Faith, Maturing in Christ

Do you want more of God? 

Do you want to grow in faith? 

In this episode, we explore salvation by faith, which is contrasted to religion by self-effort. 

Are you walking by faith and not by sight? 

Are you compromising your faith and partnering with sin? 

How do you know the difference? Can you love the sinner all while pointing out the sin in love? 

Listen to this episode with Tammy Toney-Butler as she speaks of her journey to wholeness in the aftermath of child sex trafficking, complex trauma, and coping through addiction. 

Set free by God's grace and merciful love. 

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References for Episode: Life Application Study Bible New International Version and The Evidence Study Bible NKJV with commentary by Ray Comfort.

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Transcript

Welcome to today's episode of Reflective Hour with Tammy Toney-Butler. I'm your host, but we all know who the real host of this show is: Christ.

Holy Spirit, come, have Your way.  This isn't about me. It's about You. It's about Your Words of Truth resonating in the hearts of Your people.  It's about love.  It's about us maturing and growing in Christ, knowing the fullness of all that You have to offer.  Your death on the Cross assured us fullness in everything in this lifetime.

Now, we can know the fullness of God in the land of the living. We don't have to live in lack. We can persevere through everything. How do we do that? You ask? Through faith. Faith in the Word of God, faith in the promises that His Word brings, lights our path, directs our steps, and anchors us.

How many of you want to mature as Christians, not just be satisfied anymore with milk like infants, but wanting to move on to solid food to eat the meat of the Word because it's the bread of life and it sustains us? But many of us don't go deeper. We don't seek out the hidden Wisdom and Truth that the Word of God offers.

Have you gotten alone in your secret place with the Lord?  Are you seeking the Whisper of the Holy Spirit? Letting Him alone guide you?  I know that I've been guilty of that. Getting busy. Doing works,  doing my own way, forging my own path, and then getting checked in my spirit and having to stop and say, minute, wait,  I forgot.

This isn't supposed to be about me. It's supposed to be about God.  I think that's where we go wrong on so many levels is that we make things about us. And it's not about us. It's about Christ. It's about us being the bride. It's about us being the body and He's the Head.  We are merely His hands and feet  walking around.

He's controlling everything.  When we realize that and we submit and surrender, wow, wow. 

And what joy comes to our heart when we don't let circumstances guide us any longer, but we focus on the steadfast anchoring of His Word and you know, that which is Truth as we abide in the Vine and He guides us and He keeps us.

Holy Spirit, help me to deliver to them today in the capacity that You gave to me this word when You were teaching me, and as I'm delivering it, help me to speak with Your Word of Truth.  In a lens that meets them where they are and that they can understand it, realizing there's no judgment or condemnation in Christ.

But it's merely a learning tool that we have at our disposal to glean knowledge from the Word of God and to grow stronger as Christians. 

As this world grows darker,  Your Light will shine through us to others, and they will know that we are bearers of the Light and the Truth,  that we are like You with the mind of Christ, the heart of Christ,  obeying in perfect obedience to the will of God so that we can unify the body of believers, carrying out that end time assignment that You have for us.

To bring the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of heaven,  to earth as it is in Heaven, as it says in Your Word.

Guide us, keep us during this time together, strengthen us, and free us from any distractions—anything that would try to stop us from hearing this Word.

Today's episode of Reflective Hour is a powerful one.

I base everything on it. It is faith. It is maturing in faith, faith in action, and recognizing the Truth so that the Truth shall set us free. This was one of the most difficult ones that He's had me prepare for. So, humbly, I am going forth to deliver this to you as He gave it to me.

And, I look forward to comments on it and, getting in touch with me. As always, you will find the contact information in the show notes, in the transcript. There'll be links to this episode of Reflective Hour so that you can seek out additional learning opportunities so that we can grow in Christ and the knowledge and understanding and all that He has for us as the body of believers.

Recognizing that none of us is better than the next. We're all equally one with Him.

Co-heirs with Christ, royalty. 

Let this episode touch your heart as it touched mine.  Holy Spirit.  All right. Dig in.

Faith is the basis for a Christian's life and maturity. 

Are you a baby Christian?

Desiring milk, satisfied with milk, or do you desire meat? 

Do you look to grow in knowledge and understanding?

Do you seek the Holy Spirit through prayer in the secret place? 

We must mature as Christians and grow in our faith to withstand the challenging times ahead of us.

As the world grows darker and the Messiah gets closer to coming for His church, His bride.

How do you grow in faith? 

How do I become spiritually mature? 

First,  let's look at salvation through faith and contrast it with religion through self-effort. 

Salvation by faith in Christ seems too easy for some people.  Instead, they focus on religion with self-effort as the focus.  Which often leads to disappointment or pride and eventually to eternal death (Life Application Study Bible, NIV).

When we look at the Life Application Study Bible, we'll be in Colossians 2.

I'm going to read a table on page 2163 because I want to help us understand the difference between religion by self-effort and salvation by faith.

And we look at salvation through faith.

The goal of salvation through faith is to trust in Christ and live to please God.

We contrast that to religion by self-effort, which is to please God by our own deeds.

And what is the means of salvation through faith?

We confess, submit, and commit ourselves to Christ's control, not our will but Christ's, but the Father's be done (Life Application Study Bible NIV).

When we contrast that to religion by self-effort, which we know is not the way, (practice, diligent service, discipline, and obedience, which we do that in the hope of a reward), but we aren't to do that.

We're merely to follow the will of the Father (Word of God) and be obedient to the voice, to the whisper—not our will, not our human spirit.

But His because we're one body under the Head, which is Christ, each with a purpose to fulfill on earth as it is in Heaven so that we can bring  God's Glory here for His people for the betterment of everyone, not just our self-interest. 

When we look at salvation through faith and power, the Holy Spirit in us helps us do good work for Christ's Kingdom.

And when we look at religion by self-effort, a good, honest effort through self-determination, we follow religion instead of salvation by faith; instead of faith guiding us and obedience, Then we can set about to do works. We can say, Oh, well, let me do this. I'm going to feed the hungry. I'm going to do this because this will make a difference.

But often, those are things that we want to do or things that require less of the uncomfortableness that goes along with being led by blind obedience through faith. Because with faith, when we just say yes to the Lord, we often have no idea where we're headed or what we're doing, and we just go out seeking to do His will, the will of our Father, without asking questions.

Truly, just if He says, go left, we go left. If He says, go right, go right, as long as it's in alignment with the will of God (Word of God).

And we are the sheep of His pasture. He is the Great Shepherd. We're His undershepherds, and we know His voice. 

And then when we look at control and salvation by faith, Christ in me, I'm in Christ, which means He controls us.

We have submitted fully and surrendered to His obedience. And that is very difficult for those of us like myself who have survived trauma, who've gone through and been subject to being abused by other men, the manipulation and control of others to submit and surrender to someone and let them gain control over us is very uncomfortable for us.

But I'm here to testify and to tell you that when I surrendered to Christ, to Abba Father, who will never leave you nor forsake you, He will never hurt you.  He will never harm you. He is such an amazing Father. Then He took me places I never dreamed of and showed me so much purity of love and joy. I am just overcome with love for Him.

And I did submit surrender to Him, willingly.

Now, on the other hand, I refused to be broken. Amen. But every abuser that came when I was made to be a sex slave at a very young age as a child, I refused to be broken. I refused to let them take from me my spirit, my drive, that eternal purpose that was hidden so deep inside of me.

But then, as I grew in Christ and His love and the Holy Spirit guiding me, I realized that I had to submit and surrender, to come into obedience to the Father, so that I would know His will and not try to exert my own, not have pride and ego and forge my own way that was, you know, my own. In my own mind, that was going to be the greatest path, and that wasn't because God knows so much more.

His ways are higher, above our ways. He sees the end from the beginning and is everywhere, and we aren't. So we trust, we obey, we surrender, and we watch out for what He does.

When we contrast that with religion by self-effort, self-motivation, and self-control.

What are the results?

Well, salvation by faith is joy, thankfulness, love, guidance, service, and forgiveness.

And then the results of religion by self-effort can be chronic guilt, apathy, depression, failure, constant desire for the approval of others, never truly feeling like you measure up, that that you can accomplish all the tasks that you've piled on yourself.

And something that we do as trauma survivors is trying to please everyone.

And we say yes to every opportunity that comes.

And, and we want to save everyone and everything.

And that is to the detriment of us. It's also to the detriment of the body of Christ. Because we are called to do the will of the Father and not be overcome with distractions in this great time of deception as Satan piles these distractions and deceptions upon us.

So we have to be very careful that we are walking in line with His eternal purpose. 

And again, that was looking at it. Colossians 2.

Now, He brought me the Evidence Study Bible, the New King James Version. I'm going to look at the commentary; something stood out to me, and it's on page 1711.

And again, it's regarding Colossians 2.

And I would be grateful if you could read Colossians 2 on your own time and marinate in it because I've got other passages of scripture that He wants me to read and I don't want to take up so much of your time that you tune me out and you don't listen because this is really a teaching episode of Reflective Hour on faith and the power of faith because we need strong faith.

Faith to believe in the healing that Christ already brought to us through His work on the Cross by His stripes we were healed. It's already it's past tense. It's already done, but we need to understand faith and know that. 

So I just was overcome when I was reading this, and it was looking at Colossians 2 and even was in Colossians 1:28.

Even with what I'm going to be reading, He was just giving kind of a commentary. And I thought it was a pretty great example.

So I was going to read it.

A passage from the Evidence Study Bible NKJV, "says a lighthouse keeper gained a reputation as being a very kind man.  He would give free fuel to ships. That miscalculated the amount of fuel needed to reach their destination port.

One night, during a storm, lightning struck his lighthouse and put out its light. He immediately turned on his generator, but it soon ran out of fuel, and he had given all his reserves to passing ships. During the dark night, a ship struck the rocks, and many lives were lost. At his trial, the judge, who knew of the lighthouse keeper's reputation as a kind man,  and wept as he gave his sentence.

He accused the lighthouse keeper of neglecting his primary responsibility standing for  his primary responsibility to keep the light shining. "

Let me read that again. 

"At his trial, the judge knew the lighthouse keeper's reputation as a kind man and wept as he gave sentence. He accused the lighthouse keeper of neglecting his primary responsibility to keep the light shining.

The church can so often get caught up in legitimate acts of kindness, standing for political righteousness, feeding the hungry, etc. But our primary task is to warn sinners of danger. We are to keep the Light of the gospel shining so sinners can avoid the jagged-edged rocks of wrath. And escape being eternally damned (The Evidence Study Bible NKJV).

I'm going to keep reading again out of the Evidence Study Bible,  the New King James version on page 1711,  "my friend, I stand in judgment now and feel that you're to blame somehow on earth. I walk with you by day, and never did you show the way you knew the savior in truth and glory, but never did you.

Tell the story. My knowledge then was very dim. You could have led me safe to him,  though we live together here on earth. You never told me of the second birth.  And now I stand before eternal hell because of heaven's glory. You did not tell. " Anonymous Author.

That was anonymous who wrote it.

The book goes on to say that the only way to turn back darkness is to let the radiant Light of the gospel shine,  quoting Greg Laurie. 

Each person we meet on a daily basis who does not know Christ is hellbound. That may make some folks bristle, but it's a fact.  When we refuse to warn people that their actions and lifestyles have eternal consequences, We're not going; we're not doing them any favors. If everybody feels good about his or her sin,  why would anyone repent? And that's quoting  Franklin Graham in the book (The Evidence Study Bible NKJV, P 1711).

Some may ask how Jesus could be both God and man.  It has been well said that when God, the creator and sustainer of the universe, became a man, He didn't cease to be God. He created a body and then filled that body as a hand filled a glove (The Evidence Study Bible NKJV, P 1711).

We are the body. We are to fit as a glove with Christ.

We are to have His heart and mind.

We are to love the sinner, but we are never to applaud the sin.

We're not to let it seem right or compromise with it.

We aren't to hang flags that celebrate open sin.  We are to show the sinner the way, to love them and meet them where they are, but we are never to compromise the Truth, never to say it's okay,  because to say it's okay and to ignore the Wages of Sin is Death, is to ignore scripture. 

Sin has consequences for our health, spiritual fitness, and everything else.

But Christ came to redeem us. He died on the Cross so we could live. 

I have committed sins, and He forgave me and doesn't remember them now. I was a sinner. I'm no different than any of you. I did things. But even to this day, I still have not told anyone. Many of you are that way, but I aired it all out to Jesus, repented, and asked Him to forgive me, and He did (I forgave myself, too).

And He reminded me that I don't have to carry the shame, the guilt, the fear, and the regret of all those things because He loved me so much.

He died on the Cross, rose again and Father sent His only son so I could live.  I could truly live and be reborn with that second birth. 

We're sinners.  And when Christ comes to live inside of us, we have salvation,  not by works, but by believing in His son.

And He shows us that mercy and that grace.  We can be transformed.  And I was transformed,  but I changed everything about my life.  I didn't listen to the same music.  I even didn't eat the same foods in some essence. I just began to be molded and shaped into the image of Christ.

And it wasn't that I set out to do these things; it's as He worked inside of me, I got more of the Word in me, and I grew in faith.

That I was able to accomplish the things He has set about for me to do for the Kingdom, and I really had to submit and surrender to His will and not my own because I had a certain way that I thought things were supposed to go, but they didn't; they weren't that way at all.

It was when I humbled myself, got alone with Him, sought Him and His Truth, and matured in His Word through the elders that were placed in my path and, really humbling myself and listening to some great men and women of God who guided me and are still guiding me as I'm still growing. But my primary thing was listening to the Whisper of the Holy Spirit, having Him speak to me, convict me when I needed to be convicted, and show me in His Word where the Truth was so that I could find it for myself.

Because He establishes His Word in two to three witnesses, and that's what the different versions of Scripture are like.

Ephesians is a witness. Luke is a witness. 

And that hit me because I never saw that as like witnesses. 

And they're witnesses to the Word of God, to the Truth, different accounts,  but resonating the same Truth of the Word.

And the more you marinate in the Word, and you get in it, and you grow, it's just honey. It's love. It's greatness. 

And we have a great commission to bring people to Christ, not to celebrate their sins or say, well, we can do these great works and get into heaven, and everything's great thinking we can still be going and partaking in sin.

No, I had to stop, too. I didn't curse anymore. I mean, the Holy Spirit had to change me, and it just recognized that the work He did on the Cross truly brings us freedom. And so now He has put some Scriptures on me, which I want to read, always giving Him the last Word and the final Word because this isn't about me.

It's about Him. And it's about you growing in Him.

If I show you Christ and how to get those tools you need in your tool chest, then you can grow in Him, not compromise your faith, and love the sinner, not the sin. 

Still, show them the Light and love of Christ.

Accept them, meet them where they are, recognizing that we all fall short of the Glory of the Lord, but we all must strive to do the will of the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

And how do we do that? We get in His Word and let the spirit guide us, not our human spirit, not our flesh, not our feelings, not our wants or desires.

None of those things we have to die to flesh so that we can truly live as the spiritual beings that He created us to be.

So, I want to start with Ephesians 2: 4-5, the King James Version.

Ephesians 2:4-5
King James Version

4 But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us,
5 Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;)

Ephesians 2: 8-9, the King James Version, 

Ephesians 2:8-9
King James Version

8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Luke 17, the New International Version, talks about sin, faith, and duty. 

Luke 17
New International Version

Sin, Faith, Duty
17 Jesus said to his disciples: “Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come.

2 It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.

3 So watch yourselves.“If your brother or sister sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them.

4 Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.”

5 The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!”

6 He replied, “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it will obey you.

7 “Suppose one of you has a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Will he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, ‘Come along now and sit down to eat’?

8 Won’t he rather say, ‘Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink’?

9 Will he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do?

10 So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.’”

We are to obey. We are servants. 

We're all slaves unto You, God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Willingly, lovingly, following Him and obeying because He gives us a new birth, a new life. And those of us that He's redeemed,  we seek to do His will.

There are so many that you just see them, and they say He changed everything from the moment I had that encounter with Him; I was never the same.

And that's my truth. I was never the same. I used to curse like a sailor. Everybody will tell you. As an ER nurse, I cursed like a sailor. Every other word, it was awful. The words that came out of my mouth.

From the moment the Holy Spirit filled me up, changed me, and gave me a new life, I never cursed another word.

It was crazy. I am a different woman than my husband married, which is a good thing. and as I, as the Lord has healed me and is healing me and breaking off the chains of the past from trauma, I'm truly transforming. It's just amazing. Even to me, I mean, I've shed my food addiction and everything.

I'm excited to see this new version of myself and where He's taking me as I walk in, blind obedience to the Whisper of my Father, whom I adore.

He's everything to me. I just, He's yummy and I love him. 

Now let's see. Let me keep reading because I even lost my track of where I was.

7 “Suppose one of you has a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Will he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, ‘Come along now and sit down to eat’?

8 Won’t he rather say, ‘Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink’?

9 Will he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do?

10 So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.’”

I know I read that again, but I'm sure it was worth reading again,  I know it was so worth reading again.

Basically,

Obey, obey, obey, obey, obey,  and obey.

It's really good practice to read the scriptures out loud. Sometimes, the Spirit will want you to read them aloud a couple of times, three times.

It depends on your relationship with the Lord. And as He's guiding you and directing you and, and it's just, I can't describe it, but as you grow in that bond with Him and mature, just the secrets in His Word that He shows you. 

Luke 17 goes on.

Jesus Heals Ten Men With Leprosy

11 Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus traveled along the border between Samaria and Galilee.

12 As he was going into a village, ten men who had leprosy met him. They stood at a distance

13 and called out in a loud voice, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us!”

14 When he saw them, he said, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were cleansed.

See that you go show yourselves to the priesthood. And as they went, they were cleansed.

So, as they were moving, going where He told them to go, obeying His Word, they were cleansed in the process. So it's healing, maturing, and growing in Christ. It takes time. It's a process.


15 One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice.

16 He threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan.

17 Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine?

18 Has no one returned to give praise to God except this foreigner?”

19 Then he said to him, “Rise and go; your faith has made you well.”
 
See that? The others obeyed, and they went. And we don't know what happened to them.

Did they continue to sing praises to the Father, thanking Him for His healing?

Did they have a changed life and a true encounter?

Did they or did they not?

So many of us can focus on religious tasks and doing things and being servants, but are we obeying the will of the Father?

Are we praising Him, glorifying His Holy Name, seeking to do His will above our own?

 Are we acting through true faith, 

salvation by faith, 

believing  Jesus was the son of God, fully man, fully God,  sent by God to earth, 

died on the Cross;

He was beaten, stripped naked, shamed, bore all that on the Cross for us, died, bled out,  was raised up,
 
resurrected three days later,

raised up and is sitting in heavenly places to the right side of the Father,

being our advocate, our mediator. 

Through that work on the Cross. 

We were set free by His death and Resurrection.

You merely need to believe that. 

Believe with all your heart that Jesus, son of God, raised up and died on the Cross for your sins.

You're saved. 

You have salvation and healing,

and say, Holy Spirit, I believe it. I receive it. I repent of my sins. Come live inside of me.

Make me a new creature.

Heal me, and He will.

 Every day, He'll make you new.

Like the one who came back, the one leper, and he thanked Him, like I'm doing now, thanking Him.

He changed my whole life. I was dead before he set me free, and I had an encounter with him, and I've never been the same. You can return to Reflective Hour's episode one and hear my testimony—His testimony—because it's not about me; it's about Him. I only live and exist to do His will because I can't thank Him enough.

I have such gratitude. He took the "icky, "the weight of it all, the shame, the guilt, the fear, the regret, the coping through addiction, everything. He took it. I don't have it anymore.  And I go from Glory to Glory, and I have Him to thank, but I can't humble myself enough to thank Him enough for what He's done.

I just can't. 

Now, we keep going.

The Coming of the Kingdom of God.

Again, we're in Luke 17: 20 I  want to ensure I said that right.

Yes. Luke 17: 20, 

The Coming of the Kingdom of God

20 Once, on being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The coming of the kingdom of God is not something that can be observed,

21 nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is in your midst.”

22 Then he said to his disciples, “The time is coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, but you will not see it.

23 People will tell you, ‘There he is!’ or ‘Here he is!’ Do not go running off after them.

24 For the Son of Man in his day will be like the lightning, which flashes and lights up the sky from one end to the other.

25 But first he must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation.

26 “Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man.

27 People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all.

28 “It was the same in the days of Lot. People were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building.

29 But the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and destroyed them all.

30 “It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is revealed.

31 On that day no one who is on the housetop, with possessions inside, should go down to get them. Likewise, no one in the field should go back for anything.

32 Remember Lot’s wife!

33 Whoever tries to keep their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life will preserve it.

34 I tell you, on that night two people will be in one bed; one will be taken and the other left.

35 Two women will be grinding grain together; one will be taken and the other left.”

37 “Where, Lord?” they asked. He replied, “Where there is a dead body, there the vultures will gather.”

Now, Romans 3:28, the Amplified Bible. 

Romans 3:28
Amplified Bible

28 For we maintain that an individual is justified by faith distinctly apart from works of the Law [the observance of which has nothing to do with justification, that is, being declared free of the guilt of sin and made acceptable to God].

It's not your works that are going to get you into Heaven. It's not feeding the hungry. It's not doing all these things if your heart posture is not in alignment with the will of God, the Father through faith, obedience, and doing what He's called you to do.

If He's called you to do that, if He's called you to feed the hungry, that's one thing.

If He's called you to go out and set up villages and do all these things, but we have to be very careful that we are following the will of God and not honoring individuals because of their works, Not making people idols in our lives. 

Romans 10:17 Amplified Bible. 

Romans 10:17
Amplified Bible

17 So faith comes from hearing [what is told], and what is heard comes by the [preaching of the] message concerning Christ.

Hebrews 11:1-6.

Remember, these are each witnesses. 

We can't just take one Scripture at its Word and shape it or change it to say what we want because things can be taken out of context.

We have to go through it as He shows it to us, building and building and building, so nothing's taken out of context. 

Hebrews 11: 1-6
Amplified Bible
The Triumphs of Faith

11 Now faith is the assurance (title deed, confirmation) of things hoped for (divinely guaranteed), and the evidence of things not seen [the conviction of their reality—faith comprehends as fact what cannot be experienced by the physical senses].

{Faith doesn't go by your feelings, your senses—what you hear, taste, and smell.

No, it's faith. You know it. You believe it. Even in your own life, if you have $12 in your bank account or your rent's overdue, you've got all these things happening and coming at you, all these negative circumstances, but you know, that you know, that you know, that you know, that you know, that God is with you. And He will give you the desires of your heart.

Mark 11: 23-24.

You know that He's with you. You know that He's carrying you, that He's got you. You will not default on your rent. You won't default on your bills. You know He's got it all because you walk in obedience to Him. Your faith. 

That's how you were saved, right? You were saved believing and in knowing it.

That's how you get your healing.

Knowing it. If you're saved, you have faith because you got saved, so you know you have faith for healing too in your body.

It's just a yummy thing.}

2 For by this [kind of] faith the men of old gained [divine] approval.

3 By faith [that is, with an inherent trust and enduring confidence in the power, wisdom and goodness of God] we understand that the worlds (universe, ages) were framed and created [formed, put in order, and equipped for their intended purpose] by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible.

[He spoke the world into existence. 

Speak Truth over your life. 

Let your words be
words of construction and not words of demolition.}

4 By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which it was testified of him that he was righteous (upright, in right standing with God), and God testified by accepting his gifts. And though he died, yet through [this act of] faith he still speaks.

5 By faith [that pleased God] Enoch was caught up and taken to heaven so that he would not have a glimpse of death; and he was not found because God had taken him; for even before he was taken [to heaven], he received the testimony [still on record] that he had walked with God and pleased Him.

{Oh, I long for God to say, Well done, my faithful servant.

You obeyed me.  You pleased me with what you did, that you listened to Me, that you obeyed, that you submitted and surrendered.}

6 But without faith it is impossible to [walk with God and] please Him, for whoever comes [near] to God must [necessarily] believe that God exists and that He rewards those who [earnestly and diligently] seek Him.

He wants a relationship with us. 

He's a good father. 

He wants to cultivate that with us. 

He's my friend. He's my father. 

I fear him in a good way. I don't want to ever say anything or do anything He doesn't call me to do. I want to portray His Words always as He gives them to me with love and humility, but so we can learn and grow.

And that's what we have to do. 

Set boundaries in love, and show them the love and Light of Christ.  

Walk, as He calls us to walk, obey, and surrender, not our will, not by works, but salvation by faith.  

That's today's episode of Reflective Hour with Tammy Toney-Butler. 
 
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Father God, bless them, guide them, and keep them, strengthen them as they go through this day,  loving You with Your Light shining on them,  showing them the Knowledge of the Truth so that they can come into the fullness of all that You have for them. 

Remember, Jesus came so we could have life more abundantly.  

We're heirs to the King,  a royal priesthood set apart, loved, and adored.  

Walk in that. 

Don't walk in judgment. 

Don't walk in fear. 

Don't walk in condemnation.  

He loves us. 

He's forgiven you. 

You've repented of your sins. He's forgiven you.  Let Him transform you.

Renew your heart and your mind. 

Strive to be like Christ in everything that you do.  

God bless you and keep you.

God bless you.