That way, if one or all of them are stolen, you can easily report the theft—or have someone in the States do it for you!

By the way, don’t carry cash in your billfold in your back pocket, not in your backpack, nor in your purse, nor in those fanny packs (either front or rear versions).  The only safe place to carry cash is in one of those money belts that fits under your clothes—which is quite inconvenient, so you put just a little in your pocket, but no more than you could afford to lose.

That’s enough for today, but before Sherrylee and I leave, I’ll be back writing about preparations at work and things that must wait until the last minute to do.

Here are a few thoughts for you on leaving things until the last minute. I hope they make you laugh!

  • “Only Robinson Crusoe had everything done by Friday.”
  • “You know you are getting old when it takes too much effort to procrastinate.”
  • “Even if you’re on the right track-you’ll get run over if you just sit there.”  Will Rogers

 

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November 22-24 : Last Stop!

Posted in Christian Missions, Traveling Thoughts, tagged , , , , , , on November 23, 2010| Leave a Comment »

The city of Rothenburg ob der Taube was first settled in 960 A.D.  OK, stop and think about that for a moment. That is 532 years before Columbus discovered America.  I hardly know how to relate to dates like that.  But here is the date that really caused me to pause and think:  the first Christian church was built in Rothenburg in 968. 

Now I know that the 10th century is 900 years after Paul started churches in Turkey, Greece, and other places, but what that means is that people in this valley next to the Taube River have had some exposure to the name of Jesus and the story of Jesus for over one thousand years.

One thousand years is time enough for many things to happen, for instance:

  • the simple story of Jesus can morph into a complicated, unknowable story, one that only seminary-educated people are supposed to or expected to know.
  • the community of Christ can evolve into a state-organized community listed primarily on rolls for tax collection purposes.
  • the faith of those that would leave the civilized world to build a church in the middle of paganism can evolve into a kind of Christian paganism–a phrase that to me means simple disbelief of the real story but a disbelief described  in words that were formerly Christian words.
  • the buildings constructed on the backs of and at the expense of several generations of peasants, a sacrifice made because of very simple faith but devout faith, these buildings are now museums, some museums of culture and others museums of faith–not much difference really.
  • the values preached and practiced by those earliest Christians have had time to simply be absorbed into the culture–no longer recognized as Christian values, just good values.

All of these thoughts, rather than being reason for discouragement, can also be taken as a challenge for the Christian warrior–not an image we really use very much any more.  At the Euro-American Retreat in Rothenburg, there are about 135 people from twenty different countries, many of whom qualify as Christian warriors though.

There are American missionaries from Albania, from France, from Belgium, from Austria. There are national evangelists from Romania,  from Ukraine, from Italy, from Germany. Then there are the foot soldiers, not missionaries or preachers, but Christians who live in the middle of pagan, of secular, of formerly Christian and formerly Communistic societies, who are here to be encouraged and strengthened, so that they can go back and fight some more!

That’s one of the reasons we love being on mission fields with people who live in mission fields. They know they are in a battle, they know that they are fighting against immense odds. Nothing would suggest that they will win the battle–nothing except their absolute faith in the Victory of Jesus. 

Thanks to Phil Jackson from Missions Resource Network for keeping this retreat alive. It began as an American military retreat when Europe was full of American soldiers. Phil has developed a quality program for all Christians and a growing number now recognize the benefit of spending these 4-5 days together.  Let me recommend it to you!

Tomorrow, Sherrylee, Cassie, and I leave for home via an overnight in London. We are going to take Cassie to the Tower of London and to Phantom of the Opera.  She may remember London more in the future, but I believe she will be shaped more by the conversations with Bill Wilson, with the van Erps, with the Brazles–both couples–and with the workers in Hildesheim. I’m so glad she is with us in Rothenburg; I want her to be a true believer in the Victory for the rest of her life!!

Thanks for going with us on this journey.  We will talk again next week after we recover from Thanksgiving.

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November 19-21- A Northern German Homecoming!

Posted in Christian Missions, Traveling Thoughts, tagged , , , on November 22, 2010| 3 Comments »

We left Hans and Aans van Erp on Friday to drive to Hildesheim/Hannover, Germany.  Going to these cities is like going home for Sherrylee and me.  Hannover was our home from 1973-1979 and the place where all of our children were born.  But as is often the case, going “home”  to a place you have left is never really possible.  The conflict between nostalgia and reality brings with it some pain as well as a lot of joy.

The painful part is that the church we planted in Hannover in 1973 no longer exists. It grew from nothing to perhaps 80+ in the first 25 years and was truly one of the largest and best churches of Christ in Europe, but then the devil got a foot in the door. I don’t know whether it started with jealousy in the leadership or in the failure of some key marriages, but within about five years, the church fell apart.  Most of the members are in other churches, so they did not lose faith; nevertheless, the sudden demise–even though we had not been a part of the church officially since 1979–makes me sad.

The good news is that the church of Christ in Hildesheim and the church in Peine were both daughter churches of Hannover, and the daughters live on and are doing very well.  Randy and Katie Smelser, sent by the independent Christian church,  have a wonderful group in Peine, which includes several former Hannover members.

The story of the work in Hildesheim starts many years ago when we lived in Hannover. We actually organized some attempts to make contacts in Hildesheim during the 1970s. Then in the 80s, we worked together with the Hannover church to conduct yearly LST projects in Hildesheim. No group was meeting there regularly, but several of the Hannover members began a Bible study group in Hildesheim with some of the LST readers and their friends.

I don’t know which year it was that Don Roehrkasse and Randy Smelser  both left their work in Hannover to begin the works in Peine and Hildesheim, but it has been probably about 15 years ago–maybe twenty.  A great spirit of cooperation existed then between the three churches and continues today between Peine and Hildesheim who have quarterly combined services to support each other.

Sherrylee and worshipped in Hildesheim on Sunday, Sherry teaching the children’s class and I preached. I used the story of the possessed man in Mark 5 and set it parallel to our own story described in Ephesians 2.  One German man was telling me afterwards that the healed man in Mark 5 was the first missionary sent by Jesus. I had never thought of that, but Jesus did send him to his home to tell his family and friends what Jesus had done for him.  Check that thought out and see what you think.

The Hildesheim church is full of young people, has several complete young families, and there were at least two different sets of seekers that had begun attending recently.  I had the feeling that the group was alive and reaching out–that’s probably redundant, isn’t it!  Alive churches are always reaching out. 

Just as we were ready to leave a German couple who are dear friends of ours wanted to talk with us unter vier Augen (under four eyes= privately).  I thought to myself, “Oh no, what is going wrong in their life?? Please, Lord, not them!”  I gladly repented of my Euro-pessimism as they talked to us about wanting to use their retirement years for God and what opportunities did we know of and what would we recommend.  I loved that conversation because it represents a boldness and maturity of faith in these German Christians that we don’t often see in Christians anywhere.

God is working in Germany and in Europe. He is working slowly and patiently, but if we abandon His work here, then we will miss out on the opportunity to be His servants, His vessels here. I’m glad that we have been a part of the European work for forty years now. In spite of the heartache and the wish that the harvest would come sooner, I’m glad that we and the Roehrkasses and the Smelsers and the Brazles and the Sullivans and the Wilsons, and the many others of our time, and those who came to Europe before us–and especially for those who are coming now after us, I am thrilled to have been used by God in Europe.

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November 15-18: Great People and Great Stories!

Posted in Traveling Thoughts, tagged , , , , on November 19, 2010| Leave a Comment »

I am always hesitant to tell other people’s stories because I believe it is really their story to tell, but in this post, I want to introduce you to some great people and at least hint at their stories enough that you might want to find out more about them. You will be blessed if you do–as we have been.

After leaving Chemnitz and Leipzig, Sherrylee and I drove to Mainz, home of Johann Gutenberg who invented the printing press and very near Worms, where Luther was accused and tried for his reformation heresies. (Remember that the Diet of Worms was the event, not the punishment!)

But our reason for going to Mainz was to visit with Alex and Cass Huffman. We saw them last almost two years ago just after Alex had accepted a research fellow-type position at the Max Planck Institute, one of the most prestigious research institutes in Germany. They were looking forward to exploring Europe, to an adventure for a couple of years–which is what they have had, but not the one they anticipated.

Not long after we saw them, they became pregnant, and about five months into the pregnancy they found out that their baby’s heart had not developed; in fact, only one side of it was fully formed.  That began for them a journey that has taken them through difficult medical choices, difficult ethical choices, through mountaintop moments of faith as well as valleys of angst and despair. 

Little baby Noah Autumn Huffman was born seven months ago, has already had two major surgeries to re-construct her heart so that it could function adequately for several years. She has at least one more major surgery looming–but having held her myself and watched her play in the Huffman’s small German apartment last Tuesday, I just want to say, she is a happy, precious little person–and Alex and Cass are people of great faith.

Alex and Cass have lived each day of Noah’s life, knowing that she could die at any minute, yet they see the hand of God in everything. Their move to Germany brought them into a medical system where their insurance completely covers the huge bills they have incurred. The procedure for treating little Noah is called the Giessen Procedure–because it was perfected at the Giessen Medical University, just one hour away from Mainz by some of the world’s leading children’s cardiologists, all of which they have had access to because God led them to Germany–not for the adventure they imagined, but for a faith journey that has transformed the rest of their lives.  If you want to read the details of their story, you can find Alex and Cass on Facebook and read their blogs.

We picked up Cassie, our granddaughter,  in Frankfurt on Wednesday, thrilled that she is joining us for the last week of our travels.  Our first stop with her was lunch in Cologne, Germany, with Bill Wilson and the Uli Steiniger family.  Bill has served as a missionary in Cologne since 1969. His wife Deanna died five years ago, so Bill is retiring and moving back to the States sometime this year.  He has been–and will continue to be–one of God’s great and faithful servants.  The church in Cologne has elders, so he is leaving behind a mature group of Christians.

Then we drove to a little Belgian town south of Eindhoven, Netherlands, to visit with Hans and Aans van Erp, two of our dearest friends in Europe. Thirty-five years ago, Hans visited the church in Hannover that we had planted, which started them on a faith journey. They were baptized by Tom and Dottie Schulz not long thereafter. In 1988, they invited Let’s Start Talking to help them plant a new church in Eindhoven, a church which has thrived and continues to thrive until today. The church has 50-60 members, lots of young families, and great diversity which reflects the general population in the Netherlands.

For the first twenty-five years, Hans and Aans carried the burden of leadership in this new church alone, but in the last ten years or so, other Dutch Christians have stepped forward to share the responsibilities.  We have shared the joys and struggles of three sons, one of which is part of a mission team in Ghent, Belgium. We have shared their hospitality many, many times and each time seems a little sweeter. That is just the way it should be with Christians, isn’t it!

Yesterday, we drove to Antwerp and had lunch with lifetime friends and long-time missionaries Paul and Carol Brazle. They have been faithful in Antwerp for almost 30 years–maybe longer–and I was impressed in our conversation about how they continue to find new ways to reach out to their community. As with many places in Europe, a large group of African Christians now meets in their building and they are exploring ways to nurture and grow the relationship between these two churches, spiritually of one spirit, but culturally vastly different.

And, finally, then last night we had supper with Luk and Holly Brazle–yes, related. Luk is Paul’s nephew and the son of Mark and Jill Brazle who worked in Belgium as missionaries for over 15 years.  Luk is one of the very special breed of second generation missionaries.  They are four years into a new church plant in Ghent and doing a great job.  I was impressed to find that Luk had just sent out a fairly lengthy assessment questionnaire to many people who are connected to his work, trying to help him know what his own strengths and weaknesses were.  What maturity it takes to be willing to ask others to evaluate your work.

Nothing is more refreshing than to be in the presence of people of great faith! We all still live within a great cloud of witnesses and can be encouraged by them in our own daily struggles. Maybe you want to just go see one of your faith friends–or call one up today–just for the joy it brings.

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