It's All Greek to Me: Part 3

I'm at the point where I can definitely say: Athens is no Rome. Are we having a bad time? No! God forbid! But it has noticeably less magic than Rome. We walked around Rome, wistfully noting how we could live in Rome. If only our jobs moved us there. Or, if only we married an Italian. Oh to be a Roman citizen! In Athens, it's more like: "I could never live here." I leave room for the fact that Athens may have a hidden charm that we're not here long enough to discover.

Acropolis

Today was our touristy day. First stop: The Acropolis. We've been treated to glimpses of the Acropolis since we arrived. We can see a corner of it from our terrace, and we saw the whole thing from atop the rooftop bar, A for Athens, last night, and you can't miss it while walking around the Plaka neighborhood. But all that is from afar. Up close, it's pretty impressive (my camera took THAT picture!!).

What you can't see here, but what I noticed everywhere was construction. They would call it "restoration" but they're definitely adding and taking away (the taken away pieces are placed in the Acropolis Museum). The added pieces are holding up the other pieces, making it more accessible to visitors, etc., etc.

What was interesting about the construction (to me) is that much of it was to fix or correct the errors of past restoration projects. What was meant to preserve was actually destructive. What was meant to help was actually harmful.

This made me think about the church and the preservation of the gospel. How often is the gospel treated like the Acropolis?

Note: the Acropolis only put me in the mind of the church/gospel. This is not a direct allegory for the following reason:

The Acropolis would crumble on its on without intervention, but the gospel of Christ stands forever...without our help. "The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever" - Isaiah 40:8

New steps built over old steps - Acropolis

The true, unadulterated gospel is super hard to find. Not just because of evil in the world and passage of time. But, also, the gospel has been distorted and changed due to well-meaning preservation attempts. Sometimes the "fixes" are to make the gospel culturally relevant or politically correct. Sometimes, we "fix" the gospel to make it more accessible, so we can fit a universal gospel to a specific demographic. Usually, this is well-meaning (we can even view it as kingdom building), but much of it has resulted in the recent need for correction and restoration. The "fixes" might fill up pews, but there is only one thing that saves: faith. And faith is only gained one way:

So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ. - Romans 10:17

The above verse speaks specifically to the preached word, so we have to be certain that the word we hear and the word teachers teach is that of Christ. We have to be careful that when we're building new stairs over old ones...that they still lead to the same place: repentance and a true/saving faith in the finished work of JC.

IN OTHER NEWS

We had a lot of fun today. The Acropolis was pretty exhausting (as it is high upon a hill), so we decided to treat ourselves to some frozen drinks (orange juice in the case of Bianca). We were so happy to get those drinks. They cost us 4.50 Euro.

A few minutes later we realized we had been had, as we passed a Mickie D's advertisement. How does a drink cost more than a meal at McDonald's? So then we calculated how much these drinks really cost us:

4.50 EUR x fx rate of 1.32 = $5.94 + $0.06 worth of pride

SIX DOLLARS for frozen lemonade! OMG. Look at us. Look at how happy we are to be fooled (this photo taken before realization hit us). 

We then hiked around, climbed to the top of a hill and saw an ancient statue of muses. I would add a picture, but one more picture download might kill this post. So...you'll have to imagine: 100s of steps up. We finally get to the top, and it's like a rock. I felt pretty let down. I saw this monument from atop the Acropolis and it looked so pretty from far away. I thought: "I have to go to there. " I was starting to wallow in self-pity when Bianca says: "Hey! This side is cool" and it was! I was looking at the back of the historical site! Once I went around I could see the body of the Muses (their heads were gone. Heads are a luxury in Greece).

For dinner, we went to a Greek restaurant that had so-so food, but excellent ambiance. Live music. Plate breaking. People yelling "OPA!" it was legit. Bianca had a plate broken over her head. Sitting across from us were two British gals (Dani and LeAnn) who pretty much made our night. They were hilarious. They had been slightly over-served and kept yelling out random things like:

• "Stimata!" (Greek for "stop it!")
• "Stupid fat hobbit!" 
• My dinner was trout, which came to me on fire. They began chanting: "The fish, the fish, the fish is on fire. We don't need no water...let the fish burn!" 

Random. They also asked us fun questions: "What is meatloaf?", "What are yams?" and my favorite: "Are you guys in uni?" As in, are we in COLLEGE?!!! Woot woot. Old people looking young. We left the restaurant with them to go to a place called 42. But on our way out Bianca almost got french kissed by a slightly gross older Greek man. He kissed her about three times, all of them missing her mouth by inches due to some last second head turns. As a (bad) friend...I did nothing. I didn't think she was going to make it. She's got skillz.

We stayed out way too late kicking it with 25 years olds from Kent and Brighton. But, they were awesome, and we'll look out for them on Facebook!