Kalamos and Home

I'm sorry for the lack of updates, but the last two weeks in Greece were a frenzy of activities. We got back from Volos and had about five days. We went to church, washed clothes, had dinner at Dona and Sergio's, handed out some flyers for First Church to various hotels, and met with Opal a little bit. Opal, one of MTW's coordinators, came through for a few days in order to help us start thinking about leaving Greece. It was really helpful because none of us had really wanted to start thinking about LEAVING, but we needed to in order to start processing things. It was good to see her.

Our last week we spent at teen camp at Kalamos. Each of the people on my team slept in a different cabin in order to form relationships with the teens.

(EVERYBODY)

We organized the games in the evenings, put on some skits and gave testimonies, and generally just hung out at camp with the teens. It was really hard but really good. It was hard because it was our last week in Greece, so it was difficult to focus sometimes. Not because we wanted to leave, but simply because we knew our time was winding down.

("Who is He?" Part of the theme at Kalamos)

It was really good though because we formed a lot of relationships with the kids and got to see Kalamos at work. We enjoyed facilitating the games and speaking whenever they wanted us to speak at worship.

That's a quick recap of what happened over the past two weeks. On one of our last nights there, after we had returned from Kalamos, some of the leaders from Kalamos took us dancing. Alex, Tolis, and Yannis drove us out to an old Disco place and we ended the summer in a blur of dancing. It was awesome to spend the time with both friends from home and friends from Greece. It was really beautiful.

Since I've returned home, I've had really mixed emotions. I really want to be back in Greece, but I know it's time for me to be home. God blessed us so much this summer.

He taught me so many things. He taught me the value of relationships and community through my team and the Greeks. He also taught me how God calls us to missions both at home and abroad. After the first week talking to University students in Athens, I realized that I could talk to University students in Oklahoma. God calls us all to ministry, wherever we are. The Psalm that I kept rereading over the summer was Psalm 103:

Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and all that is within me,
bless his holy name!
Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and forget not all his benefits,
who forgives all your iniquity,
who heals all your diseases,
who redeems your life from the pit,
who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy,
who satisfies you with good
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.

The Psalmist calls for us to bless the Lord with ALL that is within us. Our whole being is to be consumed with blessing the Lord. I want to feel this way, and I feel like I got a taste of it this summer. This was MTW's first attempt at an internship in Greece, so we were sort of the guinea pig interns. God is so good and he blessed our "guinea pig" mission in Greece in so many ways. To God be the glory!

Volos

Wow, what a busy week. We spent the week in Volos, a city about 4 hours north of Athens. Here's a basic rundown of each day:

Sunday - Went to the Greek Evangelical Church and heard from Pastor Miletis. We left right afterward to do a kids festival at a camp nearby. This included a moon bounce, wind tunnel, face painting, balloon sculpting, and other things. Chelsea and I took over the balloon sculpting and basically sculpted for two or three hours straight. This put some stress on MY FINGERS. It was great though.

Monday - Pastor Miletis had a lot to do so we took the day off. It was nice to rest and get our bearings in the city.

Tuesday - Left at 8:30 and picked up trash in parks until about 1:00. Then we jumped in the ocean.

Wednesday - Same as Tuesday. That night we sang some songs at the evening church service and Mallory and Chelsea shared their testimonies. We met a Nigerian named Frank who fled his country to try and find work in Greece. His story was so crazy and sad and amazing - he was looking for work but trusting God for his future.

Thursday - Picked up trash in the morning! Then jumped in the ocean!

Friday - Handed out nearly 4,000 trash bags to motorists at an intersection. This was craziness. Miletis told us to say "ya da scipithia" to the drivers, which means "for your trash."

Now, to explain all this. There is no volunteerism in Greece. We got some of the weirdest stares when we walked the beaches, parks, and highways picking up trash. People honked at us in appreciation, came up and talked to us, and even bought us juice and water. One man wouldn't stop shaking my hand and saying THANK YOU. Later he walked over to some of the girls and kissed their hands.

Crazy though - the assistant mayor of a nearby town, Agria, noticed us picking up trash. He started taking pictures on his phone, so we went up to talk to him. He invited us to dinner Friday night.

We arrived for dinner at about 10:00 pm (welcome to Greece) and ate dinner on the end of a pier in the ocean. The mayor came. They gave us medals. A TV news crew came and interviewed Chelsea and me. It was crazy. At one point the mayor even asked what the differences are between Orthodox Christians and Greek Evangelicals. In the past, Greek Evangelicals would have been considered heretics. It's so great that the community is beginning to change their perception of the Greek Evangelicals.

This picking up trash thing is really making an impact in the community and showing people the love of Christ by taking care of the environment. Miletis has been doing this for 15 years, and his faithfulness was so apparent even in our short stay in Volos.

I am still processing and thinking over a lot of what happened last week. It was so packed full of things that it's hard to really comprehend everything that happened - especially that dinner Friday night!

The Greek Bible Institute

My team resides at the Greek Bible Institute, the only Bible College in Greece. They have been operating for some 40+ years now. They are a very small college and a lot of the staff is volunteer and/or raises support.

Just recently the Greek government has chosen to recognize private colleges in Greece. Previously, they had only recognized public universities. Unfortunately, a new law essentially requires that there be 500,000 Euros in the bank for every recognized university in Greece. This is bad.

The people on staff here are relatively calm about this predicament. They seem to be quietly trusting God for whatever happens. I look around at how small and good this place is - a place where Greeks and Americans come to learn about the Bible, Theology, and Christian Community.

Pray that the Greek Bible Institute would be able to raise this incredible amount of money by August. They have a start, but they need a lot more.

Brothels

We have been visiting the brothels in Athens' Red Light district every Wednesday morning. Teams normally consist of four people - three girls and one guy. The guys don't go into the brothels, but rather accompany the women for safety. They also pray outside. I have been two or three times now, and the brothels always strike me for their anonymity. Only a little white light outside the doorway marks each individual brothel. There are no pictures. There are only men entering and exiting the brothels to see the women. The streets and walls and doorways are so blank. They look like anything else except for the little lights. It is ominous and oppressive.

I am used to sexuality being expressed so publicly via magazines at Walmart or Victoria's Secret or internet pornography. It's strange that when it comes to selling sex as a profession that the business is so anonymous. Both the men and women lose their individuality in the brothels. Sex was meant to be so personal, and yet sin twists it to be outrageously public and therefore impersonal or outrageously anonymous and therefore impersonal. If sin and death are forms of separation, then this is another example of the way sin separates us from ourselves, each other, and God...

I would encourage you to read the posts of some of my female team members. They have actually entered the brothels, so their thoughts touch more on the prostitutes themselves. Here's Mallory's thoughts - "A Blessing in Disguise."

Greek Hospitality

We are ministering to the Greeks, but in a lot of ways, they are ministering to us. I am constantly blown away by their generosity and friendliness. Just in regard to meals - Aryellis invited us into his home for dinner, Tikanis invited us to his home for lunch, and Tollis paid for our dinner one evening. Many times it's not even people we know. After we finished sorting some clothes for refugees and immigrants this morning we went to get coffee. The woman who made coffee for us gave us four free bottles of water "on the house." A man on the metro offered to throw away some of our trash for us. A mechanic offered to help direct us when we looked lost in the middle of Athens. University students bought us coffee when we had conversations with them. The church also tries as much as they can to keep a Greek speaker with us to help us as we're navigating the city.

We have often felt at a loss as to how to repay them. As Americans, deep down each of us has had to struggle with subconscious thoughts that tell us we are only worth our work. We don't want to owe people. We want to "pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps." We've realized that we are not very good at simply receiving help and blessings from other people.

We are helping the Greeks, but they are also helping us. We did not expect that. I think that was pride. Pray that God would use both us and the Greeks to be Jesus to people.

More About Youth Worship

I thought I would answer these questions from Ms. Tracy in a post because I thought it was interesting myself:

What kind of music do they sing?
They sing music similar to songs like "God of Wonders" and "Blessed Be Your Name."

Are they songs you know, or do they have their own songs?
Both. They sang "Blessed Be Your Name" in Greek. Other times they sing songs in English, but they mostly sing in Greek. Sometimes they sing original Greek songs which, obviously, I don't know. They sound great.

Is it praise and worshippy, or are they singing hymns?
I've sort of answered this by describing the types of songs they sing, but it's definitely more "praise and worshippy."

Youth Worship

We got to attend the last youth worship for the summer on Sunday night. It was really cool being able to see a lot of local teens gather to worship God and hear from God's Word. Gatherings like this are groundbreaking in Greece - the Orthodox church doesn't provide an outlet for teens to be involved in worship and feel relationally connected to other Christians their age. The youth met on a rooftop with a really cool view of the Acropolis! These are a few pictures from that night:







It's hard to explain how different this is for Greeks. Christianity to most Greeks is Greek Orthodox. Anything outside of that is heresy. In fact, in talking with young people about religion they will often ask, "So what heresy are you?" Yet many of the youth are searching for true spirituality. Pray that God would save more of the youth in this city.

Kids, Community, and the Kentro(s)

Last Friday some of our team went to the community center of the First Evangelical Church. First Evangelical's community center is open every Friday night as a place where kids from the area can simply hang out and have fun. There are lots of games for the kids, from Uno to Wii to Ping-Pong. Parents in the area appreciate the community center because it's a safe place to send their kids on Friday night. The community centers are primarily places where the churches connect with the community by building relationships with kids in Athens.

(First Church's community center - Kentro)

Every now and then, especially in the summertime, the community centers of both the First and Second Evangelical Churches host festivals on the weekend. They take lots of games and treats to a local park and kids just start showing up. It's "kind of a big deal." I took some pictures of our first festival.

(kids begin to gather)

(Chelsea doing some face (arm) painting... she did a lot of Albanian flags - Greece has many Albanian immigrants)

(preparing to throw water balloons, part of one of the games)

I've learned enough Greek to ask kids names and tell them my name. I can also say Thank You, You're Welcome, etc. It's amazing how much more you can communicate just through body language, especially around kids. Throwing a football or showing a kid how to walk on stilts (one of the games) doesn't need a lot of explanation.

It was great seeing so many neighborhood kids. It really gave you a feel for "growing up" in Athens. The Evangelical churches are trying to reach these kids and get involved in their lives.

Giving Your Testimony

Greece is a country of about 11,000,000 people. Of that 11,000,000 there are only 30,000 Protestants. That is less than %.001. The Greek Evangelical Church is struggling to survive.

I shared my testimony here at the Bible Institute (the only Bible college in the whole of Greece) last week in chapel. Afterward, I had so many people come up and pat me on the back and ask me questions. People here love to hear testimonies. It gives them hope in the Gospel's power to transform hearts.

Part of the reason that testimonies are so powerful among Evangelicals here is the predominance of the Greek Orthodox church. For many people to be Greek is to be Orthodox, but that doesn't mean having a relationship with Christ. Also, many of the university students we've talked to are atheistic, agnostic, or simply believe in the concept of God. Their definition of church and Christianity is highly ritualized, traditional, and bound up in the Greek state. That's reasonable because there was never a Protestant reformation or enlightenment here. Church is Greek Orthodox. That's all. The young people don't have a leader and they don't have a community. They are angry and confused - you can tell this by the riots that have been happening over the past few months.

It's no wonder that testimonies about the saving power of Jesus Christ inspire the people at the Bible Institute. They love to hear stories about a personal God being at work in the lives of people.

Nea Zoi

I have so many things that I could say that it is almost too overwhelming to try and type something up.

I will just describe one of the ministries that we are helping here. Nea Zoi (New Life) is a ministry to prostitutes in Athens' Red Light district. Yesterday we went there for a briefing on how we are going to be helping them. Many of the prostitutes in the district are trafficked women who come from countries like Bulgaria, Nigera, Russia, and Albania. Nea Zoi tries to reach out to these women, establish relationships with them, and draw them out of prostitution. It is extremely difficult to do though, for several reasons. First of all, most of the women do not speak Greek. They do not have anywhere to turn for help once they are in Greece because they cannot speak the native language. Second, the bosses who control the brothels make sure the women move around a lot, so the women are never able to establish meaningful relationships with anyone in the area. Third, prostitution makes more money than any other job these women can find. Nea Zoi tries to establish relationships with the prostitutes, develop their social and work skills, and also help them find work.

I was amazed at the hearts that the people at Nea Zoi have for the women of this district. Day in and day out they are trying to be Jesus to people in one of the darkest places of Athens.

άφιξη (arrival)

We arrived in Athens, Greece on Saturday, May 31st late in the evening. We are thankful that God gave us safe travels. We are staying at the Greek Bible Institute, a very small Bible college just outside of Athens in Pekirmi. It was graduation night, so things were a bit chaotic as we tried to find our rooms and get settled. The Greeks were very welcoming though, and we got to be with a lot of people almost immediately upon arrival!

It's amazing that just about anywhere you go in the world, there are a few Christians there to be your family. The Christian family spans the entire globe.


This is a picture of our team right before our first Sunday at First Evangelical Church in Athens. From left to right: Agilles (one of the Greek leaders), Austen, Chelsea, Mallory, me, Rachel, Caroline, and Brian & Lorrie (our mentors for the first two weeks).

Our team is excited about what we're going to be doing here. Keep us in your prayers!