Italy Part II-B: Venezia: Scenes from the Boat Taxi

Cool building with lots of pictures and character

Basilica della Salute: Church of S. Maria


I liked the submarine!

no cars..... just boats on the waterway.... so cool!



Next stop.. Piazza San Marco!

Italy Part II-A: Venezia: The Grand Entrance!

On Sunday, I took a 4 hour train ride to Venice. I spent the day by myself switching trains in different cities and taking in the beautiful sites. The architecture was amazing! There are no words, so I will just stop rambling and give you pictures.....


This is the view from when I exited the train station into Venice! Top picture is the view to the left, middle picture straight ahead view, and the bottom pic is view to the right. From here I got on boat taxi (the station is in the top picture).

There are so many pictures to show and to categorize, I think I will drag this out in many short posts!

Italy Part 1: Lago Maggiore

Italy was amazing! Not only did I get to go to Italy, but I was blessed to spend some quality time with my sister in Christ, Kristin Thomas! That was definitely the highlight! So we arrived there after flying for an entire day, and slept. The next couple days were spent visiting the center of Varese (forgot my camera), going to the grocery store, and going to play on the playground on Lago Maggiore. Here is beautiful scenery!

There is a rainbow in there!



And here are the girls playing on the playground....

Coming Soon to a blog near you......

Italy.... pictures are being uploaded to computer as I type!

Andy and the Andy's dinner opportunity

I know that pretty much no one reads my blog, but if you happen to, check this out.

You can bid to win a pair of tickets to the Andy and the Andys concert along with dinner with the band beforehand! BID, BID, BID to raise money for Uganda Adoption!

Romans 6:1-14

^"1What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound?

²By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? ³Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? ⁴ We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

⁵For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. ⁶We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. ⁷For one who has died has been set free from sin.

⁸Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. ⁹We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. ¹⁰For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. ¹¹So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

¹²Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. ¹³ Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. ¹⁴For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace."

(emphasis added)

Thank you Jesus for dying on the cross that I might live in You and be free from sin. May we who claim to know Christ present ourselves as an instrument of righteousness!

Justification

<sup>Romans 4:16- 25

16</sup>That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the adherent of the law but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, ¹⁷as it is written, "I have made you the father of many nations"—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. ¹⁸In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, "So shall your offspring be." ¹⁹He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. ²⁰No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, ²¹fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. ²²That is why his faith was "counted to him as righteousness." ²³But the words "it was counted to him" were not written for his sake alone, ²⁴but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, ²⁵ who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

What amazes me about the faith of Abraham is even when things were not looking possible for God's promises to come true, he still gave God the glory and grew strong in his faith. I hope that I have that same attitude in life... being fully convinced that God is able to carry through what he has promised!

I also am humbled by the last two verses. For us who believe in God, that belief is "counted to us as righteousness". No one is righteous, but our faith in God is counted to us as righteousness. God sacrificed His Son so that we might be right with Him. We are sinners and because of our sin, God's wrath has to be poured out to justify that sin. So He chose to pour out His wrath upon His Son so that the price for our sin could be justified. He doesn't just skip over our sin... our sin was payed for by Christ. So we are justified in Christ. May God receive the glory due to Him through the way we live an outward expression of that sacrificial love and grace to others!