a good story : part 4

 

The first person to accept Jesus as Lord in (over) Macedonia is not a Macedonian but a Lydian. Nonetheless, it was Macedonians that Paul, in a night vision, was asked to rescue. This raises questions. From what did they need rescuing? And, what made them open to being rescued by the good news Paul would bring them? I shall turn to the second question first.

Greek religion had three distinct strands: civic religion (my duty towards my neighbours; duty towards the patron god/goddess of your city for the good of the city); natural religion, or philosophy (thinking about the nature of the world, and of divine and human beings); and mystery religion (a sense of awe and wonder). Of these three strands, the second and third were optional, and could sit alongside or challenge the first/others. True to its Jewish roots, Christianity did not separate these three strands but held them together; though over the past three centuries they have been separated out again, such that it is assumed that you can be a heritage-Christian without participating in corporate ritual worship, or that congregations might serve their neighbours without recourse to a sense of awe and wonder.

The Macedonians recognised that civic religion — duty towards your neighbour — needed to be sustained by mystery religion: by an awareness of awe and wonder, crucially engaged with in communion with others, supported by ritual and liturgy. This is something we have largely lost to individualism.

Moreover, the Macedonians acknowledged their fears and pressed into them. The mystery religion centred on Samothraki was particularly concerned with seeking assurance of being kept safe while crossing the sea — and to secure such assurance, devotees had to cross the sea. That is a fascinating psychological insight. It flies in the face of our attempts to numb our fears, though it does perhaps feed into modern self-help advice.

So the Macedonians had much going for them. What, then, did they need rescuing from? I am inclined to find generic answers unsatisfying, and look instead for storied answers. Therefore, I might suggest that they needed rescuing from being stranded ‘half way there,’ wherever ‘there’ might be. This is why Paul travels from Alexandria Troas to Samothraki and then from Samothraki to Neapolis, Philippi, and beyond. He does not even stay two nights, as those seeking to be fully initiated into the mystery religion must do. Samothraki does not become his touchstone; but it is a stepping stone. It gets Paul from Asia Minor to Macedonia, and it gets the Macedonians from captivity in limbo to the kingdom of heaven, the expanding story of the justice and peace of heaven administered on earth through Jesus the anointed one.