Day 14 Sat Jun 19

Day Fourteen Saturday June 19th

Today we were on the bus at 8:00 and headed toward Corinth. This city is not too far from Athens, about an hour and a half via bus from our hotel. We saw the Corinth Canal, which is cut from the rocks, connecting the Aegan Sea with the Ionic (or Adriatic) Sea. This canal is 4 miles long, 290 feet deep, 78 feet wide, and the water is 28 feet deep. It was pretty impressive. Interesting fact is that there are bridges at both ends of the canal that are the opposite of draw bridges, instead of raising up, they lower down below the water allowing the boats to pass over them.

We stopped at the Canal for a rest break, then proceeded on to the Ancient Corinth. There was a nice museum at the location of the ancient Agora (marketplace) of Corinth. There was the Bema seat where the Jews brought Paul before Gallio in Acts 18:12-17.

Pastor Wayne did some teaching there from 1 Cor. Verse 3:11 and after talks about the Bema seat judgement and how all believers will be brought before the Bema seat by grace, while non-believers will appear before the Great White Throne judgement described in Revelation. Since we are saved by grace, we have an implied duty to live by grace. Everyone who is saved by faith is justified (v15) but what we have done with our lives (sanctified v12-14) will determine the rewards we have in heaven. Also in 1 Cor 6:19, Paul describes that our bodies are bought with the price of Jesus Christ, and so they are not our own, they are the temple of the Holy Spirit. This is very poignant here in Corinth, since there was so much immorality here, but it is also very convicting. One day we will stand in front of the Bema seat and God will judge how we spent our time, our energy, the blessings of health, and wealth, and wisdom that He has given us, and we will give an account of our actions. Pastor Wayne encouraged us to spend some time in prayer to seek God's wisdom on what kinds of changes we should make in our lives.

Tomorrow is a very early morning and a very long day. We will be getting our large luggage out of our rooms at 3:45 and on the bus at 4:30, so that we can make it to the airport in time. We fly for approximately 3 hours to Madrid, have a layover, and then another 10 hours to DFW, target time for arrival is 4:45, so with the 8 hour time change, that is a 20+ hour day, and that is just to DFW. We can certainly use prayers for safe travel and that nothing will go wrong.

This will probably be my last update till I get back to Texas. Hopefully I can post something Sunday evening to let everyone know about the flight back.

*Dale*