Bible Art Mistakes

Hello Friends,

Yesterday I painted in my bible again. This meditation was based on Psalm 68:13. My bible is NIV but I like the 21 Century KJV for this verse:

"Though ye have lain among the pots, yet shall ye be as the wings of a dove, covered with silver and her feathers with yellow gold." 

I started by stenciling a bird image over the verse. I began with Water colour metallic paints, but was not happy with the results so I switched to watered down acrylics. The gold was nice, but the silver just looked grey. I went over it with a dry blue chalk pastel, but that didn't help. I decided to just leave it as a failed experiment rather than risking further damage to my page.

I printed and die cut the verse in the preferred version. Then I punched a hole to make a tag out of it. But how would I affix it to my page? I don't have a journaling bible and my pages are very thin. I decided to be brave and sew the tag in. This seemed to work - at first.

What I didn't mention was that I heat-embossed the back of the tag with all kinds of scrumptious silver and gold powders. I used that method where you pile it on and heat from underneath first. (I forget what that technique is called.) I thought it would be nice to have that part showing and then flip it over to see the verse.

In all of the tying and re-tying, as well as the weight from the melted embossing powder, my page tore between my needle holes. As they say, "In for a penny; in for a pound." (Which never made sense to me as a child since we have dollars, not pounds, in Canada) I hot-glued (low-temp gun) my cotton string over the tiny hole in my page. Yes, I am cringing even now as I think of it. But it seemed to work and now I have a slightly ugly but memorable page, highlighting a beautiful verse in my bible.

If I had to do this again I would go with a one-sided tag (very light weight) and a narrower needle. One thing I went back and did was to tie this very loosely so it does not pull on the page when I flip it over. I'm not sure how I would improve on the silver paint. Maybe I would just not do it at all.

The thing about mistakes is you don't know you have made one until AFTER it is done. But you will never discover new ways of doing things if you don't take the risk of making a mistake.

The bible is filled with stories of great people who made blunders at different times in their lives. There is no attempt to hide these mistakes, even the really big ones. God was always ready to forgive and restore. He is still ready to do so even today.

I'm not suggesting he is concerned about me messing up a page in my bible. He is just as pleased with my artistic meditation on this page as with anything that looks pretty to my eyes. They are all just delightful scribbles to him of a child who loves and wants to please him. How could a loving Father be anything but pleased? :)

Thank you for visiting my blog today. Please don't feel you should compliment my page, but I do hope this blog post inspires you in some way. Above all, I want you to know that you are an exceedingly beautiful creation, full of divine purpose, and God the Father loves you with an infinite, everlasting love.

Blessing hugs,
Teresa