St. Paul in Greece

It's been awhile since I've posted something. Blame it on my summer travels and Atcs For All. Making and trading artist trading cards can get very addicting! But that is another story.

This summer, my husband and I visited Greece and Turkey and although we did not take one of those "Follow in the Footsteps of St. Paul" tours, we did get to visit some of the places St. Paul travelled to in his missionary journeys.

First stop was Greece, where we walked to so many historical sites. While in Athens, I came across a thrift shop filled with all sorts the things you find in thrift shops. I looked through the row of books, thinking to myself that maybe I could find a New Testament bible in Greek. It would be all Greek to me, of course, but it seemed like the kind of meaningful "souvenir" I wanted. I didn't find one.

After wandering amidst all the amazing structures in the Acropolis, we walked towards the rock of Areopagos , below the Acropolos. We stopped to look at a plaque mounted on the rock and since it was in Greek, we wondered what it said. Just then, a man holding a book in his hand came up to me and offered the book to me. Suspicious, I asked him what he wanted from me, "Nothing" he replied, "it is a gift", continuing on to say that the book contained what the plaque said. The book contained the passages in the bible about St. Paul in Greece, not only in English, but also in Greek! I had my Greek "New Testament" or at least part of it.

I realized, with awe and delight that this rock was where Saint Paul spoke to the people of Athens in Acts 17, and the plaque embedded in the rock contains his words.

"Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: "Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. ²³For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you.

²⁴"The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. ²⁵And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. ²⁶From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. ²⁷God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. ²⁸'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.'

²⁹"Therefore since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by man's design and skill. ³⁰In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. ³¹For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead."

Thousands of years after Saint Paul spoke these words, I marvel that one man's words have reached me from so long ago, from so far away. I marvel that his words are relevant today as they were then. Do we have our own objects of worship? What do we value more than God Himself?

May we continue to "seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being."

Next stop, Turkey...