Malta...the adventure moves on

Malta....It stirs the imagination to visit this gem of an island. From the St. Paul's shipwreck adventure in the Book of Acts to pirates and knights of the Crusades, this is a place of loads of history. I also found these two young men looking like Greek gods near the entrance to the Old City.

Our teaching subject this week was on relationships. It is interesting to be learning about how to relate to one another with the backdrop of an island full of fortifiications that were built to protect them from their enemies. As individuals, we examined the issues in our personal lives that hinder each of us from being able to form healthy relationships. As we dismantled our strongholds, we examined the injustices that had hurt each of one of us. By the end of this week, we all seem to be carrying a few less heavy stones of unforgiveness and hurt.

On our second day of teaching, a storm had blown in and the ship was moving like a cork in the water...not very helpful if you are trying to listen to teaching. In praying about how to handle the situation, we felt a nudge to ask for a classroom from the port authority. They very graciously gave us the terminal waiting room in which to have our class. It might have echoed but what a blessing to be on solid ground talking about "relationships". A good lesson in seeing how God is watching over us at every point of this journey!

On to Kalamata, Greece...may the seas be calm. Paul might not have minded being shipwrecked on an island but we want to make it to Greece without too many waves!

On to the French Riviera

As we headed into the French Rivera, our subject of study was the Kingdom of God. What could be more of a backdrop for study then being in the harbor of an ancient port near Nice that is beautiful to the eye. VilleFranche is a lovely harbor near Nice and Monaco.

As our speaker, Scott Tjernagel, turned our minds to understanding the Kingdom of God, we began to talk about the inequality of wealth in our world and how we can be challenged to understand the gospel’s influence on how we use our wealth and power. I thought as I walked around these beautiful places that many who have so much would use their influence to build communities that are caring for those less fortunate around them. Our students will be going from the ship to spend two months working on relief projects. The one group will be going to Guinea Bissau to work on building an orphanage for two months. The other group is going to Bethlehem to work with the poor and so in both cases, the contrast from this wealthy port will be stark.

As the week progressed, the group began to see the need for them to see the teachings of Jesus and the Old Testament as leading them to understand a stewardship of the whole earth. Often we think of our faith as only bringing us personal joy and freedom which it does, but the message of Jesus was revolutionary in its call to bring to earth God’s desire for restoration of the whole earth and every part of society.

For me, it was a wonderful week of having my brother Scott with us as the speaker sharing his passion for building the kingdom of God and for discipling young people. What a privilege to be able to share part of the sea adventure with him and to be able to send him back to New Braunfels, Texas to continue to see our faith community growing in living out the gospel. One of their projects has been for the church to help clean up a local river. New Braunfels is a haven for tourists year round who come to enjoy riding inner tubs through the river and who typically drink a lot while floating. As these cans are thrown into the water, the church has been diving for the cans and trying to clean up a small area in the hopes of awakening the community’s need to take care of creation.

Journey into Forgiveness...Marseilles

Marseilles…if one has seen the movie The Count of Monte Cristo, then it is impossible to be able to sail into the Marseilles harbor without thinking about the theme of injustice and revenge. In the bay is the famous prison and then one enters the main harbor right in the center of the city which is sheltered behind huge fortress walls, and so we rested there for a couple of nights as we began the week’s teaching.

Our subject for the week was forgiveness. As we engaged in looking at the subject of forgiveness in their own lives and in the lives of communities, the truth of God’s love became clearer to each of us. Our speaker, Padraig Twomey leads a forgiveness project in Belfast that is teaching forgiveness principles in the local schools. Whether the school is Protestant or Catholic there is an awareness of learning principles that could help change the next generation of Northern Irish.

At the end of our harbor was a beautiful Catholic church that I and others attended on Sunday morning. As we walked in, there was such a rich sense of God’s presence. As we left the service, I tried to talk to the priest how deeply I had been touched during the service with the peace of God. As he listened to me, he smiled and replied “go and live the message that you have heard here.” This priest’s face will be for me, the image of a Frenchman from Marseilles that I will remember. Here at the gates of the city was a priest teaching his congregation to live out the life of Jesus through love and forgiveness.

Through the week we also discussed two movies where the two fictional men had reacted to injustice in their lives through using revenge to win the justice their hearts desired. In both movies, the subject was brought up but ignored because forgiving was not the aim of their hearts. Both characters sought vengeance against their enemy and were almost destroyed by their acts of vengeance. When we compared this to the rewards of forgiveness in our lives, we all gave thanks that we have been called to way of living through God’s mercy that brings freedom to our lives and we want to share that good news with others.

On to Nice……..

Ibiza...a spectacular adventure

Having missed several ports due to lack of time and internet cafes, I don’t want to leave out the adventures that the school has been having as we travelled from Malaga, Spain to Sicily. So sorry to work backwards but the chronicles of our travels wouldn’t be complete without a few of these adventures.

In sailing from Malaga, we sailed for the island of Ibiza. We were dancing on the deck singing a popular song about going to the island. Ibiza is an island of indescribable beauty that captivates the eyes of the visitor. We harbored in En Cana which is a town that caters to family visitors. Our host Roy and Catherine Dixon, Mercy Trucks, welcomed us to the island with a brunch at a local restaurant owned by friends. The local press came out to interview our team, and we were able to tell about our adventures as an international community. The Spanish press also came on board to videotape the school as an example of a multicultural Christian school, and it was broadcasted a few nights later on a popular channel in Spain. It was also a time for Mercy Trucks to be able to explain their relief work.

Roy rented jeeps for the team for the remainder of the day, and we set off to travel around the island which was great fun and ended with us having a feast on the Dixon’s home property in the mountains. As we returned to the ship that evening, the storms clouds that we had seen all day had built into a major storm. As a school, we suddenly found ourselves stranded on the island unable to get out to the ship which was at anchor in the bay. But before we could panic, Roy announced that he thought he knew who would take us in for the night.

Another set of Roy and Catherine’s friends owned holiday homes near the restaurant where we had eaten earlier that day. This Christian family had been praying for us during our stay on Ibiza, and they offered us three apartments where the school was very comfortably housed for the next three days until the sea calmed down.

It was stormy outside but inside we were able to carry on with our teaching with Anne who was our weekly speaker. She took up the challenge of creating a classroom in our living room as well as helping us organize our meals. A real live/learn situation.

We were able to make friends with people around us who had seen us on tv and now knew that our ship had to leave us behind as they sailed to a safer harbor on the other side of the island. For all of us, this was a time of seeing how well God was watching over each of us. Through the goodwill of the Dixon’s friends we were well cared for through this time. For the ship’s crew, they learned how their teamwork saw them through a mighty wind.

The rest of our week was also full of adventure but we all left this time overwhelmed by the graciousness of people who had opened their homes and hearts to us.

Catching Up in Sicily

I can't believe it has been so long since my last entry. We have had very few internet connections and a busy school so the mixture has wrecked havoc on my travelogue! So hopefully I can catch up with the journey while we are here in Sicily.

We are in Catonia, Sicily with Mt. Etna in the background. It is gorgeous here although a bit more wintery then we all expected. We are in week 8 of the school lectures and having our teaching on board the ship has been rather exciting and challenging. Thankfully this week we are in a calm port where we have easy access to walking into the city. We had one speaker teaching as the we were moving from one port to the new one with the wind whipping up. Poor Padraig did very well staying in his chair as the ship was rocking!

In a few hours we are off to Church which will be the first cross-cultural church experience for the team. The pastor and a member of his church arrived yesterday at the ship carrying various goodies from a local bakery. Yummy! I don't think any area of the world can probably compare with the delicacies of the Mediterranean countries....it is just all delicious....well most things are great.

Over the weeks, Erica has managed to introduce all of us to delicacies from the region we are in. This week's unusual find was the swordfish...we didn't actually eat the fish...just smelled it. The last fish that Erica brought home is called a devil fish and it was actually despite its looks, rather tasty. It looked like a happy face with loads of teeth!

Well, off to church and more will follow of hurricane force winds and the open doors of welcome in France and Italy!