Jonathan and Dawn Clark

Sowing the Word amongst students in Athens

Working full time in ministry is always a privilege, but being in Athens has the added bonuses of taking part in something quite new – IFES Greece – and seeing the current crisis evolve from up close. Being in Athens, but not from Athens, has meant that our lives have not been hit the way that most Greek people’s have, for which we are grateful. To be able to live and work here while the world’s media have been focused on the city has been fascinating.

In some ways it has been a rather schizophrenic experience. On the one hand, life goes on as normal. Cafes, shops, buses, classrooms have all continued largely as normal, with the occasional blip for a strike. Even the recent capital controls imposed as a result of the July referendum only had the effect of increasing queuing time at ATMs. On the other hand, the word on the street has been about little else. The scale of the economic and political woes facing Greece means, unsurprisingly, that our friends and neighbours are preoccupied with just how bleak the future might be.

There is still much to do, but gradually the students are gaining confidence that God does his work by his Spirit through his Word

There are a couple of things that trouble me a little about all this. One is to do with reality versus perception. Given the dreadful state of the nation’s economy, how are we able to keep going seemingly as normal, in Athens at least? Are the violinists playing on as the Titanic sinks? Is the reality quite different from what the leaders across Europe are saying? Are the real costs being stored up for the future? Are the real hardships simply being faced by people other than those we know? Time will tell and yet the fact that life appears to be continuing as normal means that what you have been reading in the papers is not all there is to it.

The other issue is how Christians respond. If it is true that we are waiting for a better city (which we are!) then as churches and as individuals our attention should probably not be quite so taken up as
it appears to be with the rising and falling of a nation’s fortunes. God has given us a task – all of us – which is to build his church, and that task continues regardless of what the European powers-that-be determine about how Greece should run her affairs. I wonder if this means that what we need to hear in the midst of instability is the reminder that, of all people, Christians should be the calmest and most steadfast, given our hope and security elsewhere.

With all this going on, we’re grateful that student ministry has been able to continue largely unhindered. Not only that, but the past academic year has seen real progress as we work towards the establishment of a national, evangelistic, disciple-making IFES movement. There are now staff (at least part time) in three cities rather than just Athens, and there are groups (of at least two students!) in six, possibly seven cities. We have even heard reports of a couple of conversions as a result of personal witness.

There is still much to do, but gradually the students we work with are gaining confidence that God does his work by his Spirit through his word as his people live and speak for his Son – in his time. We are particularly pleased that Georgia in Thessaloniki and Vasilis in Athens will be joining us as part-time interns this year, and that Tim and Nicky Sandell have settled in Volos. The search goes on for a long-term national director, and for part-time staff in two other cities, but the pieces are falling into place for a movement increasingly effective in mobilising small numbers of believers to go about the task of sowing the Word patiently and faithfully to his glory.