This week we shifted from focusing on our personal lives in the field to focusing on the people to whom we will be going. We had a solid day of studying Anthropology, and as exciting as it sounds it was actually very enjoyable. It is amazing how different the worldview of other cultures is compared to ours and how people approach things differently. In some cultures, talking with your hands in your pocket is extremely rude and shows that you want to have nothing to do with them!
In light of the anthropology lesson, we spent another day studying the state of Orthodoxy in the CEE (Central and Eastern Europe) region. The people to whom we will be going in Macedonia are a predominately Orthodox. The Orthodox do not believe in the sufficiency of Christ. They believe that they must believe in Christ’s work on the cross as well as do good works. It is interesting to see how this theory of works has over time slowly grown far away from the Truth of the Bible in Ephesians 2:8-9.
“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.”
Unfortunately so many in Macedonia believe they have to be good and/or keep the Church Sacraments and keep up doing good works to earn their salvation. They do not know that they need and can have a relationship with God. They do not even know what having that faith means. It is our prayer that we will have an opportunity to share the truth of the Bible with them. Please be praying for the Macedonian people that we might be able to have open doors with which to talk to them.
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