Word: Revelation

Welcome to the last official Word design, folks. Whether it's your first time here or you've been with me since Genesis, Thanks for stopping by! It's been a pretty busy week around Word headquarters...

• Free Prints! I just launched the final week of free print giveaways. This time I'm giving away 3 free Word prints. You should probably enter that contest right now.
• 22% off prints! In addition to giving away free prints, I've also got a sale going on. Christmas is coming up soon and if you're thinking of giving the gift of a Word print this year, you can get 22% off your entire order at my ImageKind store with the code DECORATE22 through Sunday at midnight.
• I'm a pretty big deal in Canada. CONVERGE Magazine is based in Vancouver and they recently featured my "Word: James" design on the cover of their Nov/Dec issue and also did an interview with me. You can check out an online version of the issue on their site (my interview is on page 20-21 and you can even see a picture of my ugly face). Big thanks to Shara Lee at CONVERGE for getting in touch with me and doing the interview. I babbled endlessly and she somehow put together a really cool piece out of that. If you're interested in an interview about Word, drop me a message.
• I'm a Modern Reject. Nicole Cottrall is the person behind ModernReject.com and to celebrate the launch of her new site design she had a giveaway which included a Word print from yours truly. The giveaway ended yesterday, but head on over and check out ModernReject anyways. Nicole does some great writing and is super active with the folks that follow the site. There may be more Word stuff on her site down the road too, so stay tuned for that.
• Don't worry. There's awesomer Bible design coming down the road. I know you may be bummed that Word is now over, but I've got something else up my sleeve. I don't want to give away too much, but me and my bud Troy DeShano over at StrongOdors are working up a new project that will involve the Bible and a crapload of awesome designers. (You may remember Troy from the inspiration post I did about him.) It's still a few months out, but I wanted to give all you loyal Wordies a heads up about it. Make sure you're following me on Facebook and Twitter for to get future updates on that.

You want awesome Revelation design? You may want to leave my site.

I was dreading Revelation for one big reason: Chris Koelle. Some of you may remember Chris from the inspiration post I did on him earlier this year. Well, since then Chris has taken on this tiny little project where he ILLUSTRATES THE ENTIRE BOOK OF REVELATION. And it is awesome. You can check out some of his Revelation designs and read an interview with him about the project on Tim Challies' site.

I'm Dumb

Revelation has been the subject of a lot of controversy (and some awful bumper stickers) over the years. Mostly having to do with all the end times stuff in there. A lot of folks have gotten REALLY into that stuff and have very strong opinions about what the end of this chapter of humanity will be like. By now, I think you all know that being a theonerd is not my strong point, so I'm gonna tell you up front that I'm not tackling any of the deep controversial end times stuff here. I'm just to dumb for that. Now that we've gotten that out of the way, let's chat about what I did do with this design.

Visual Feast

For the past few weeks, I've been dealing with some pretty short and, in my opinion, visually dry books which makes things difficult. Revelation seems to come out of nowhere with battles, mythical creatures, readings of scrolls.... It's kinda like the Lord of the Rings of the Bible. With Revelation, the difficult thing was trying to narrow down on one thing.

Revelation seems like it comes straight from the Old Testament based on how much violence there is. However, there's some incredibly beautiful stuff in there too. There are several spots amidst all the violence where creatures (sometimes angels, sometimes mythical animals with eyes all over their bodies) sing beautiful songs of worship. Here's a few:

Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!

To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honor and glory and power, for ever and ever!

Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb

In the end, I went in a direction based on things I've heard the pastor at my church, Greg Boyd, talk about. (As a quick aside, I want to give a huge thanks to Greg. There have been many times throughout this series where his take on an passage or verse has really fueled and ignited my writing and design. If what I said has ever made sense or resonated with you, it was probably something I got from Greg. You should really check out his site.)

Violent Beauty

With all the death and violence going on, it's easy to think that Jesus is going around slitting the throats of the bad guys and laughing hysterically as the blood spews out and splatters all over his face. Here is where I love getting Greg's perspective. In short, Greg calls attention to the fact that when the lamb makes it's entrance to the climactic battle in chapter 19, it's covered in blood. But it's not the blood of his enemies, it's the lamb's own shed blood. There's also another beautiful reference in chapter 7 where it says that people have had their robes washed clean by the blood of the lamb.

Shedding his own blood. This is how the lamb fights. This is how the lamb redeems. This is how the lamb wins.

It's this kind of thing that I've seen over and over throughout this project. Jesus just does things differently. There's a love in him that makes his every action a surprising, creative and rebellious shock to our conventional fallen way of thinking. And at the same time, there's an invitation to actually become one of these creative, surprising rebellers. If you want a theonerd version of this take on Revelation, check Greg Boyd's site. (Warning: His post is in direct response to a well-known American pastor who has a slightly different view of Jesus. For this post, I'm not at all interested in that aspect. I just appreciate Greg's take on Revelation.)

So will we ever see each other again?

While I'd like to say a few more words to wrap this whole project up, I've kinda already done that with my post, "An Idiot's Guide to Reading the Bible." But look out for a couple wrap up posts down the road. In fact, I need your help to write those posts. If you check out my last free print giveaway, you'll see I'm asking folks to write in and ask me any questions they have about the project. I plan to take a bunch of those and use them to put together some Q&A posts. I couldn't have done it without your support this far, so it only makes sense to have you help me end this thing, right?

How can I give show my appreciation for your 91 designs of awesomeness?

I'm glad you asked! If you have enjoyed this project and are wondering how you can continue to participate or give back, here are two things that I'd really appreciate:

• Buy some prints. Right now, prints are pretty much the only way my Word designs are available. From early on, my goal was to make these as high-quality and affordable as possible because I wanted them to be accessible for everyone from churches with large budgets all the way down to working stiffs like me. I'm obviously a little biased, but I think they make great gifts. Who needs another piece of junk from Target or Wal Mart? Why not give someone some unique art instead? In fact, even if you don't get a Word print as gift for someone, look for some local artist in your area and support them by purchasing their art.
• Start buzzing. I've always thought it would be cool to put all the designs together in a book someday. I'm realizing that the only way that will happen is if this project generates enough buzz where the publisher head honchos start hearing about it. Honestly, if that doesn't happen, I'm totally fine with it. But if you'd like to see that happen, consider sharing this project. I'm not asking you to spam everyone you know, but just sharing it with people you think may like it. You share, they share, the people they shared it with share and maybe someday a publisher head honcho hears about it. Again, if this doesn't happen, oh well. But I appreciate any sharing you've done and any you continue to do.

It's been fun sharing this with you. The future holds more awesomeness, so stay tuned.