Christian Church Experience and 3 out of 7 Revelation Churches

      We were able to experience a Christian church here in Izmir today, and compare our own American experience to the short part of the service we attended. There were few differences, the biggest being that the service was all in Turkish, so we smiled and nodded a lot. Overall, the church had a great community and you could see the members of the congregation engaged in fellowship before church, and enjoying each other's company. They didn't have a sense of time, and just talked until it felt like time to start worship as more came in. They had told us the service would start at 11, but it was more like 11:15-11:20 when worship started. We are able to say from our time there that we sang "I Love You Lord" and "How Great is Our God" in Turkish since we learned the pronunciation rules from our guide. Overall it was an interesting experience and great to see a strong congregation in the midst of a dense Islamic population. 

       The other three sites we visited today were all mentioned in the book of Revelations, when John is writing to the seven churches. The city we are in is also known as Smyrna, and we were able to see the ruins of the ancient agora of the city. There was a basement uncovered and a huge arch and columns. There were quite a few graves uncovered, which were there as well with ancient inscriptions along the side.

       We then traveled to Sardis, which also means "west," so this city was the furthest west. The ancient acropolis was set on a mountain, but only the city wall remained due to landslides in the past. Thought a temple to the goddess Artemis still stood at the bottom of the mountain, with huge columns still standing and parts of the altar. Though this was not as impressive as the massive gymnasium still intact across the street. The building still stood tall and you could see where the shops along the side had been located and where they exercised and went in the pool and the baths. The synagogue inside still had some mosaics on the floor and altars still intact. It was impressive to see so much still standing and see how the people lived in that time and what they did in their gyms. 

        There were more parts here than in Philadelphia, which was another Revelation church. Philadelphia had the remains of a church dedicated to St. John, which only had a couple big pillars and underground rooms left.