So long time and no blog. Quite a lot has happened since we left Croatia for debrief. I’ll try to fill you in on everything:
After leaving Split, we travelled on ferrys to Ancona and then to Patra. On our second ferry to Patra, we were kicked out of the inside seats because we really only paid for the deck. So finding a big area on the deck, we decided to pitch our tents to claim our spots. Never imagined I would sleep in a tent on the deck of a ferry…that was fun. Rand
om sleeping spots got more interesting as we got to Patra.
In Patra we discovered that the train ticket to Corinth would be half the price in the morning so most all us decided to stay and sleep outside the bus station. And what is sleeping outside a bus station without a little begging for money. Some of the South Africans put together a number or two, performing outside a couple stores and bringing home about 30 Euros by the end of the hour…enough to pay their train fare the next morning! Praise God for the random ways He has been providing for us on this trip.
The next day we made it to Corinth. We took taxis to the ancient city where Paul lived and worked as a tent maker for 1 1/2 years. Here we also saw the Bema where Paul might have preached. It is almost hard for me to fathom that I walked in some of
the same spots as the apostle Paul. At Corinth the book of Acts really began to become alive to me. Next we would journey to Athens.
In Athens we had about a day to do some research on the upcoming race the next day to Ephesus in Turkey. Ashley and I spent most of the morning gathering information on the cheapest, quickest way to Turkey. It was looking like we were going to need the Goodyear Blimp to get us there at a decent price until Ashley found a travel agent friend who got us cheap ferry tickets. We were assuming most other teams would do the same thing.
That night we met up with everyone on the Areopagus, where Paul preached according to Acts 17. Here Anna Marie gave us our race instructions in the form of an old letter…burnt edges and all. There were six tasks involving different forms of communication that could not be started till the next morning. Since our ferry didn’t
leave till 4pm the next day we were hoping to get some of the ones that weren’t location specific done before leaving Athens.
Before boarding the ferry we were able to write letters home to our moms and mail a postcard to the Red Team in South Africa, congratulating ourselves for completing the race. With the speed of Nike, I delivered these to the post office, while Ashley worked on researching places we needed to go once getting to Turkey. Gary and Katherine set out on a mission to get Turkish money. With 2 tasks complete, we boarded our ferry to discover what we expected…all the other teams.
With a long ferry ride ahead Gary used his computer, equipped with surge protector, to work on task number 3…writing a blog to the world about thoughts on the letters to the 7 churches (3 of which we would visit on the race). This blog can be seen on the Red Team site. And while I’m on the topic Gary posted another team blog on his site because we weren’t able to get into the team one a while back…so check out ‘Greece is the Word’ if interested.
After arriving in Samos all teams also got on the same ferry to Kusadasi, Turkey. While on the boat we practiced task number 4: the 7 minute drama Ashley had written. Our task was to go to Ephesus and perform a drama about life there during the times of Paul and John. We were required to end the drama with the reading of the letter recorded by John in Revelations to the Ephesians. The trick was this drama had to be done on the stage of the Great Theater which held 25,000 people. However, we only needed to invite 10 to watch ours. Ashley wrote a tremendous drama in which she played an Ephesian girl named Ashley, Gary played Paul, I played the narrator, and Katherine played the letter reader.
All practiced up and ready to go we arrived in Turkey. Crossing through customs and trying to not let any of the other teams know our plan of action, we saw a Starbucks and decided to stop to for a nice, refreshing beverage. After all the teams had already left, we headed out to find transportation and a place to store our luggage so that we wouldn’t have to haul it around to all 3 cities we intended on visiting. Standing on the corner not knowing what to do (the only options being to take a 50 Euro taxi or walk a really long way to the bus station), out of nowhere came a guy named Mike.
Mike offered to give us a ride into Selcuk for a cheap gas fare. We agreed but on the way flashing yellow lights go off as he started to tell us about his hotel he works in and how we could store our luggage there. We were thinking ‘oh no’ this is just a business deal so he can make us stay at his hotel. However, we were wrong as the hotel offered to store our luggage for free and saying ‘maybe you stay with us, maybe you don’t.’ Mike then even gave us a free lift to Ephesus. Upon arriving, we thanked him and said we would either be back very late that night or the next day. He said it was fine.
Entering Ephesus we tried to enjoy as much of the ruins as possible as we briskly walked towards the Great Theater for our performance. After listening to a Chinese man sing ‘O Sole Mio’, Ashley quieted the many tourists in the theater and announced our drama, inviting them to watch. At the beginning of our performance, the tour guide of the Chinese group even translated for them. After the 7 turned 15 minute drama, we left Ephesus to head to Izmir (formally known as Smyrna).
After an hour long bus ride, we arrived in Smyrna. We had to go down to the Agora, read the letter in Revelations to the people, and buy Anna Marie a ‘kelim’ in the market. We were also required to spend 2 hours here. In the market we ran into the Brown team and had a lunch with them. From the market we taxied back to the bus station but couldn’t get on the next bus to Bergama (formally Pergamum) that left soon, instead we had to wait about an hour for the next one. While wandering around the bus station we ran into the Lime, Yellow, and Brown teams who we then realized had teamed up to work together. Sometime in between us getting icecream and Gary posting the blogs, these 3 teams had pooled resources and found a faster way to Pergamum.
Lime, Yellow, and Brown were able to clinch first place by about an hour because whoever got to Pergamum first could stop their time first. While there we were required to spend 5 hours, pray for the people, and read the letter to Pergamum. Blue team, doing things in reverse order and enjoying their time on the way took, didn’t mind coming in last.
Upon arriving in Pergamum, we were still under the impression we had to visit the ruins before officially stopping the clock (a bit of a misunderstanding of the rule on our part…but one that led to a great adventure). It was already past closing time, but we thought we would try to pay a taxi driver anyways to take us up and see if we could get in. Little did we know that for a small fee our taxi driver would turn tour guide and lead us up into the ruins at night. We might have accidentally gone through a huge hole in the fence and somehow ended up on top of the acropolis with the ruins. This was incredible as we were able to view the whole city at night under a full moon! We were very, very sneaky.
Later that night we completed the race by reading the letter and praying for the people. Gary told us how in Pergamum the first Christian, Antipus, to be officially martyred by the Roman government was roasted alive! I’m pretty glad they don’t do that to Christians today. After staying the night in Pergamum, we worked our way back to Selcuk to retrieve our luggage (actually spending the night at Mike’s hotel because of the great rate). The next day we visited Ephesus again to spend more time enjoying the ruins and then went to meet up with everyone else at a campground in Kusadasi for our study of Ephesians.
The past couple days we have been spending time going through the book. I’m amazed at how the scriptures come so alive after studying more of the history and visiting Ephesus. Paul writes of the incredible calling we have received and how to live out that calling. A part of the book that has stuck out to me is Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians, which has now become my prayer for myself and for my friends and family:
‘I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and wide is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.’ Eph 3:16-19
May you grasp how wide and long and high and deep God’s love is for you today!
