Sunday, November 16, 2014: Zephaniah 1:7, 12-18; 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11

For our 15th anniversary, my husband Chris and I cashed in our frequent flyer miles and traveled to Greece. On the fourth day, we drove into the surreal landscape of Meteora, with its sheer rocky towers rising from the valley floor. Soon we began to see what we had come for: old hermitages nestled in caves high in the cliffs, followed by tile-roofed monasteries impossibly perched atop stone pillars. Since the ninth century, Christian monks have come here to dedicate themselves to solitude and prayer in the austere loneliness of rocks and wind.

We had anticipated the landscape, and we came looking for the monasteries. We had even anticipated—sort of—the treacherous paths to the six monasteries currently open to visitors, though crossing a narrow swinging bridge hundreds of feet above the valley floor required some deep breathing from me and some deep patience from Chris.

What we did not expect were the vivid interiors that greeted us. When we entered the narthex of the tiny church at Ayios Nikolaos Anapaphsas, we immediately confronted a wall of frescoes showing the final judgment in fearsome detail: Christ in the top center, with those on his right going to glory and those on his left roasting in a river of fire or being devoured by sharp-toothed fish. We could hardly take our eyes from those tortured bodies, even as we passed through the door into the radiant sanctuary.