BUT A POOR REFLECTION: Patmos today - let's see if we can get there!

Thursday, May 03, 2007

Patmos today - let's see if we can get there!

The bible is the worlds' best selling book. All reading enthusiasts know of the Book of Revelations, but not everyone is aware that it was written on Patmos or why a book about so much destruction was written in a place so beautiful and peaceful.

Saint John the Divine (also known as the beloved disciple of Jesus) was sent here in exile, Patmos in those days was a place for criminals because it was so inaccessible.

This is what I just read on this site about Patmos. This is the official site from Patmos - and I am still trying to find a church or Christian community on this famous island that I can get in touch with via email.

Let's see if we can get an answer to these general questions...

What is it like to live on Patmos?
Can you describe the natural environment for us (animals, plants, trees)?
Please tell us a little bit about the people from Patmos...

...and to these more specific questions for Christians living on Patmos today!

What are your fellowships like are they informal?
Do you meet in homes?
Do any of you have a vision for the church today?

Mike, thanks for your questions that I can ask fellow believers living on Patmos today - if I manage to find them!

PATMOS
37°20”N 26°34”E.
INHABITANTS: 3,000 approximately.
AREA: 34 square kilometers.
COASTLINE: 63 kilometers

Some websites that I have found...

Patmos Times (local news paper - in Greek!)
Official website of the Monastry of Saint John - if you open this link, you will see an opening page, you must click on the single Greek word below to enter! But than again it's al Greek to me... But - and this is really cool - you can also listen online to the choir from this monastry!
More Patmos links

The shape of Patmos reminds me of a seahorse!

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God loves us

Have you ever wondered why God gives so much? We could exist on far less. He could have left the world flat and grey; we wouldn’t have known the difference. But he didn’t. He splashed orange in the sunrise and cast the sky in blue. And if you love to see geese as they gather, chances are you’ll see that too. Did he have to make the squirrel’s tail furry? Was he obliged to make the birds sing? And the funny way that chickens scurry or the majesty of thunder when it rings? Why give a flower fragrance? Why give food its taste? Could it be he loves to see that look upon your face?

Max Lucado - He Chose the Nails

Sadhu Sundar Singh

I do not condemn theologians wholesale, but it is unfortunately the fashion in Western thinking to doubt and deny everything. I protest this tendency. I never advise anyone to consult theologians, because all too often they have completely lost all sense of spiritual reality. They can explain Greek words and all that, but they spend too much time among their books and not enough time with the Master in prayer. It is not that I oppose all education, but education without life is certainly dangerous. You must stop examining spiritual truths like dry bones! You must break open the bones and take in the life-giving marrow.

Oswald Chambers

In the Bible clouds are always associated with God. Clouds are the sorrows, sufferings, or providential circumstances, within or without our personal lives, which actually seem to contradict the sovereignty of God. Yet it is through these very clouds that the Spirit of God is teaching us how to walk by faith. If there were never any clouds in our lives, we would have no faith. "The clouds are the dust of His feet" (Nahum 1:3). They are a sign that God is there. What a revelation it is to know that sorrow, bereavement, and suffering are actually the clouds that come along with God! God cannot come near us without clouds— He does not come in clear-shining brightness. (Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, July 29th)