Scripture Challenge {Week 17} & RAK Winner

Before I begin our study for this week, I wanted to share with you what Rita, one of our Scripture Challenge participants, did last week with the word presence. She wrote an amazing poem about God’s presence and created an amazing album. Here is her poem:

I heard God today when I awoke to songbirds outside my window –
greeting the morn in happy song.
I felt God today in the warmth of hands held in family prayer,
and a hug from my very best friend.
I tasted God today while relishing fruit so sweet,
and wondering at the goodness He provides.
I smelled God today in the rich perfume of glorious flowers,
wafting through the air so I would stop and take notice.
I saw God today in the majesty of His creation,
in the joy seen on the faces of my family,
but most of all, in the mirror as I glimpse His image in me.

And you can see her entire album with poem here. I hope you enjoyed that, and thank you Rita for sharing this with us!

Now onto Week 17! When you have a problem, what do you do? Do you talk with friends about it? Do you hide and keep it inside? When you do something great, do you brag about it getting praise from those around you? What about your actions in public? Do you look like “the world” around you or do you look different? Have you ever thought about what God wants you to do in those good and bad times and how He wants you to look to the world around you? Well, He wants us to glorify Him in everything! Isaiah 43:7 tells us that He created us for His glory—“everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made.” Such a great verse, and as I am sure you are guessing by now that our word for this week is:

Week 17 Challenge Word: Glory

Glory is to call attention to the magnificence of another, not ourselves but to another. Our chief purpose is to glorify God. He is number one; we are not. My happiness is not important; however, our amazing God can bring glory to Himself and joy to me all at the same time even during difficult times! What an amazing and loving God we have!

How can we glorify Him? We can use scriptures that glorify Him, we can sing hymns, or we can even use our own words. Our actions should also show in everything we do that we trust Him and live for Him everyday. He is to get all of the applause not us. We had a great example of living for Him everyday last night at dinner. We went out to a restaurant to celebrate my husband’s birthday. We had the best server. He was just wonderful, and the girls were being absolutely amazing. Well, I always want to share Christ with others but I am not always forward with people such as servers, cashiers, etc.; however, I felt God wanted us to share Christ with this server. So, as I paid for the bill and left a tip, I wrote on the bill “May the Lord bless you for your amazing service,” and I signed the family’s name. I pray that God used our actions to glorify Himself to that server. I pray that the server saw Christ in us. I have never done that before but I am so glad God led me to it. How might He be using you to glorify Him?

And something that really touched me was at our BSF leader’s retreat last month. At the end of our weekend, Mrs. Jean Nystrand, Executive Director of BSF, gave her last amazing teaching on the book of Isaiah. As she ended, all 3,000 leaders gave her a standing ovation and began applauding. She immediately asked us to sit and humbled herself saying it was not her but it was all God!!! How many of us would not take the applause and humble ourselves and give Him the glory as she did in front of 3,000 people? Wow!

The verses I chose this week were:
1 Corinthians 11:31 "So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God."
Psalm 19:1 "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands."

And for my card, I used some yummy Basic Grey papers, some Creative Cafe goodness, and a Cuttlebug die and embossing folder. Fun, fun!
And finally for our RAK winner! We had 13 of you post links to your completed cards/pages! Thank you all for sharing your amazing pages with us! And our winner of the devotional is Nilsa from Scrapjazz! Yeah Nilsa! Please e-mail me your address so I can put your book in the mail to you! Congrats! And now, as you go out this week, think about glorifying God in your problems and in your successes! Have a joyous week!