Are Christian holidays to biblical sites more than just 'sun, sea, sand and Scriptures'? Paul White and Philippa Jones went on a tour of the Seven Churches of Asia to find out.
The wind took Christ's words and whipped them away. We were standing on castle battlements surrounded by the sprawling Turkish city of Izmir. It was the second stop on our whistle-stop tour of the Seven Churches of Asia. The Revelation letter from Christ to his church was being read aloud at Smyrna.
From our precarious vantage point, we could see the ancient site of Smyrna - no more than a handful of pillars on a patch of greenery in the heart of the city. But Christ's words still stood. 'I know your affliction and your poverty,' he spoke to Christians he knew and loved. Surrounded by street children selling bread for what they could, it seemed nothing had changed - except where once there was a thriving indigenous church, now there was none. It was a glaring absence that became more familiar as the tour progressed and drove us to pray for Turkey, its people and its Christian revival.
We hadn't expected to. Before we set off, Christian holidays seemed a convenient way to soak up the rays and appease the conscience. Travelling with Christian company MasterSun would take us to the Med., while bypassing raunchiness, drunkenness and shady dealing we thought. Besides, the brochure promised 'a style and a mission quite unlike any other holiday company' with the 'friendship of like-minded Christians' at literally no extra charge. What could be better than a holiday to refresh body, mind and spirit? The answer surprised us.
Operation World records Turkey as the largest unreached country in the world. When the country became a republic in the 1920s, it was made a secular state but the national religion is Islam and its grip is tightening.
Present-day Turks arrived from Central Asia in the 11th century, bringing Islam with them, and now Christians - mostly non-Turkish - make up just 0.2% of the population. Half-finished mosques were a common sight from the coach window as we drove 650 miles round the Seven Churches. The only half-finished churches, however, were ruins from the Byzantine era.
A place in biblical history
Yet modern-day Turkey (ancient Asia Minor) is a country with a noble role in biblical history: Noah landed on Mount Ararat in eastern Turkey, settled nearby and through his family 'the whole earth was peopled' (Genesis 9.19b). Within its borders lay Galatia and the cities of Colosse and Ephesus. Its churches were visited by the apostles on their missionary journeys, and Christ spoke personal messages to John in a cave in Patmos about seven of them.
Actually being at the ruins made them come alive. At each site, tour leader and retired Baptist pastor Rev. John Lawson read the relevant letter and gave a brief message - pithy and enlightening - about each one.
At Sardis - fairy-tale hills in a Poussin landscape - we saw what remained of the unfinished Temple to Artemis. The letter is severe: 'I know your works,' says Christ, 'you have a name of being alive but you are dead.'
John Lawson said: 'What happened to the church here? I suggest it responded. The temple was never finished because the gospel was here in Sardis.' Sure enough, scratched all over the walls we found Christian crosses, and nestled between two Ionic columns was a tiny brick Byzantine church from the 5th century.
Yet, although the sites were illuminating to visit, they were ultimately depressing. We visited beautiful ruins, but ruins nonetheless. Ephesus is an excavated city where tourists snigger at an ancient brothel advertisement and pop concerts are played in the amphitheatre where silversmiths once rioted (Acts 19). A fenced-off square in Philadelphia (now Alasehir) displays three brick columns from a 6th century basilica across the road from a busy mosque. And in Bergama, overlooked by Pergamum acropolis, tourists translate the inscription over the door to a healing centre in honour of the god Asklepios. 'Death cannot enter here' it declares.
But it had, so we prayed for the everlasting life that Christ offers. Sometimes we prayed at the sites themselves, sometimes in the hotels. The venues may have been bizarre - a disco one night, an Arabian room with a no-shoe rule the next - but the prayers were strong. We prayed for our Turkish guide, Subetay, for the schoolchildren we met in Thyatira - modern-day Akhisar - and for the country as a whole.
Burden to pray
We were only holidaymakers. We were heading back to our hotel near Bodrum to water-ski before breakfast, laze in tropical gardens by the pool and play backgammon with the waiters. But we did what we could. For MasterSun managing director Bob Fleming, this is all part of the point.
He said: 'People debate whether Christians should boycott Turkey because of its human rights record. But when you go, especially with a Christian holiday company, you come back with a burden to pray for the country and an understanding of the issues. If Turkey is going to change, it will be through the prayers of Christians - that's what I believe. A boycott isn't going to do it. Praying Christians are.'
MasterSun run the three-day Seven Churches tour at a cost of £150 added on to their basic Turkish holidays. A week full-board in Hotel Bargilya, Guvercinlik, where we stayed, costs from £339, with a fortnight from £499. A week in Hotel Silver Beach, Gumusluk, costs from £369, with a fortnight from £499.
Other tours run by MasterSun from different resorts include Cappadocia and the Early Church, the New Testament Christians, and St. Paul in Greece.
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