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Beginning around 600 BC, the city of Byzantium spanned the small strait of water dividing Europe and Asia, running from the Marmara Sea to the Black Sea. In 324 AD, the Roman Emperor Constantine founded Constantinople on the ancient city of Byzantium. Constantinople served as the seat of Christianity as it expanded throughout the Roman Empire, and was the home of the Fourth Ecumenical Council. In 1054, the Roman and Eastern churches split and Constantinople remained the seat of the Eastern Church. In 1453, it fell to the Ottoman Empire and the cathedral (the seat of the bishop) was turned into a mosque. It is now the famous Aya Sofia Museum, and at the center of the city, stands as a testament to the incredible expanse of history and culture that area has seem over the millennia.
Although St. Paul never traveled to Byzantium (modern day Istanbul) as far as we know, he traveled extensively throughout Turkey (called Anatolia in his day). This Sunday we will use Romans 12:6-10 as the backdrop for trying to distill 9 days of travel and learning in this ancient city into a 12 minute sermon. The photograph above was taken on our last day in Istanbul from the Süleymaniye Mosque, looking across the Golden Horn at the sprawling city on the left, and across the Bosphorus toward the Asian side of Istanbul on the right. Pictured from left to right are: David Holmes (Calgary), Wain Wesberry (Amelia Island, FL), Brian, Matt Fry (Norcross, GA), Robert Lowry (Clarksville, AR), and David Bender (Indian Land, SC).
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