The Holy Land

Good Tuesday to ya!

Holy Week. That week when we span the Passover to the empty tomb.

Holy Land. Those words, I'm certain, are indelibly linked to Palestine and modern day Israel. The West Bank and parts of Jordan may slip into the definition just as the door of our minds slams shut. That's the "Holy Land", right?

Not for everyone. And by that I don't mean Saudi Arabia and the city of Mecca as the alternative. Know when that building above was built and what its name is?

For me, for us--Jean and me--the Holy Land has always been what is now the modern Republic of Turkey. Turkey is the land of Apostle Paul's birth. His hometown is still there and known by the same name, Tarsus, to this day. It's the land of Ephesus. The land of Nicaea and the councils that gave us a Christian creed by that name. It's the land of over half the place names in the New Testament from Acts of the Apostles to the end of the canon.

And this week our President has been there mending fences and visiting places where Jean and I walked.

Face it. After the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem in AD 70 and the substantial demise of Christ followers among people of Jewish ancestry there, the church and the faith you know today came to you through the Gentile world known as Asia Minor: Turkey, the Holy Land of faith for me. How much of this Holy Land do we really know?

Shalom,

Pastor Roger