The Gospels

Our blog doesn't really have a theme. We don't write frequently enough for one to emerge. It's a bit random, but that's OK I think. We just pop stuff down occasionally, as and when 'stuff' crops up, and we have time and memory to post. 

Some 'stuff' has been cropping up for a while now relating to the gospels - the four of them at the start of the New Testament. I think this has been brewing since about 1993! 

Here's the background.

[And a disclaimer: none of this is likely to be particularly new or noteworthy for anyone reading this: it's all rather Noddy-ish, but I don't think that means it's not useful - even if only for me, a bear of little brain, to properly take note and make real progress. Enough flannel.]

Being a member of a good UCCF [IFES Great Britain for the uninitiated] Christian Union from 93-96 I was enormously privileged to take part in the very first 'gospel project', the fruit of Nigel Lee's walk with the Lord. This was called 'The Big Idea' (can't find it on google anywhere!) and was based on giving thousands of copies of a specially-produced Luke's gospel to students across the UK. (Anyone reading this remember that?) We saw a number of people become Christians at Birmingham.

A big part of the project was studying the whole book in our CU small groups so we were learning from God's word ourselves, and being prepared and equipped to engage meaningfully with others as we offered it.

Dave Burke, now (I think) a pastor in North East England was the main speaker at a mission week and I remember him saying to us at one point, perhaps in the preparatory house party, that a serious Christian will build in to his regular Bible reading a continual revisiting of the four gospel books. I sort of took it on board.

Three years later we repeated the project nationally, this time using John's gospel, calling it Breakthrough. Again, good stuff. We spent loads of time in Birmingham studying John and preparing simple evangelistic Bible studies. (One girl converted through that project  - unknown to me at the time - ended up sitting in our kitchen in Athens about five years ago. I wrote about it here.)

A few years later we were heavily involved in the Identity project, based on Mark, whilst on UCCF staff in the East Midlands, and I began to get to know Mark well (really for the first time in my life, I'm ashamed to say). Since then - 2001 - I've had cause to go back to Mark again and again - on Paros every year, for example, and not got bored yet! Even yesterday, sitting with Giannis in Starbucks to help him prepare for his small group Bible study tonight in west Athens, we were in Mark 4 and I saw something that I'd never noticed before, despite hearing the definitive teaching series on the whole book at Beeston Free [seeds are very growy things…] and despite having studied Mark 4 dozens of times in the past 12 years.

This is turning out longer and windier than I'd expected. Sorry.

Anyway, thanks to UCCF and Beeston Free I'd had good training in three of the four gospels (although Luke is a bit hazy) but really had never seriously gotten into Matthew. Everyone knows some bits of the book, of course, and some bits are rather over-quoted, if that's possible, but hardly any of us know the book as a whole. In some ways that's neither here nor there but we've noticed all sorts of significant issues in ministry and church life and discipleship that often stem from a mishandling of the gospel books.

Here's an example - and the spur to write this post this morning - from Matthew, which I've at long last got round to studying properly. I've just been reading Matthew 2 and something made me glance over to chapter 10. You know how people often take the 'what would Jesus do?' kind of approach to life and ministry? I've long thought it was a faulty question, starting at Birmingham when some CU members were agitating for the CU to take on a broader approach to our mission on campus 'because Jesus wasn't only about evangelism'. Well, true, but our CU commitment to evangelism on campus wasn't a result of saying 'Jesus did evangelism so we will too'. The gospel books don't work like that. When people talk about Jesus doing all sorts of things and we ought to do them too, it's often out of a motivation to make more of Jesus, and with a concern that a more conservative reading seems to seek to limit the ministry of Jesus and limit the ministry of the church. The sad irony however is that it actually ends up making less of Jesus and more of us, because it easily results in missing the point that the gospel books are trying to make about Jesus - who he is and what he came to do - that has much less to do with what we're to do and much more to do with what we're to make of him.

Anyway, the example from Matthew 10 made me chuckle because if one takes the approach of 'do what Jesus did' we'd have to end up disobeying the Great Commission - the over-quoted bit of the book. In Matthew 10:5 Jesus explicitly tells the disciples to NOT go to the Gentiles. So are we supposed to take the gospel to all nations or not? Jesus says not to! How are we supposed to read that kind of book when at one point we read that we're not supposed to go to the Gentiles and later on we are? Which command do we disobey? (These are rhetorical questions by the way!)

The long and short of this meander is that we've got to learn to read those books properly. If we don't we go wrong in all sorts of directions. It's not rocket science.

This book is really helping with this whole issue. It's worth a read if anyone's interested in getting into the gospels better, though the main job is for us just to learn to read the gospels as books, rather than as a series of disconnected passages that we don't quite know how to use. Perhaps one of the questions, rather than 'what would Jesus do?', is 'what are we supposed to make of Jesus given that he did that?'

Forgive the blather, if you've got this far. Dave Burke was probably right to say that we should be regularly in the gospels, especially if by doing so we learn to read them well, appreciate Jesus more deeply, trust and love him more fully, and set about helping to encourage fellow-believers to stop missing his point so regularly.

New student year, new students, new opportunities

We've just returned from a really encouraging start to the new year - around 40 students came along to the opening meeting of the year. Between us we laid out the vision for the year and some of the opportunities that there'll be to be trained, encouraged and equipped to make Christ known in word and deed on the deeply lost campuses of Athens and beyond.

The chap in the green t-shirt addressing the 40 or so students is Dimitris, the brand new director of IFES Greece. He's half-time. Just visible behind his back is Christos who's working with us for 10-15 hours a week. Not present is Manos (working 10-15 hours a week) who was supposed to be running part of the evening but had a motorbike accident on his way to it. I've just heard he escaped with one cut needing stitches. Every time we gather students together in Athens something bad or obstructive happens, but we're relieved he's OK.

It was a really good start to the year, with clarity on vision and purpose, lots of good things for people to get involved with (1-2-1 support, small group Bible studies explicitly shaped to get people living and speaking for Jesus on campus, an advance notice for Paros 2014 plus a regular series of new leaders' training and regular cold-contact outreach - and a good vibe to boot. 

We're really pleased with the start, but now comes the hard part: encouraging them to really get involved and nail their colours to the gospel mast, and helping them to learn (often from scratch) how to really meaningfully engage their fellow students with the good news. This is not going to be helped by the fact that many universities are still closed because they're unable to operate in the current financial climate.

Watch this and other spaces for updates.

Summer word cloud

It's still quite tiring living away from home

You may know that we're hoping to get a place for Ruth in pre-school so she can begin to spread her wings (she's keen on this) and get going in Greek (she's not so keen on this). Registration for said place is turning out rather trickier than we'd imagined.

The other three kids got their places with a bit of paperwork: birth certificates, UK medical records, proof of parental employment etc. Turns out that bureaucratic levels have been stepped up. We can no longer use proof of employment from outside of Greece (stamp from a Greek agency needed). We can no longer use Ruth's standard issue Nottingham birth certificate (non-Greek ones need an official seal before they can be officially translated). UK medical preparation wasn't enough (various jabs that aren't standard there are standard here).

All this is mostly fair enough - we've no huge complaint about that, as the authorities are entitled to request whatever they feel is necessary to run the education system. But what has struck me this week after trying yet again to get Ruth through the necessary hoops is that, despite having been here over six years, it is still difficult encountering all these obstacles. Greek families have to do the same, but they're in the system already so much of it is more easily obtainable, and the normality of it being home culture for them would mean the frustration is perhaps far more lightly borne.

It was the way in which it made me feel so tired and frustrated that struck me. 

There was a moment in the translation office having been told - politely, fairly and firmly - that the standard certificate was not enough when I just stood in the middle of the Greek/English section of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs not quite knowing where to go or what to do. I think I may have wandered around in a couple of small circles, thinking through our various options and suddenly feeling very, very tired.

I'm not writing this to describe any level of suffering or hardship, but rather to get into black and white where we're at regarding culture stress and adjustment. Despite all the progress made, there are some things that will perhaps always feel thoroughly alien and frustrating. 

Welcome back to Athens

It's good to be back in Athens, which is both home and not a horrible place to live! Feeling at home is not the same thing as being entirely at ease however, and some things will probably never cease to cause us to realise how different by character, culture and temperament we are. They're usually quite trivial, such as the following incident, which I've put down here to illustrate a little of the cultural gap we try and bridge whenever we leave the house (and often in the house too).

On the way back from school with Hannah I popped into the local supermarket (been there way over 100 times) for onions and bread: goods worth €1.40. €5 paid, €3.60 due in change (I didn't get an E in A-level maths for nothing).

Taking the change from the lady, it briefly crossed my mind that it looked a little light, but pocketed it and then took it out again about 5 seconds later to check. I definitely had the €1.40 rather than the €3.60.

I caught up with the rapidly retreating assistant and explained what had happened.
Me: 'Excuse me, I think you've not given me the correct change.'
Shop assistant: '[Slightly irritably] Why did you do that?'
'Ummm...well you've given me the wrong part of the fiver'
'Surely you've made a mistake?'
'Er, no, I've got the 1.40 here.'
'You've probably got the rest in another pocket?'
'[Remaining very calm] No, just this and my keys.'
'Pfff...well I'll have to get the key for the till then won't I...'
'Thanks very much'.
'...'
'OK, bye!'
'...'

Note how in the entire course of this conversation I managed not to say 'sorry' (which non-English readers should know is how we feel whenever someone else is remotely put out on our account, even if we're not at fault...probably because we're aware of how much wrong we've done in the world. Sorry.).

The joke goes that when the verb 'to be at fault' is taught to primary school kids, it goes like this:
Δεν φταίω (It's not my fault)
Φταις (It's your fault)
Φταί (It's his/her fault)
Δεν φταίμε (It's not our fault)
Φταίτε (It's your fault)
Φταίνε (It's their fault)

Repent and believe the good news, Jesus says. Repentance requires the humility to stop saying 'it's your fault' and accept that actually it's very much mine. 

A slightly wandering train of thought on a plane

I was flying back to England after a wonderful time on Paros, and loving reading this book. 

It’s going slowly. First, I left it in Athens when we went to England. 

Second, I kept trying to read it but found that I was with great people to talk to so did that instead - thank you Team Paros and JJ Wyatt, Ellie Maffett and Will Woolnough in particular.

Third, I found it necessary to have the occasional siesta to keep me going through the late-night card games, the beach evangelism and the volleyball-for-the-gospel. 

It is however quite brilliant. Thank you Tim Vickers for giving it to me.

I’ve just read this section, which comes as part of a chapter exposing the myth that the ancient pagan world was joyous and vigorous, at one with the cosmos and at peace with itself, whilst Christianity was essentially a great big kill-joy, diseased with ‘bloodless antisensualism’, exerting an ‘icy and withering embrace’ on a vibrant pagan culture.

During the Paros beach mission we enjoyed a brilliant series of Bible studies in Mark. This means that fresh in my mind are lots of Markian gospel emphasies. 

So the gospel is good news? The main reason why it is good news of course is that the gospel tells of God’s free gift of life and forgiveness for sinful people - people whose hearts are desperately sick and beyond cure, apart from the Christ who came for such sick people. People who know they are dogs, worthy only of the crumbs under the table. (One of the highlights of studying Mark is having the eye-opening moment that the disciples only experienced after the resurrection, but we are privy to rather earlier: have you still not understood about the bread? Have a read of chapters 5-8 if you’ve no idea what I’m on about). 

The free gift is a cure for the sinfully sick, it’s food for the hungry-for-God, it’s forgiveness for the helplessly sinful rebel; sight for the blind-to-the-Christ is guaranteed, proved and inaugurated by the actually-resurrected King who had suffered and died in our place, drinking for us the cup of wrath that was rightly ours to drink, making possible the ripping of the excluding curtain and opening the way directly into the Holy of Holies.

As I write this I’ve got Chris Martin singing in my ears (thank you Ted & Rachel Watts) of how ‘life goes on, it gets so heavy...in the night the stormy night she closed her eyes, in the night the stormy night away she flies, and dreamed of para- para- paradise’.

The good news that Chris Martin probably hasn’t accepted (he’s definitely heard it) is just so good. We don’t have to dream of it. We don’t have to run away from the storms. We don’t have to escape a world of disappointment and shattered hopes. Jesus came into exactly that world bringing good news, which is ours by repenting of our rebellion and believing the True King. 

No need for fake saints to stand for us. 

No need for the false hope of impressing God with our virtuous lives - who can honestly kid themselves that they are such?

No need to invent rules to make us clean.

No need to fear that following Jesus makes us miss out on the good things - there is nothing we could give up or miss out on in this life that will not be far-outweighed by the glory to come.

All the time there’s this free offer of direct friendship, sonship and blessing, all tied up in the simple act of listening to Jesus, the Son who is loved by the Father and who has all authority to forgive, welcome and bless. And all the time people go on with their self-delusion that they’ll be ok on their own, or that there’s no possibility of any other way to be ok, or that the good news is so ridiculously good and free that it can’t be something for them. And so they turn to the beach to satisfy, or to the saints to mediate grace, or to science to explain their otherwise meaningless existence - though it’s still ultimately meaningless - or to a discredited communism to build the impossible utopia so cruelly promised. 

We’ve been told good news, we’ve believed the doctor’s diagnosis, we know we’re terminally ill, facing wrath and hell, but that the doctor is good and infallibly cures all who come to him knowing they need him, and we’ve begun a life that is anchored in the first resurrection, knowing that no amount of suffering and dying between now and the second resurrection - a resurrection that will be made visible by the Father’s glory and all his holy angels - is too great to make it not worth enduring.

So it’s good news. Not mere information or a mere worldview, but a cosmic declaration of and from and about an eternally good and glorious and gracious and great King, Jesus the Son of Man who suffered and died and rose again.

We live in a world where, like in those early pagan centuries, the vast majority of people are trapped in a dark, joyless, despondency. The gospel of Jesus doesn't stifle light and goodness and freedom and creativity: it reveals all of that. Atheist Delusions was such a brilliant read because it reminded me that the goodness of the good news is good indeed: better than this pagan world thinks, and better even than most Christians know - and that despite protestations to the contrary, modern secularism offers nothing good in its place. 

Paros 2013

It looks like our team for Paros is just about full, and it's far bigger than in previous years so we'll have more options for what we get up to I think. We'll make sure news makes its way off the island while we're there so you can follow progress. I think it will be a combination of twitter (@clarksinathens), this blog and the facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/ParosSummerTeam) so if you want to be connected there's plenty of choice.

For some (limited) visual interest the screenshot below shows the place we camp (the northern shore of the eastern bay, just outside the main town - follow the bay around from the port [A] to the broadest sandy beach), plus the even nicer beach where we meet people on the beach volley court and in the bar etc. 

If the picture doesn't show up completely you can click it to enlarge, I hope.

The open tabs show what's going on at my desk at the moment.

Spot the difference

I don't know the ins and outs of this set up, so these photos could be misleading (a picture can tell a thousand wrong words) but I think they're indicative of a shocking and frustrating thing.

Greek bureaucracy is infamous, and this snapshot is from the police station that deals with immigrants, which I had to visit today to renew my residency permit to complete the ownership documents for a car we've just bought (proper family car that we can all fit into  - woohoo and thank you for your support in that project).

This is the room that deals with the EU applicants. There were two people in the room waiting and one official serving them. I have to return tomorrow at 6.30am to complete my process. It will cost 23 cents, if it's the same as last time. A lady will sell me that stamp from a separate window. The official barely gave me the time of day and I had to beg his attention three times simply to find out where I need to be tomorrow morning. (I'm still not totally sure where exactly the 'back door' is.


This is the rooms that seemed to be dealing with the rest of the Balkans (including the wife of our local kiosk owner, a friend of ours, who is to the left of the second picture with a dark cardigan over her shoulders) judging by facial features and accents.



This group outside seemed to be mostly Africans. I'm not sure why they weren't inside the building - could be a totally different process, but probably isn't. You can't see but the line stretches a long way behind the barrier, and the official in the white shirt was pretty agitated. I was expecting to see lots of Asians (from Iran across to Bangladesh) but perhaps today wasn't their day, or they're being dealt with at another station.

It is indescribably chaotic and hopeless for those from non-EU countries. And I probably shouldn't have been taking photos at a police station but I didn't see any signs...

What we've been learning about typical Greek students

Between Christmas and Easter I was on two campuses regularly with small groups of our students, getting on with evangelism to strangers, hoping for two things: first, to sow the seed of the word to whomever we could and, second, to grow confidence and skill among the members of IFES Greece.

We anticipated this being a small beginning, and it has been, but here's a couple of observations.

This conversation lasted an hour

Typical Greek unbelievers fall into three broad categories. The largest group could be described as apathetic atheists. This means that the vast majority of our approaches to people are rebuffed immediately with total indifference and unwillingness to engage. It's not surprising: we don't resent them for it. They have no reason whatsoever to engage with us. Apart from the fact that there is an inherent level of suspicion about anyone who wants to talk religion or spirituality of Jesus, it is not in the Greek social make-up to profer interest in strangers. Greeks are warm and close to those with whom they are warm and close, and aren't like the English, with their sense of obligation to be friendly to total strangers. (That's an observation, not a value judgement - there and pros and cons of both types of relationality!)


Another group are the crusading atheists - the communists. They sincerely believe that the USSR is the utopia we should all be aiming for. It was the happiest, most free society that there has ever been - and it's capitalist propaganda that tells otherwise - and Greece needs to become a Marxist state. They are therefore committed - in a friendly, non-violent way - to the removal of God from society. 

This is the entrance to the Law school. Not hard to see what the most visible ideology is.

I have found them to be the easiest to talk with, but they are dedicated to their cause and are reluctant to discuss Jesus specifically. Some of them are still Orthodox, but atheist ones! (Yes, I know, that ought to be oxymoronic. But it seems frequently possible to be vociferously communist and retain a sense of loyalty to Orthodox roots. I think the pattern is that they remain actively communist through their youth, then revert to more 'practicing' Orthodox when they get married and have children, because the baptism of their children becomes a pressing issue. Having said that, it may be that we are at a watershed, and the current generation of Greek young people may be ones to buck that trend and reject Orthodox roots even into their family life).

The final main group are the sincere Orthodox. This is the smallest group by far, and it's also hard to talk with such folks about Jesus because the veil of institutional religiosity is heavy. It may be that some have real, saving faith. It's hard to discern, and it's not our responsibility to do so, but it seems highly unlikely that significant numbers know and trust Christ. It seems theologically tricky to be a 'good Orthodox' and be a real believer, because to be so one needs to accept and trust things that make the gospel an entirely other gospel. (This isn't the place to go into detail on that).

Sorry for the quality. On the left are two lads reading a New Testament we gave them, and on the right one of our members is chatting to the students in the first picture. ALL of the posters and banners are urging a Marxist uprising.

Scattered among these main types are those who have a real hunger for truth. Not many people are offering truth. Our challenges are to keep proclaiming it, to learn the skills to engage with each person we meet, unique and precious as they are, and to gather and mobilise more believers to be active in proclamation and public in good works.

Summer team on Paros (which is a very lovely Greek island)

You can find details about what we'll be doing on this facebook page and on this blog.

Back to the blog

Hello all,

Yet again we've not been blogging, but both Dawn and I have various things in mind to blog about - some weighty, others less so. To try and help restart things here's a photo from today which illustrates three things (at least):

1. It's warm and sunny in Athens. Winter sort of set in, and we had the heating on for a while, but it seems to have fizzled out somewhat. This is a good thing because the oil for the heating has rocketed in price.

2. Building work has re-started on the kids' new school building. There has been no progress since before Christmas, which I guess is down to cash flow.

3. There are owls on the perspex fencing, because the owl is the symbol of Athina, the patron goddess of Athens. 

We really hope they finish soon as we want Joel to have at least his final year of primary school in a shiny new building.



Watch out for updates (on the blog, not the building).