Day 09 - Western Coast: Priene, Didyma, & Miletus

HELLOOOOO EVERYBODY!!! This is Sophie!!! I cannot WAIT to tell you all about today — our last full day in Turkey. Wow. What a GIFT! I cannot start this update without first reflecting on the gratitude we have to those who have given, supported and prayed for us! This trip was not just for us, but by the grace of God will be for all who get to witness His glory through our stories and what we’ve been taught! In the upside-down Kingdom of God, those who give freely grow all the richer (Proverbs 11:24). Praise be to God for the richness of His grace lavished on us, and for the fragrant aroma of His Gospel in Turkey!

Today was largely a day of reflection, and so I want to offer you a moment of reflection on the Gospel before I share what we did and learned. For those of you who know the Gospel, the good news, my hope is that God will continue to restore in you the joy of your salvation. For those who are reading this and may not know or believe, my hope is that you would consider the word of God and the world around you, and even if just for a moment sit in the mindset of what it would be like to believe in a loving God who created all things, but His affection for you overshadows them all: though we are messed up and broken, He made a way for us to live a life abundant and free. The God who formed all things came down from heaven and put on flesh, healing people both in body and in spirit, and He died the death that we deserve — that I, chief of sinners, deserve — to cleanse the dirtiness of our pasts and establish the glory of our future. I’m alive and sitting in Turkey because this is what Christ has done for me, and He has done it for you too.

We started the day at the city of Priene, where we were greeted by one of the best things about Turkey: a dog!!! They’re everywhere and all so friendly. We hiked up to the location of the Temple of Athena, dedicated by Alexander the Great in 350 BC. Each day at the Forge, we together recite the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4-5) with our right pinky raised. This morning we were FINALLY fully explained why we raise our pinky! The finger of God holds more power, more might, and more authority than anything we could fathom — while our pinky is perhaps the weakest member of our bodies, in even the singular pinky of God we find the strength that founds and upholds our faith. 

As we later stood in the ruins of a church at Priene, we were reminded that a life lived in obedience is what it means to stand firm in God’s grace, and this will be what changes the world around us. In Acts 1, we are told that the number of Christians started somewhere around a mere 120. I had a conversation with an agnostic friend of mine once, and one of the things he said to me has always stuck with me — there is something significant about the Christian faith and the way that it has persisted and remained so prevalent and influential in the world. This influence does not come from a domineering religion that seeks to seize the culture, but by faithful men and women who stand firm in the grace of God, because they have marveled at the very finger of God that has changed everything for them. In Jeremiah 29:4-5, the prophet Jeremiah explains the will of God to the exiles in Babylon — telling them to settle in and to live as strangers and aliens amongst suffering and a Pagan culture, promoting the welfare of a land that is not their home. Why? To live in the image of Christ — who came as a stranger and alien into the world and lived for it’s welfare, that the world might experience His Kingdom of Shalom.

Next we visited Didyma, a city known for its Temple to Apollo and as a place where people would go to receive an oracle of wisdom from the god himself. In order to receive an oracle, people would have to cleanse themselves before entering with holy water, make a sacrificial offering before a priest, and wait for the priest to intercede. Regardless of who you are, we all grapple with the reality of the unknown and are going somewhere, to some source, for an answer. But for the Christian, we can find contentment in the fact that we have already been cleansed to enter into the presence of God, Christ has gone before us to be our sacrifice, and He sits at the right hand of the Father interceding for us for eternity. 

Our last site was Miletus, where we learned how Paul “passed the baton” on to the elders of Ephesus in the city in Acts 20 before he departed for Macedonia. Paul wanted God’s work to be done on earth as it is in heaven, and encouraged these men to continue in faithfulness and bring God’s Shalom to the world. Tonight, we stood around a piano in our hotel lobby and witnessed the Church alive and active in Turkey as we sang hymns with new friends while many people stopped to listen for a time. Part of our memory verse from this trip says “though you have not seen Him, you love Him. Though you do not now see Him, you believe in Him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls” (1 Peter 1:8-9). An older muslim woman stood in our midst for a while, and I’m reminded of her look of marvel and joy as we sang, likely in a language she doesn’t understand, to a God she does not know — this should break our hearts, but also ignite an urgency within us. Though we do not now see Him, we love Him and believe in Him, and this love should lead us to repent and stand firm — the Kingdom of God is at hand! With faith as your livelihood and the Gospel as your native tongue, live for the welfare of this world that is not your home, that many might be pointed by the finger of God and inexpressible joy to a salvation ready to be revealed.

LET’S GO!!!