Day 9 in Greece (Berea, Phillip's Tomb, Meteora)
Today we visited a wide variety of sites. Only the the first one was directly related to the Bible.
We started off my visiting Berea. Berea has always been one of my favorite parts of Acts. It says, "10 The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue. 11 Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so. 12 Many of them therefore believed, with not a few Greek women of high standing as well as men. 13 But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the word of God was proclaimed by Paul at Berea also, they came there too, agitating and stirring up the crowds. 14 Then the brothers immediately sent Paul off on his way to the sea, but Silas and Timothy remained there. 15 Those who conducted Paul brought him as far as Athens, and after receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible, they departed" (Acts 17:10-15). The Christians sent Paul and Silas (most likely Timothy as well) to Berea because of the trouble happening in Thessalonica. My favorite line in this passage is that the Bereans were more noble because they received the word with eagerness and examined the scriptures daily to see if Paul was speaking accurately. I beleive this should be a pattern for all of us in the church. This is one of the reasons I encourage, and love seeing, open Bibles when I am preaching. I don't want the authority to lie with me but with God's Word. Berea has a small monument in honor of Paul's visit.
We also visited the Jewish quarter of Berea. We were able to see a synagogue that still exists to this day. The one we saw didn't date back to Paul's day but it is sitting on a foundation that date's back to Paul's time. So, it is very likely that there was a synagogue in this very location when Paul visited. This synagogue was also known for having some very old scrolls in it. One of them, supposedly, had a note written in it about Saul from Jerusalem visiting the synagogue. This could possibly have been an extra-biblical reference to Paul visiting this city. However, the scrolls disappeared when the Germans rounded up the Jews from this quarter during World War II and has not turned up since.
Another highlight from out time in Berea was a Greek Pentecostal pastor. We met him on our walk to the Jewish quarter. He asked if we would come in his church and sing a hymn. So we obliged. It was beautiful to sing in his church. However, the highlight came as he began to talk about his ministry. Many Jews come to the city to visit this synagogue. So, he has many new testaments with the picture of the synagogue on the cover. He hands them out to Jews as a "souvenir" and has an opportunity to share the gospel with them. He also has been doing ministry with the Syrian refugees in Greece. He is sharing the gospel with them regularly. He said that God is going a powerful work. He was very excited that this Islamic population was coming to him and he was jumping in the opportunity to share the gospel with them.
From Berea we visited Phillip II's tomb--Alexander the Great's father. A museum was built around the location where it was discovered. It was pretty cool to see the elaborate armor that was in the tomb and the elaborate jewelry. This doesn't necessarily have a direct connection with the Bible, but the Greek empire definitely influenced history and had ripple effects that entered into Biblical times.
From Phillip's tomb, we went to Meteora. Once again, this isn't a biblical site but it was pretty amazing. Meteora is a place in Greece where there are some very unusual rock formations. They shoot straight out of the ground, many of them looking like spires. Back in the 1100's some Greek Orthodox monks headed to this region and began to live in the caves of these rock structures. They were very ascetic monks and would live in these caves by themselves only on bread an water. Eventually, they began to build monasteries on top of these spires of rock. They were pretty spectacular. If I remember right, there were 20 different monasteries on these formations at one time and many different hermits loving in various caves throughout. I don't remember the exact number that are still remaining, but we saw around 10. Since they are in very precarious positions, entrance was very difficult. Many of the monks had to enter a net and be pulled up to the monetary by a pulley system or climb up by a series of rope ladders. Now, they have created some steps in the stone for visitors. It takes over 1,000 steps to get to some of them. We visited the easiest one which used to have a long draw bridge which is now turned into a regular bridge. We had a tremendous view from on top, looking over the city/valley below. I can't wait to show you the pictures.
Now, we're back at the hotel (which is in the village below Meteora). Tomorrow we head to Athens.