I am Loved

‘so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.’ (Eph. 3:17-19)

I’m loved beyond measure. It’s still something that I struggle with. I know it’s true but for some reason this knowledge takes a long time to settle down in my heart. There are a lot of days that I don’t feel worthy of Gods love, but I may know that not my actions determine the love of God but that He loves me no matter what. That He will always welcome me into His loving arms, just like the prodigal son. This stamp set helped me to get back on the journey to find Gods love in the bible.


I prepared my bible page with clear gesso (the pages in my Dutch bible are very thin). The other side of the page left some bleeding on this page so I had to find a way to cover that up. I used my acrylic paints to make a background. I would be able to cover most of the bleeding with the paint (or incorporate it into this page) but I decided to add a piece of paper on the left side of my margin. Just to be sure that nothing would show through. I stamped the tag and some words onto white paper and cut them out. The name tag and everything on it is from the set ‘Hello My Name Is’, the words Amen and the heart are from ‘Note This'. I missed something in the background of my page so I decided to stamp a couple of leaves from the ‘Whimsy Bouquet’ stamp set with black ink. When my background was finished I adhered the stamped pieces into my bible and that’s it.

Have a blessed day!

- Lucinde

Hello, my name is...

I love this song and the stamp set too. The words are so recognizable. How often do we think of ourselves in judgmental ways. Bringing ourselves down with our own thoughts and feelings. At least, for me the feelings of regret and not being good enough are returning way too often. 


So today I made a sort of therapeutic page in my journal. At the top and the bottom of the page I wrote down a couple of things that I dislike about myself or that I would like to change. After that I started stamping. I stamped the name tag first and decided to use 'chosen' as the name. I stamped a couple of the other words around the tag to remind me of all the other things I am through God. Saved, beautiful, loved, free. Great things to remember. The other things are better to forget, so I added a black layer of paint on top of it. I blended the black layer out so that I could add some bright yellow in the center of the page. I used acrylic paints so they are a bit translucent (accept for the black color). That way I could still read the 'good words' and the 'bad words' wouldn't be visible anymore.

I used the stamp set 'Hello My Name Is' for this page.

- Lucinde

They rejoiced with great excitement

When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy. (Matthew 2:10)

I love the star in the stamp set 'Peace on Earth' so I had to use it for this page. At first I wanted to draw a silhouette of the stable with the star above it but then I thought... Why not use the stamp of baby Jesus instead. 

I wanted to make an intense sky so I used pastels to create the background. I started with the yellow color and added some red, purple and blue colors around it. I used a little bit of black on the edges of my paper. I added a couple of layers to get a more intense color. The images are colored with colored pencils so I could get into all the details. 

I used the stamp set Peace on Earth for the images and hand lettered the message.

 

- Lucinde

Emmanuel

Hello everyone! Today I want to show you a page from my art journal. It's a little bit different than bible journaling but I still like the freedom watercolor paper gives me, especially compared to the papers in my bible. Next to my bible journal I have a 'regular' journal with watercolor paper that I use a lot.

For this page I made a frame with the Christmas Botanicals stamps. I started with the two flowers that are 'on top' of the frame. I masked the rectangular area with a couple of post-it's after I stamped these flowers. I stamped the other flowers around the rectangle to make a border with flowers. When the entire border was covered with leaves and flowers I removed the post-it's and drew a border around the rectangle with a black fineliner.

After I finished the border I could start coloring the flowers. I used watercolor brush markers and a water brush to color everything. I limited my colors to red, green and a tiny bit of yellow. I wanted to add a message to the center of the rectangle and keep the 'Christmas feeling'. To keep this feeling I chose a gold watercolor and I lettered everything with a dip pen.

- Lucinde

Go, spread the good news

Then He told them: Go and preach the good news to everyone in the world.
Mark 16:15

Jesus told the disciples to go and share the good news. To everyone in the world. When you’re just with eleven man that must have sounded like a mission that could not be completed. And well, we’re still busy spreading the gospel. With the internet it seems much easier these days but you still need good teachers to explain everything that’s in the bible. So… it’s good to realize yourself every now and then that we’re still part of a living gospel that needs to be shared around the world. I don’t mean that you have to travel around the world (if you feel like you’re called to do that, that would be great too) but you can show a little bit of Gods love through your own life to the people around you. In these days before Thanksgiving and Christmas, it’s good to share some love :).

I made the background for this page with acrylics. I added them with a piece of paper towel. I used light layers so you can still read the text on the page. I stamped the words and images (from the set 'Send Me') with a black ink. I decided that I wouldn’t add a lot of color because of the bright background colors. They’re already adding enough color to the page. I did add a couple of white accents with a white gel pen. The clouds and the bike are rub-ons that I rubbed onto the page.

Blessings, Lucinde

Peace on Earth... - Luke 2

I’m already preparing for Christmas. Just in my bible though ;). I love reading the scriptures that tell about the birth of Jesus. It must have been so hard for Mary to carry this special Child. She didn’t know what would become of Him but she knew that there was something going to change. How weird would it be to get a visit from a couple of shepherds you don’t know and that they would tell you that a choir of angels told them to come and visit you and your baby. And that these angels were singing ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men in whom he is well pleased.’ I just can’t imagine what she felt in that moment.

Back to these days. It’s almost impossible to imagine a peaceful earth. With no wars, shootings or other attacks. Or even without bullying and gossip. But we know that one day there will be true peace on earth. When Jesus, who saved us, returns… What a day that will be.

For this page I used the stamp set ‘Peace on Earth’. I stamped it on my bible page with a black ink and colored everything with colored pencils. A CAS bible journaling page, but I like to use these clean and simple pages for important messages that just stand out on their own.

I hope you will know the peace of Christ in these months before Christmas :)

- Lucinde

Joy to the World

Hello everyone!

I used one of the Christmas stamp sets for the page I made today, but I didn’t use one of the more well known Christmas passages in the bible. When I read the message ‘Joy to the World’ I had to think of the song. I think most of us immediately sing this phrase in our minds ;) But that made me wonder if this song was based on a special bible text or where it came from. So when I did a little research I ended up with Psalm 98. And even though I’m not sure if it’s true that this song is based on this Psalm, it works really well with these stamps.

'The Lord hath made known His salvation; His righteousness hath He openly shown in the sight of the heathen.  He hath remembered His mercy and His truth toward the house of Israel; all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God.' (Psalm 98:2-3)

I prepared my page with clear gesso but it’s so simple you wouldn’t even have to do that (my bible has very thin pages so I prepare every page, if yours has thicker pages you won’t have to prepare them). Most of the time I want to color my entire background and give a little bit more color to my pages but I thought that the simplicity of this page made the message stand out even more so I decided to go for a white background. I stamped the images and I made a couple of extra stars around it to fill the page a bit more. I colored everything with colored pencils. For this page I used the set 'Peace on Earth'.

I hope you’re inspired to make your own page!

Blessings,

Lucinde

Sing of His glory

Burst into song, you mountains, you forests and all your trees, for the LORD has redeemed Jacob, he displays his glory in Israel. - Isaiah 44:23

When I read this part I had to think of the talking trees in the Lord of the Rings and how they would be singing hymns with their deep voices. How powerful would it be if the mountains and trees would start singing, rejoicing God. That's how this page started...

I used two stamp sets (Sing Loud and As the Deer) to create this page. I have a lot of journaling space in my bible and there's a lot to journal about in this chapter so I kept this part of my drawing in one column and I highlighted the message I was working on. I prepared my page with clear gesso and made the background with Distress inks. I stamped the images with black ink after the background dried. I used watercolors for the images and the word 'glory'. Because of the stamping you can build this page really quick. I had to wait for the gesso and the ink to dry, but if you'd just stamp the images and color everything with colored pencils it's a really easy page to make. 

- Lucinde
 

Serve God

Proverbs has a lot of wisdom, last week I was reading in Proverbs 23 and I wanted to journal about this message. 

‘Do not wear yourself out to get rich; do not trust your own cleverness.
Cast but a glance at riches, and they are gone, for they will surely sprout wings and fly off to the sky like an eagle.’ (Proverbs 23:4-5)

We’re worrying about a lot of things that are happening in our lives. And money is often one our worries. When I read this I had to think of the stamp set ‘His Wings’. Because while we’re worrying, God will spread His wings around us and take care of us (of course this idea was inspired by the saying about the eagle ;)). So we have to remember who we’re serving. God or the money? We have to serve God and not worry (too much) about all the other things. 

I prepared my page with clear gesso (the Dutch bible has very thin pages) and stamped the images with black ink. I masked the images before I made the background with Distress inks but I didn’t like the hard white edge, so I added a little bit of yellow around the feathers to make the contrast a little les hard. The word ‘serve’ was a little bit too long to fit next to the feathers so I stamped it on vellum and colored it with a watercolor marker. I adhered it with a piece of washi tape and stamped the word Him underneath it. 

I used the stamp sets 'His Wings' and 'All your Heart'.

- Lucinde

Where was I?

I’ve always been interested in the story of Job. How his life gets turned upside down and he still keeps his faith. He got lectures from all of his friends, they thought that they knew what he had to do or what he did wrong. And then God starts speaking… We think we know everything, we think we can earn a lot in our lives but in comparison to God we are so, so small. He created the earth, the heavens, every tree, all the creatures and even you. I can think that I know a lot  but… where was I when the world was made? God has the last word. He created the entire world. When I don’t see the plan, that doesn’t mean there is no plan. God definitely knows what He’s doing.

I prepared my page with clear gesso and stamped my images with black ink. After that I wrote down the sentence 'where was I when the world was made' and added a dashed border around the world. I masked the earth and blended out some blue ink around the world. I didn't wait long enough so the words smudged a little bit... I colored the images with colored pencils and added some rub ons to finish the page.

I used two stamp sets for this page, Awesome Thoughts and Send Me:

 

- Lucinde

Child of the King - Romans 8

You didn’t receive a spirit of slavery to lead you back again into fear, but you received a Spirit that shows you are adopted as his children. With this Spirit, we cry, “Abba, Father.” - Romans 8:15

Hello everyone! Today I want to show you a page I made with two stamp sets: mini grunge alpha and Child of the King. I love the smaller alphabet because you can just stamp an entire sentence and you’ll still have room to add something else ;). Child of the King had just the perfect elements for this page; the little diamonds and the crown were perfect for this part of Romans (Romans 8:12-17). And of course the sentiment: child of the King matched this part too.

I prepared my page with clear gesso (I use a Dutch journaling bible with extremely thin pages, almost every waterproof ink will bleed through so that’s why I prepare my pages) and started stamping the sentence ‘always wear your invisible crown’. When I stamped the sentence I ended with the word ‘crown’ from the stamp set ‘Child of the King’ but when I finished the stamping I thought the lettering didn’t really match the rest of the sentence so I decided to add some white gesso on top of the stamped word and stamp the word crown with the mini grunge alpha too. I think it would be hard to see if I used another background. But these crayons got a lot less color on the white gesso than on the rest of the page so you can still see that I tried to fix the page. I don’t really mind it (I learned to be a little bit less hard on myself when it comes to journaling mistakes ;)), but it gives a weird color change in the middle of the page. I colored the background with wax crayons that I blended out with odorless mineral spirits. After that I colored the images with colored pencils.

Have a nice day!!
- Lucinde

Help me grow

 

 If I'm honest I don't have a lot of words to say today. A friend of us passed away this weekend and I feel a bit 'empty'. Luckily we are assured that he is saved by the blood of Jesus and that he was a man of the word of God. And today I want to let the bible speak about this message. I want to be a woman of the Word, I want to grow in the way that God wants me to grow. I want to be a seed that He can use. 

So I want to ask Him if he will help me to grow, according to His words...

 

I want to share a story from Matthew 13: 

That same day Jesus left the house and went out beside Lake Galilee, where he sat down to teach. Such large crowds gathered around him that he had to sit in a boat, while the people stood on the shore. Then he taught them many things by using stories. He said: A farmer went out to scatter seed in a field. While the farmer was scattering the seed, some of it fell along the road and was eaten by birds. Other seeds fell on thin, rocky ground and quickly started growing because the soil wasn't very deep. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched and dried up, because they did not have enough roots. Some other seeds fell where thornbushes grew up and choked the plants. But a few seeds did fall on good ground where the plants produced a hundred or sixty or thirty times as much as was scattered. If you have ears, pay attention!

I want to listen to the voice of God and take root and grow and be productive.

I made a couple of pictures while I was working on this page. I used the stamp set 'Living Word'. Before I started my page I layed down the stamps I was going to use to see if everything fitted the page. After that I stamped them with black ink and made a background with distress inks. I colored the images with colored pencils and that's all!

- Lucinde

Jesus saved the world!

It's almost Valentines day. I don't have a Valentine so nothing special planned for me. But... I read a compilation of different bible verses called 'Fathers love letter' recently and these messages were so beautiful that I had to work with them in my bible. This one stood out to me because Jesus saved the entire world and it didn't just stop there. He turned us from enemies into friends. Talking about love... amazing love!

This message is in 2 Corinthians 5:18-19 (I'm using the Good News translation here, for a non-native speaker this part was way more clear than the ones that talk about reconciliation. A word that's not used a lot in the Netherlands 😉).

'All this is done by God, who through Christ changed us from enemies into his friends and gave us the task of making others his friends also. Our message is that God was making all human beings his friends through Christ. God did not keep an account of their sins, and he has given us the message which tells how he makes them his friends.' 

I used ink and colored pencils to add some color to this page. And of course the beautiful 'My Savior' stamp set for the images! (except for the hearts and border around the message, these are just hand drawn).

- Lucinde