Ezekiel 37:26-28 NIV

I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant. I will establish them and increase their numbers, and I will put my SANCTUARY among them forever. My DWELLING place will be with them; I will be their God, and they will be my people.”

We dwell in Him And He dwells in us. He planned it long ago, and executed His plan through the blood of Christ, Emmanuel: God with us. And now Christ dwells richly in us, the hope of Glory in us. We are a Dwelling Place for a God who desires to dwell in us. That’s pretty powerful stuff to think about.

Other references to study: MT 1:23, IS 7:14, 2CO 6:16

Ez 37:26-28

About the artwork: Wow! I love holy accidents. I had this stencil mask that I loved because it has the feeling of an umbrella. I wanted to leave the girl ’empty’ except for His Words, but wanted a bright glow around her. So I placed her down on the page and decided to sponge out my bright colors to show the Glory of the Lord as He inhabits His temple, me 🙂 but when I carried my Bible into a dark room I realized it wasn’t just bright paint, it glowed! If He dwells in me I will bring light into dark places even when I am not aware of it! Awesome!

*** I cut the stencil out of card stock with my Silhouette Portrait cutting machine, placed stencil adhesive on it and let it dry. I then placed it on another piece of paper to make sure it wasn’t too sticky to rip my Bible page, but sticky enough to to hold it in place and keep paint from bleeding under. I used FolkArt fluorescent bright yellow, orange and pink to sponge and drag out over and around the stencil. Then after drying I traced the image with a micron and gently peeled the image up. I penciled in the words so they would be vaguely centered and traced over with a pen. Painted a sparkly Wink of Stella onto the dress and the Bible verse.

White Gel Pens

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Week 12 Seeing Who You Are
Ephesians 2:6-10

Remember Genesis 3? Adam and Eve had partaken of the wrong tree. Then they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day and they hid among the trees. But the Lord God called the man and said, “WHERE ARE YOU?” And the man said, “I heard you coming and I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid.”

So, while we were ‘naked’ we were separated, dead. That was true, but NOW Galatians 3:27 says our baptism into Christ clothes us in Him.

According to Ephesians 2:6-10, we WERE indeed dead, carrying out our fleshly desires, and children of wrath. BUT… God’s mercy and great love has raised us together with Christ. What a beautiful expression of chesed.

Raised up where? Ephesians 1 says that Christ Jesus is currently seated at the Father’s right hand. The verbs used in Ephesians 1:20-23 are in what I call the ‘timeless’ tense (aorist tense.) Chapter 2 claims we too are currently, in an on-going basis, seated with Him. Not someday, but NOW! That should change our perspective!
In fact, Jesus’ sacrifice reversed the story of Genesis 3.
We are NOW His workmanship, His poetry and art, seated with Him in Heavenly Places. In essence, we are NOW His dwelling place, a new ‘garden’ for the Lord to fellowship in. So now, when He asks, “WHERE ARE YOU?,” we can safely say we are NOW reconciled, raised up and seated with Him in Christ.

Go to your mirror and ask the Lord for eyes to see where you are.
Ephesians 2:4-10.    But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Week 11 Seeing Who You Are

Perspective is everything. So far this year we have read what the Word says about our Heavenly Father and our place through His eyes. But we must internalize these truths; we must have OUR eyes opened to SEE who we are.

This study is giving me the edges to help me put the random puzzle pieces I’ve collected over the past few years together. And then I can step back and see the whole picture and be who I was always called to be. Perspective is everything.

This week I studied a lot of passages about who I am in Christ. I settled on one to illustrate all, but you can focus on any or all. 

COLOSSIANS 2:9-10For in Christ lives all the fullness of God in a human body. So you also are complete through your union with Christ, who is the head over every ruler and authority

ROMANS 8:1-2
So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus. And because you belong to him, the power of the life-giving Spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death.

ROMANS 8:15-17
So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children. And since we are his children, we are his heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory. But if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering.

2 CORINTHIANS 5:17, 21
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!
…God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Week 10 The Story of You 

Look over last week’s scripture and now see what a Magnificent Father we have, who cannot leave us in death, but paid a high price to bring us back to Life. Jesus counteracted man’s decision; not his will, but God’s be done.  

For the joy set before Him He endured. I am His joy, I am His reward, I am His daughter once again, He overcame judgment to bring my peace.

Read Romans 5, focusing in verses 8, 10, 12, 15
But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us… For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!.. Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned… But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God’s grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many!

“The Reward” by Jonathan David Helser 
In a garden we fell, but in a garden he prayed,
Not my will but yours be done.
My sins he became so I could be like him 
To go beyond the veil and see his face 
The cross has made a way so we can enter in 
To go back to the garden once again 
The cross has made a way, forever I will say 
Worthy is the Lamb that was slain 

Worthy, Worthy, 
Worthy is Lamb that was slain 
To receive the reward of his suffering 
Worthy is the Lamb that was slain

Receive Your reward oh Lamb of God

Week 9 The Story of You

Who do You see in the mirror?

God always gives mankind choices. In the beginning the most important one was between life or judgment. 

We can look back at Genesis 1 and know that God’s intent was very good. So the moment man entertained the serpent’s editorial on God’s will, their eyes were deceived to judge God’s intent. Although Adam and Eve had lived in a world where life was nothing but good, they judged there was better. They forgot who they were and as a result, not His will but theirs was done.

The story of mankind has been about judgment ever since. To judge means to separate between two ideas, things or people. We judge others, situations, worthiness; there is a constant struggle to decide what is good and what is evil. We even look in the mirror and judge the reflection staring back at us. Judgment always brings death. And all God wanted for us was Life, and that more abundantly.

No worries, though, God planned ahead for such circumstances, as we’ll see next week.

Go back and look over your journaling from Week 3. (Ge 1:26-27, 2:7)

Now read Genesis 2 & 3, specifically the following verses:

The LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life AND the tree of the knowledge of good and evil….And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from ANY tree in the garden; BUT you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”   (Genesis 2:9, 16-17 NIV)

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”
The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’ ”
“You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” 
When the woman SAW that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves. (Genesis 3:1-7 NIV)

Week 8 The Story of Your Father
1 Sam 12:20-25
And Samuel said to the people, “Fear not. You have indeed done all this evil; YET turn not aside from following the Lord, but serve Him with all your heart. And turn not aside after vain and worthless things which cannot profit or deliver you, for they are empty and futile. 
THE Lord will not forsake His people for His great name’s sake, for it has pleased Him to make you a people for Himself. Moreover, as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you; but I will instruct you in the good and right way. Only FEAR the Lord and SERVE Him faithfully with all your heart; for CONSIDER how great are the things He has done for you. But if you still do wickedly, both you and your king shall be swept away.”

Back story: In 1 Samuel 12, Samuel has just finished crowning the new king, Saul. The man Israel chose over God to lead them. He then asks the Israelites to consider all the great things God has done for them and their ancestors, proceeding to remind them of all the awful ways they have betrayed God.

Samuel is not judging them, instead he is painting a picture of their history of repentance before God and God’s ‘chesed,’ everlasting kindness and mercies. You see, it is impossible for the Father to reject His children. His very name is marked upon them.

The word for ‘name’ in Hebrew means much more than something to be called. It speaks of identity and nature. Because of who He is, because of the very essence of His nature, He will not, even cannot, abandon you. That is the relentless affection, or CHESED, of your Father. Wow, this gives me such hope for some who have strayed from the faith. He will never stop waiting for their repentant hearts.

Your Father’s heart has always been for you and not against you. His promise silences a deep fear in us that we could be left alone, lost or forgotten. Only seek Him.

Psalm 136 …for His steadfast love (chesed ) endures forever.
CHESED…This steady, persistent refusal of God to wash his hands of his wayward children is the essential meaning of the Hebrew word which is translated loving-kindness or mercy. (http://www.bible-researcher.com/chesed.html)

Psalm 24 …He prepares a table before you… His goodness and love will follow you all the days of your life and you will dwell in the house of your father forever.

John 5:22, 24, 27, 30, 45 …For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son…Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does NOT come into judgment, but has passed from death to life…And he (God) has given him(Jesus) authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man…I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me…Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you: MOSES, on whom you have set your hope.

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