I never thought that the ends of the earth would look like County Donegal. But as we drove round bays and craggy inlets from Santiago in north west Spain to reach the village of Finisterre, I felt that I had come to the end of the world, and it felt somehow like home.
Maybe it was the combination of the green fields and hedges, gentle mists and clear sunlight, maybe the Celtic music playing from one of the cellars in the small fishing village, but it all conjured up for me the west of Ireland. We had come north from Lisbon for a short break and were attracted by the promise of cool and unchangeable weather, the possibility of wild and stormy seas, and dramatic scenery. As it turned out the day we arrived was calm and idyllic with a clear sky and warm sunshine. However we woke next morning to a cloudy sky and a mild drizzle!! Now that's more like the Ireland I know!!
Now, apparently, when the Romans first came to this craggy corner of Europe, they looked out over the ocean and reasoned that this was it – that there was nothing else out there, that they had reached the end of the world. And so they named it “finis-terra” the end of the earth. And so is been called that since those days.
As we walked the narrow peninsula from the village out to the point of Cape Finisterre, my thoughts went back to those early disciples, and how they gathered around Jesus after his resurrection, when He told them that they were to be His witnesses, starting in Jerusalem, through Judea and Samaria, and from there to the “Ends of the Earth”. I wonder what went through their minds. Was it this place in Galicia that they though of – as far as you could sail out to the west over the Great Sea, and then to traverse that massive land over to its western edge. It certainly was in Paul’s mind and plans to bring the gospel to Spain. And James is also supposed to have lived and ministered here.
I supposed the “Ends of the Earth” is a subjective term and depends very much on where your starting point is. For us, now, it would probably be considered Antarctica, or some remote isle in the Pacific – but the Pacific Islander, for his part, might consider it to be in the bowels of New York City or some other great soulless city! Whatever it is, that is where the commission takes to us, the urge to declare God’s glory, and to share the wonder of Jesus throughout this world of ours. For us right now, our “ends of the earth” happen to be in a corner of Lisbon. And what a delight! What a privilege to be able to do this, and to do so, knowing that the great God who commands us, also promises His eternal, loving personal presence to go with us, even until the end of the Age.
