Archives for October 22, 2021

Last Saturday, Mary and I flew from Athens, Greece to Milan, Italy in the morning. At the airport, we discovered that we had failed to fill out one of the forms that was needed for my entrance into Italy, but by God’s grace we managed—not without stress—to complete the job in order to board the plane on time.

We were warmly greeted at the airport in Milan by Keith Jones, pastor of the Veritas International Church of Milan, and a young pastor named Marco who was wonderfully converted about half a dozen years ago. Pastor Jones served as the organizer of my itinerary, which included speaking ten times in three days. First up was a conference of five messages for about 150 attendees (photo #1; which is not a small conference for Italy!)—three addresses on Saturday and two sermons on the Lord’s Day—that revolved around the theme of how to live for God’s glory, particularly as exemplified by the Puritans. On Saturday, I spoke on vital Christianity for God’s glory, marriage and children-rearing for God’s glory, and embracing a Trinitarian view of God for God’s glory. On the Lord’s Day, I preached on worshiping God for His glory and on being united in utopian marriage with Christ for His glory. After the service on Lord’s day evening, I gave an address to a few dozen ministers and elders on the need for and challenges of holiness in the ministry (photo #2).

On Friday, October 15, we concluded our tour of following the footsteps of John and Paul in Greece and Turkey by traveling a scenic coast south of Athens down to Sounion which is overlooked by the Temple of Poseidon (photo #1). The scenery was breathtaking (photo #2)!

This was one of the best tours God has ever granted us to lead. David Woollin was a great help throughout, in edition to his speaking nearly ten times. I was privileged to speak about twenty times, half being lectures and the other half were short talks at various sites. I cannot help but remark that God wonderfully granted that, despite traveling through several downpours while on the bus en route to various sites, we never encountered rain while at the sites throughout this entire 12 day itinerary.

Early the following morning (last Saturday), we drove to the airport with most of our tour group who flew home, while Mary and I went on to Milan, Italy, where I was scheduled to speak ten times in the next three days.

On Thursday, our tour group of 39 headed out for the city of Corinth, Greece. On the way, we stopped to see the beautiful Corinthian Canal (photo #1), and visited nearby Canchrea, one of the two harbors of ancient Corinth (photo #2).

Paul most likely sailed from this place and it was also the home of the ancient Corinthian church to whom the apostle ministered and wrote 1 and 2 Corinthians. The city is located on the slopes of the towering Acorinth that was crowned in ancient times by the temple of Aphrodite (photo #3). Extensive ruins include several temples, water fountains, shops, public buildings, the largest Agora (gathering place) in the ancient world, and the Bema, where Paul met and was judged by the governor Gallio (photo #4). We also visited the Corinthian museum.

We then traveled back to our yacht, where we enjoyed a farewell dinner with our captain and crew, as well as our tour guide. Our group sang the naval hymn, “Eternal Father, Strong to Save,” to the captain and the crew. After I prayed for them, the captain movingly told us that this was the first time in all his years of serving as captain of ships that anyone had publicly prayed specifically for him (photo #5).