Stuck on You

"Know therefore that the Lord your God is God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations." Deuteronomy 7:9

God is so so good! I just returned home a few weeks ago from a bible journaling retreat that left me filled to overflowing with the goodness of God. So many 'God moments' (those moments that could have only happened because of God...you know the times you say "wow God!") happened to get me to the retreat and while I was there. The crazy, mind blowing thing is, He not only loves and is good to me but a thousand generations that will follow after me. I received this new set of cactus and succulent themed stamps (Refresh my Soul) and instantly the phrase 'stuck on you' jumped into my heart. 

This a really simple and quick page. I stamped one of the cacti on dark green cardstock, fussy cut it out then stamped the adorable face. To make the details pop a little more I used my white gel pen to doodle over some of the stamp line work. I created a little succulent garden on the page and watercolored the images. After stamping the title towards the top I added my prayer, some coordinating washi tapes and tabs. 

This was not a fancy elaborate page, but some days we need that. We need to allow ourselves the freedom to not feel like every page in our Bible needs to be a framable work of art worth of gallery walls. This is a personal place to reflect and pray. So today if you have five minutes or are blessed with hours of time pull out that Bible stamp a quick image use those pencils, watercolors etc journal a prayer and dig in. God is waiting for you... He longs to show you how much He loves you and how good he is. Press in friends and get stuck on Him!

Hugs and Prayers,

Jenn (@creativegurl85) follow me over on instagram to catch all my pages and ideas

Be a Light

Hello everyone!
    I hope you guys are off to a great start this week! Today I am sharing a page with you I recently created in my 100 Days of Bible Promises book. This book/journal has been a wonderful and inspiring place to try new techniques that I would normally be afraid to try out in my bible.

Romans 12:2

"Do not conform to the patterns of this world, 

but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. 

Then you will be able to test and approve that God's will is --- 

his good, pleasing and perfect will."

After reading this verse, it reminded me of how hard it really is sometimes to live the way God calls us to! The reality of the world we live in today is really quiet far from the way God would like us to be, as a general population. The world is mixed with all kinds of different people and not everyone loves God and his word the way some of us do. It can be very easy to fall into the pits of what is most popular or "accepted" today instead of following what is right. If we can stay in His word and remind ourselves of the path we should be following, we can become a light in a dark world for others to follow. There are some that may not know God's word or simply just need to be reminded of it. And WE can be that light for those people! Shining our light can have an amazing impact on one or many.

So shine bright in a dark world!!!

Creative Details

To create this page I covered the entire page with Distress Ink in the color Black Soot. I then used a white colored pencil to get a general outline of the mason jar I wanted. To create the grass and the light in the jar, I used mixtures of lime green, white, bright blue, black and white acrylic paints. The text was the last thing I did on this page after making sure the rest of my page was completely dry. I used two different stamp sets (listed below) and stamped them with VersaMark embossing ink, then used white, black and silver embossing powder. I only embossed one word at a time to keep the powders from mixing. I set the embossing powder with my heat gun and done!!

Thanks for stopping my the Creative Worship Blog today and checking out my page! Have a great week.... and shine bright!!

xoxo,

Stephanie Gammon

Bitty Minnie Alpha

Mini Grunge Type Alpha

Shine Bright

In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven. Matthew 5:16

Dear Friends,
I love this verse! So much so, that I have journaled the verse in all 5 of my journaling Bibles already! So, I made a tip-in. More details on that farther down. :) This verse tells us to shine. But not for our own glory, but to glorify God. We should act in a way that shows others Jesus and draws them to Him. I listened to a lesson by Ray Vander Laan where he said, "Create an alternative to what's wrong in our broken world." That really stuck with me. Our world is broken. It's full of hurting people. He went on to say that God desired to create a community that would live out an alternative, showing the world what He intended and desired. Rather than criticizing what's wrong around us, let's create alternatives- communities that show the love of Jesus, families that live out the roles of parents and children in godly ways, businesses that are honest and just and use profits to improve the lives of those around them. When we do this, when we shine our light before others, they will see our good deeds and give glory to our Father in heaven.

Now for details on the tip-in. I used the following Sweet n Sassy Stamps sets: Girl Power, Bitty Minnie Alpha, Skinny Minnie Alpha, Worthy King, and The Good News.

Girl Power and Bitty Minnie Alpha are brand new sets this month. I love both of them! Girl Power includes 8 girl heads along with shoulders, necklines, and images to make faces if you don't want the girls to be faceless. So cute!! I cut a piece of card stock to be slightly smaller than the Bible page. I used watercolor crayons to color. I attached the tip-in to the page with washi tape. Tip-ins are a great way to add journaling to an already journaled page!

Shine on, friends! Andrea

Be Thou My Vision

Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;
naught be all else to me, save that thou art -
thou my best thought, by day or by night;
waking or sleeping, thy presence my light.

Be thou my wisdom, and thou my true word;
I ever with thee and thou with me, Lord.
Thou my great Father; thine own may I be,
thou in me dwelling and I one with thee.

Riches I heed not, nor vain, empty praise;
thou mine inheritance, now and always;
thou and thou only first in my heart,
high King of heaven, my treasure thou art.

High King of heaven, my victory won,
may I reach heaven’s joys, O bright heaven’s sun!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
still be my vision, O Ruler of all.

This ancient Irish poem dates back to the 8th century and was translated in the early 1900's.  I grew up singing it in church and now I sit in thankful worship when I listen to some of the newer renditions of the hymn.  There is so much to love about the hymn. I love the Irish melody, but the words are powerful too.  Sung as a prayer, it simply petitions God to be my everything...to give me eyes to see all that He is and all that He has done.  The lyrics speak of practicing the presence of God, that our best thoughts, words and actions would indicate the devotion we have in our hearts for the High King of heaven.  It describes the intimate relationship between the Father and His child and the promised inheritance we receive as children of heaven's ruler.  

When designing in my Praise Book recently I chose to extract the meaning from the hymn and journal its practical application.  This two-page spread is the result.  I copied the hymn from an old hymn book and adhere to the page then hand drew a frame to finish the edges and added a paper pieced girl from the Girl Power clear stamp set just released this month. The stamped words at the top of the page are from Bitty Minnie Alpha; the glasses are from the Girl Power set.

I created hinged tags to express my interpretive prayers. 

My prayer...

     When I look to my highest GOAL, may that be YOU.

     When I look to my greatest HOPE, may that be YOU.

     When I look to my deepest NEED, may that be YOU.

     When I look to my strongest LOVE, may that be YOU.

     When I look to my surest WAY, may that be YOU.

     When I look to my brightest LIGHT, may that be YOU.

Underneath each tag, I wrote prayers, journaled thoughts and wrote quotes regarding each of the prayer topics.

When God is the Lord of our heart, He will be our vision, our best thought...day or night; He will be our wisdom and the foundation of our truth, He will dwell with us and we will become one with Him just as Christ was one with the Father.  When God is the Lord of our heart, He will be sufficient for any need we have and will give us our promised inheritance when we see Him face to face.  I want God to be my vision, to fill my thoughts, to be the heart of my heart!

-----

Sets Used (all new May releases)

 Girl Power Clear Stamp Set

Bitty Minnie Alpha Clear Stamp Set

Itty Bitty Blossoms Clear Stamp Set

Ask for Rain...

Hi friends,

I recently did a search for the word 'rain' in the Bible and came across this Scripture:

"Ask rain from the LORD in the season of the spring rain, from the LORD who makes the storm clouds, and he will give them showers of rain" (Zechariah 10:1)

When I first read this verse I thought it was a great encouragement to pray for God's refreshing and provision. While I think it does carry that meaning, I also noticed the part about seasons. I found it interesting that the instruction is to pray for rain in the season for rain. It made me reflect on whether there are things in my life that there are seasons for, and if I am praying for the right thing at the right time. You see, so often it's easy to get impatient and want things now, so we pray and ask and pray some more. But God knows when it is the right season for each provision we need. Living a life of faith in God means waiting for His timing and His seasons, all the while holding up our requests to God with patience.

I'm having a lot of fun creating with the a-MAY-zing new stamps this month! On this page a stamped the cacti from Refresh My Soul then masked them so I could sponge and stamp ink on the background. The cacti were then coloured with Inktense pencils and an aquabrush. The verse was stamped using the fabulous new Bitty Minnie Alpha set along with its big sister set, Skinny Minnie Alpha. I also used Texture Tiles 1 to create the stamped background effects.

May we all recognise the season we are in and bring our prayers to God in response and faith.

Many blessings.

x Amy x

Trust His Heart

 

 

Trust in the LORD with all of your heart, and do not lean
on your own understanding.  In all of your ways acknowledge
Him and He will make your paths straight.
Proverbs 3:5-6

It's interesting that in the last month or so, the Lord is sending these old "primary" songs my direction; songs from my early times as a Christian.  Little ditties and jingles to help me memorize the Bible.  Very effective!  But while I do memorize more easily when verses are put to music, sometimes it's hard to recall these beloved tunes when I need to. 
Proverbs 3:5-6 is a WONDERFUL passage of scripture.  Seems pretty simple, straight forward; definitely a passage of great instruction and wonderful promise!

 God gives us such clear directives in our lives; such amazing guidelines to help us "sync up" with Him.  Proverbs 3:5-6 is written from the point of view of someone who has seen, first-hand, what it looks like and what comes from meditating on this principle.
1.  Trust God with everything
2.  Don't practice self-reliance
3.  Know the Lord's direction in all situations

The beautiful, underlying purpose of this passage revolves around God's heart.  He's like a daddy that looks at his kids straight in the eyes, telling them how to best avoid danger; how to use reason; how to accomplish much; how to have joy; telling them how much he loves them, indeed!
WOW!  God's heart is amazing!  He's wanting us to trust this heart of His. These words in scripture are God's "breath of life" to us that we may have lives with purpose.  God is giving us helps, so that we may see our lives as directional and intentional, fruitful and full to His glory!

My dear sister, God does NOT want us to embark on the journey He's set before us with our own vision and interpretation of what we see or understand.  As Maker of the universe and Maker of our brains, He knows us intimately, and He understands our inability to "make it" on our own.  We only stand to gain by trusting the Sovereignty of our Creator: He will make our paths straight!
What does that mean??  It means, "not crooked."  :)  Does not deviate.  Does not break off; does not become lost.  Safe.  Plentiful.  Resulting in accomplishment and fulfillment.  OH YES!  Give me THAT! 

Inspiration comes from the most interesting places; I
guess that's why it's called "inspiration!" 
Coffee mugs are getting better and better!! :D

Even as I write this post, I'm practicing: "Lord not me; You! I can't write this unless You have purposed it.  My heart does not yearn for people like Yours.  Help me remember Your will for my life and allow me this chance to help others see it for theirs!" 
I'm not saying this as though I've already "arrived."  Again, through a childish song, I've been reminded of the importance and value of Proverbs 3:5-6.  God's heart is for me and you! Do we trust Him?  With everything?  All of it?  Are we choosing our own intellect over His Sovereign plan?  Do we bring God into the situation?  Every time? 
Practice is everything - today's a good day to start!  Holy Spirit, You are welcome here!

This page layout was heavily inspired by the coffee mug you see above.  The "Itty Bitty Blossoms" set is rapidly becoming one of my faves, and the "Girl Power" set used allows for me to construct SO many combinations of facial features and accessories!   All the May releases are superb!  Checkout the entire May release for your own Bible Journaling!

So excited to be using them for Him!  God bless and much love,

~**Deeds**~

IG: @mrcfuldeeds2010
Youtube: mrcfuldeeds

 

 

 

Lyra brush pens and liquid chalk
edgers helped me achieve the colorful
look of the page!

Jesus came and told his disciples, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth.  Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.  Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” 

Matthew 28:18‭-‬20 NLT

It's been awhile since I have thought of these verses. And yet it's so timely God is laying these verses in front of me. Let's talk through this.

Go- it's an action. It requires movement. It doesnt have to mean overseas. How many times do we think that? But it might. No really, it might. No matter where, it is going to require you to move your feet. To go where He is asking you to go. So, are you already serving in that place? Are you waiting for where your "go" is? Are you willing to go anywhere? Whatever and wherever? Is your heart willing?

Make Disciples- so important. It's not just share the gospel. But its teaching them what it means to follow Christ. What it means to be a Christian. How are you doing this? Who around you are you investing in?  Can you think of someone? Family, friends, children? Do you need to start being more intentional?

Join me in praying about our Go and Make. 💜

ART TALK

I stamped this beautiful Girl stamp first. It's so fun to build her and watch it come to life!!! So fun. I used watercolor to color her in. Next I used the NEW Alpha Stamp set to stamp out the words. Such an incredible set. I love the versatility of the stamp and the bonus words in it. Next I just scattered some watercolor on the page. To finish I used the grid stamp from Texture Tiles one.

Happy shopping this month.

Blessings,
Colleen