A little more than a month ago I took on a task that was way bigger than I expected. I decided that writing one Advent devotional and creating one to two pages of art as a printable per week was something I could manage. Ha! It was a lot more work than I imagined! Phew! But I’m so glad that I did it. I look at the ten pages of original artwork and can’t imagine that it was me who actually did it. It was covered in so much prayer and I know without a doubt that my prayers were answered. God has done amazing things. And I’m so glad it’s done.
Thank you to all of you who joined me on the journey! It was a great blessing to see all the Bible and journal pages that my friends created using the Watchful Waiting Joy printables. I re-posted some of their pages along the way on the Recess With Jesus Facebook page and posted mine as well but I wanted to give you all a chance to see.
Please enjoy the gallery below!
The Watchful Waiting Joy Art Gallery
“Hope Wearing Skin” – Week One
“You be the skin that Hope wears. Live out loud. Share your hope. God will use your story to bring hope to your world.”
“Expensive Love” – Week Two
“The quality of love that God wants to see in you and me for Him and for each other depends on how deeply we understand God’s love for us.” Henry Blackaby
“Joy Wells Up” – Week Three
John Piper wrote, “…the Holy Spirit opens the eyes of my heart to see the beauty of Christ. When I see Christ in all that he is doing, and all that he is, then my heart is drawn out in joy towards him. The Spirit gives us eyes to see the beauties of Jesus that call joy up out of our hearts.”
“He Left Us Peace” – Week Four
“Peace comes when we secure our mind on God.” (Isaiah 26:3)
“Our Savior is Here” – Christmas Eve
“We continue to watch and wait with hopeful expectation for Jesus to come back again.”
“Three Gifts for Our King” – Three Kings Day
“While we wait God is at work around us, in us, and through us. We don’t have a star to point Him out but we do have the Holy Spirit living within us to give us eyes to see Him and ears to hear Him. Let’s listen well and be ready for action when He calls! No hesitation. Living with intentionality for Him every day.”
Unique… every person, every page!
My very favorite thing of all is that every one of us had the exact same images yet not one of our pages turned out the same. It’s such an awesome example of the perfect skill of our amazing Creator God who made only one of you and one of me. It’s such a gift to see right in front of our eyes. I hope that, even if you didn’t participate, you have enjoyed the gallery.
Thank you again, so much, to all the lovely ladies who participated!
If you did not participate but would like to read the devotionals or see the Watchful Waiting Joy Advent focus printable images, you’ll find them here on my blog.
And one last thing…
This photograph was the inspiration for the whole collection of Watchful Waiting Joy Advent images. Isn’t that a cute manger?
Our church hosted The Manger Build for dads and their kids some years ago. This is the manger my husband built with our babies. I love our little but not so little manger. It’s life-sized! The star was my own brainchild which my son brought to “life” with some scrap pieces of wood and his handy dandy saw. I’m not exactly sure which is my favorite piece! I feel like I can’t have one without the other.
The Manger Build is a resource from Noble Warriors, a ministry to churches to help them equip their men as leaders in their homes and communities. “The Manger Build provides a strategy to help churches encourage men in their congregations and communities to lead the charge in keeping Christ in front of Christmas for their families.”
I love The Manger Build. After dads spend an evening building a manger with their kids, they are provided with a devotional tool to use in the days leading up to Christmas to lead their families to focus on Jesus. Helping dads by giving them an opportunity and a tool to lead their family to keep their eyes on Jesus Christ at Christmastime – really to disciple their children – is an awesome thing. Dads don’t always know how to do that. When they learn how, whole families are transformed! So exciting.
Maybe your church would like to host a Manger Build next Christmas. There are two links above. Pick one to find out more information!
I hope you don’t mind the commercial break. I just wanted you to know about my inspiration! And by the way, the only connection I personally have to Noble Warriors and The Manger Build is a husband who lives out his calling to disciple men and equip them to be disciple-makers on a daily basis.
Has your church hosted a Manger Build in the past? I’d love to hear about it!
