Our time in Sicily is coming to an end – another 10 days or so to go. When it is over I will try to put something of a summary in here – summarising 5 months, numerous locations, 20+ different beds, response to a few thousand years of history? An inadequate summary, but I will try.
It is hard to say what underlines why we came here but I guess it has something to do with one from the tribe of Benjamin called Saul of Tarsus. I consider him a bit of a friend – pure fantasy on my part and revealing that I think it is easier to relate to someone who won’t kick me up the proverbials than someone alive in my era! But enough of exposing any inadequacies I have, moving on…
Life seems so accidental at one level – who would I have been, what would I have done if I had been born in another era, another culture? And yet if we walk humbly (by that I mean accepting our stupidity) it does seem the Lord guides (when I do summarise Sicily I hope I make that clear as to the journey here). 2001 Hanover and the launch of ‘Target Europe’, which marked some great partnerships and some clear divides, I was asked to address a session. I took as my theme Isaac re-opening the wells of his father Abraham so my theme was to ‘re-dig the wells of revival’. At the end of the session I was met by a handful of Spanish believers who said that there was not the same history in Spain as I had referenced (Wales, Hebrides, Wesleyan etc.) so they asked what were they to do. If not 100% accurate I can substantially remember my response – a response that was not premeditated and one I did not fully understand:
Tell me, what nation on the planet can claim, on the basis of biblical authority, that there are first century unanswered apostolic prayers in the land. You do not need a revival history in Spain, go dig out those prayers.
I left thinking what on earth does that mean but soon concluded that Paul prayed for Spain. He was not looking for a beach holiday, nor a villa with a pool, but for the gospel to finally get to the end of his world – the western edge of the Roman Empire. Prayers for the land were sown deep into the ground. (I don’t think Paul ever got here in spite of the legend that he made it after his imprisonment in Rome, but there are first century apostolic prayers in the land – literally in the land.)
The Pauline Gospel. Bigger, much bigger, than the ‘gospel’ that I grew up on, the one defended as the ‘evangelical gospel’. (I first studied theology at under-graduate level in the 70s – an era when evangelical theology was defensive and still very narrow in scope.)
In the last 40 years or so there have been many shifts in Pauline theology – and I am way from being up to speed. Some still defend the ‘old perspective’, there is the ‘new perspective’ (such as NT Wright, Jimmy Dunn, and pre-them EP Sanders), ‘Paul in Judaism’, ‘Apocalyptic Paul’ and variations of the above and also a host of others. I am deeply impacted by the new perspective and see the NT context as the Imperial world. A well known inscription from 9BC shows the common language from that Imperial world to the world of the New Testament:
It seemed good to the Greeks of Asia, in the opinion of the high priest Apollonius of Menophilus Azanitus: “Since Providence, which has ordered all things and is deeply interested in our life, has set in most perfect order by giving us Augustus, whom she filled with virtue that he might benefit humankind, sending him as a savior, both for us and for our descendants, that he might end war and arrange all things, and since he, Caesar, by his appearance (excelled even our anticipations), surpassing all previous benefactors, and not even leaving to posterity any hope of surpassing what he has done, and since the birthday of the god Augustus was the beginning of the good tidings [εὐαγγέλιον] for the world that came by reason of him,” which Asia resolved in Smyrna.
Saviour, gospel… ‘secular’ words, and we can extend that with other terms used such as ‘lord’, ‘kings of kings’, ‘prince of peace’… Such a crossover of terms alerts us that the good news of Jesus is not primarily about a private response of faith that was to be demonstrated in religious activity. It was deeply ‘political’ and about an alignment that affected the whole of life. The concept that ‘Jesus is Lord’ and ‘declared to be the Son of God by the resurrection’ had (has) profound implications for our world.
The entrance of Jesus – born of a woman, born under the law – as a human and as a Jew was central to Paul as well as the Gospels, with the Gospels recording the ministry of Jesus within the context of an oppressed land; Paul takes all that was presented there and works it out within the context of that oppressive imperial power. This has led some to say he is the founder of ‘Christianity’ and for some the one who distorted the message. My take is he faithfully applied the message.
Anyway I will begin to post inadequately on Paul over the coming days, concerning the few insights I have into the ‘Pauline Gospel’. But back to Hanover and beyond.
The core focus that took Gayle and I to Spain was to dig into the land to play a part in the re-digging of the Pauline gospel. Maybe it has an impact on Spain, but it certainly has brought about shifts in us. Fast forward and in May 2025 we responded to a very generous invitation from two of our heroes and friends (Adrian and Pauline Hawkes) to come to Malta. Aware that Paul was shipwrecked there we thought maybe there will be some stimulus for us regarding Paul. (There is a possibility the shipwreck was not there, though the term used of the people was βάρβαροι – not a term likely to be used of some of the alternative suggested islands… so probably Malta.) We read Acts 28 on numerous occasions and then saw that from Malta he went to Syracuse (Sicily):
We put in at Syracuse and stayed there for three days (Acts 28:12).
We literally live on ‘Island of Sicily street’ in Oliva and have often wondered if there was anything beyond it simply being an address… And, short story long, we left Malta with a conviction that within weeks was firmed up that we should head to Sicily. Two history books later and in November 2025 we left in a van we have always seen as transportation for Europe.
Many aspects have come together for us and we have been convinced that there will be a ‘before’ and an ‘after’ related to our time here.
In short it has brought us to the conviction that the biggest element in our world today is the ending of all abusive uses of power. Could it be possible? Well that takes me back to what I will be posting on – the Pauline gospel.
Hi Martin: the more I study civilization collapse and imperialism the more I am convinced of how radical Jesus and his movement was and is. And why it got co-opted early on. Much of the Bible, including the OT, is anti imperialist. To be expected as various imperial type states ran amok in the region. Israel even gave it a go with Solomon. But Rome was definitely on a different order. So not unexpected that folks would arise from the oppressed community with a voice for doing things differently in terms of resistance. And not surprising that the Jewish religious community (itself an oppressive construct) would more or less be collaborators in order to maintain their own power. Jesus challenges all of that though he is harsher on the religious leader collaborators. (forgive any poor theology, its been a long time since I read anything in the Bible)
While civilizations come and go there is good news about it all. Collapse doesn’t necessarily mean apocalypse. Sometimes it is a generational decline. People drift away back to the countryside or emigrate to other places with more opportunities. Sometimes there are the struggles with economic collapse, violence, famine, plague and population decline. Collapse can have a hard or soft landing sometimes determined by the leadership and many times outside of their control.
Imperial constructs seem inevitable and natural for humans. I had a history professor who argued hierarchies were essential to stop class war and maintain stability. Oh so wrong. Prior to the establishment of permanent hierarchies, along with the need for expansion – that is, imperialism, just a few short 10,000 years ago, humans tended to live in more egalitarian ways. Bullies were resisted. Often banished from a community, occasionally killed. Humans don’t enjoy being oppressed no matter how it is dressed up – God’s will, a theological order, essential for stability, natural to humans for half of them (women) to serve the other half. Doesn’t matter the narrative created to serve the oppressive order, it ain’t natural for humans to live in those ways. The very long history of human kind demonstrates that.
And we don’t even need these kinds of politics and polities to engage in big projects. Agriculture and large irrigation structures predate large civilizations. Large scale civilizations depend upon enslavement (waged or otherwise), loot-able resources for the elites, and a way of keeping a population under control. It is about the rise of elites who become convinced that they must do whatever to maintain their power. Young males with immature brain structures become an essential part of that because they often are used to provide the threat of violence and real violence to maintain the elite-serving order.
Climate chaos invites elites to get ever more controlling over resources. But in the end it will defeat them. So who will we be in the future? How will humans organize themselves? What will our communities look like? The good news is that small and medium sized communities based on sharing survive the best. Are the most resilient. Ummm, that reminds me of an early church structure from the NT. Ummm.
PS: first Christianity needs to be decolonized from its own imperial ambitions and decouple itself from the oppressive use of power. Otherwise, it will have little or no role going forward. However, that says nothing about Jesus and his followers or allies. They will have lots to do.
Poor theology…? I think that might be found elsewhere! This whole issue of decolonisation (and essentially of the Christian faith) will start a ball rolling. The Jesus’ momentum is like fuel to all genuine movements of liberation. If I understand liberation theology at a small level it is that ‘salvation’ is present to the extent that we are being liberated and liberating others. All might be crazy – but the other way has been tried and got us into this mess.
One thing I do remember from the NT is that Jesus continually tells people to not fear. Fear is the root of greed and seeking power (whether over another person, thing, country or globe). We know that the brains of people who are more comfortable with more authoritarian relationships are also more fearful. They are triggered into fear more easily and quickly. When I watch the news and see these folks working for and propping up authoritarian regimes I see people in a constant panic. They get to the point that they will do anything, including killing others, in order to feel safe.
We all have to set aside fear if we are going to create a new world.