Faith In The City

I read Amos 5:24 this morning and it would not let me go. Let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never failing stream. I have read that verse before, but today it stopped me in a way I needed to slow down and actually think about.I started wondering how often the Bible talks about justice. Turns out it is a lot. Righteousness alone shows up hundreds of times depending on the translation, and when justice and righteousness are paired together like they are in Amos, that combination shows up close to fifty times across the Old Testament. That is not a coincidence. In Hebrew poetry, repetition is the underline. It is God saying pay attention, this matters.So I went digging into the context. Amos was speaking to the northern kingdom of Israel during a season where, on the surface, they looked fine. They were showing up. They were sacrificing. They were going through the religious motions. But underneath all that performance, they had neglected the poor, tolerated corrupt courts, and turned their eyes away from injustice happening right in front of them. Some were even worshiping idols on the side. God was not impressed with their performance. He told them flat out that their worship meant nothing to Him while they were allowing oppression to continue.That is the part that stopped me. God is saying justice is not a suggestion. It is not a nice idea for the people who happen to care about that kind of thing. It is a divine demand. It is not political. It is spiritual. It is foundational to how His government operates on earth, and our worship cannot be separated from how we treat the people around us.The river image is what got me thinking the most. Water does not ask for permission to move. It does not wait for the right moment or check if conditions are convenient. It just goes. It finds the dry places and fills them. That is what God is asking His people to be. Not occasional justice. Not justice when it is trending or when it is safe to talk about. Continuous justice. Always moving. Always finding the next dry place.I think about that and then I think about where I land. What am I prioritizing in my own life. Am I actually serving people or am I doing things to be seen doing them. Is what I post and what I give and what I show up for coming from my heart or am I just checking a box so I can say I did something.The devotional made one more point that I cannot stop thinking about. It said something like a small act of justice on earth expands when it reaches heaven. That tracks with how God works everywhere else. He takes the little we offer and multiplies it. If that is true, then the small things actually matter. Showing up for one person. Speaking up in one room. Giving when it costs you something. None of that is wasted.So here is the real question for both of us. What are we prioritizing. Are the things we do coming from our heart or are they for show. And where in our community, our family, our school, our church, is there a dry place we have the power to fill.Peace, Love and Joy alwaysInfinite Faith and Favor | InfiniteFaithandFavor.com

Some scriptures make sense the moment you read them. Others you understand in your spirit but struggle to explain out loud. Luke 9:24 is one of those for me: whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Jesus will save it.I have read this verse plenty of times and I still had to slow down and actually think through what it was saying.The second half is the easier part. Whoever surrenders what they want, what they have, and what they are chasing in order to follow Jesus actually gains their life, because they gain eternal life. The first half took me back to the story of the wealthy man who asked Jesus what he needed to do to follow Him. Jesus told him to give up his wealth, and the man walked away because he wasn't willing.Here's what I love about following God: He never asked me to give up everything I own. But that story shows something important. The man's unwillingness to let go revealed he wasn't ready to surrender. Following God comes down to the posture of your heart, how attached you are to what you own compared to how attached you are to Him.GOD WANTS YOU TO FLOURISH, NOT JUST SURVIVEOne thing I'm learning is that God never designed His people to live paycheck to paycheck or stuck in poverty. He created us to do more than get by. He created us to flourish. Flourishing goes beyond money, though money is part of how we survive in this world, and God is fine with us having it. He cares about whether we love it more than we love Him.Faith can be your income and your calling at the same time, done with full integrity. I know people who make a living from faith based work without compromising a single thing. The posture of your heart is what matters, regardless of whether you're earning money doing it.DISCIPLESHIP IS THE ACTUAL GOALThere's a word for what following Jesus really requires: discipleship. A disciple is a learner, someone patterning their life after Jesus, not just someone who says they believe in Him.Here's where I actually am with this: I say discipleship is my top goal in life, but my daily choices don't always reflect that it's actually first. That gap between what I say and what I live is something I'm actively working on.Jesus says the next step after choosing to follow Him is denying yourself, which means putting what He wants above what you want. That includes admitting you don't automatically know the right direction for your own life. Discipleship isn't a title. It's closer to a job description, one you accept every single day.DENYING YOURSELF IS A GIFT, NOT A PUNISHMENTDenying yourself might mean letting go of things that feel good right now but are quietly pulling you away from God. People should be able to look at how you live and actually see Him in it. And the gift on the other side of that surrender is eternal life.The devotional I read this through raised a question I'm still thinking through: when we hold onto our own life instead of handing it to Jesus, we miss out on the abundant life He promises. I keep asking myself if that abundant life is only about eternity, or if it's also about the fullness available to us right now. I don't have a clean answer yet, and I think that's okay.WHERE THIS LEAVES USIf you're reading this, take inventory of your own life. Are you living for Christ, or living for what feels good in the moment? That question isn't meant to make you feel bad. It's meant to point you toward Him.The call to action here is simple: commit to following Jesus, no matter how hard the road gets, and ask for the strength to endure while you do it.Peace, Love and Joy always. Infinite Faith and Favor | InfiniteFaithandFavor.com

I was listening to the book of Obadiah and it hit me that the whole book is really about a family fight. Edom and Israel came from the same bloodline, Esau and Jacob, twin brothers who never got it right with each other. Obadiah is God calling Edom out for how they treated their own blood when Israel was down.That got me thinking about how far back this pattern actually goes. Cain killed his own brother Abel out of jealousy, and that was the first family that ever existed. Isaac and Ishmael were split apart before they were even grown. Jacob and Esau fought over a birthright and a blessing, and that fight followed their descendants for generations, which is exactly what Obadiah is addressing centuries later. Joseph's own brothers hated him enough to sell him into slavery. Even Rachel and Leah competed with each other over a husband and over children.The same two family lines, Jacob's and Esau's, are still the ones people point to when they talk about conflict in that part of the world today. That is not a coincidence to me. That is a wound that started inside one family and never fully healed.It made me think about me and my own brothers. We do not always agree. There have been real issues between us at different points. But if something ever went down, I know at least one of them has my back, and I believe the other one would too, even if he did not agree with what I was doing. They would not let somebody take advantage of me. Disagreement is not the same as abandonment. That is not always how it played out in scripture, and it is not always how it plays out in real families either.So I am left with a real question. Why does the person who should be your first ally so often become the hardest relationship you carry? I do not have a full answer. But I think part of it is that closeness creates the deepest wounds. You cannot be betrayed by someone who was never close enough to hurt you. Cain was not jealous of a stranger. Esau was not robbed by an outsider. Joseph was not sold by men who did not know him. The people who can wound you the most are usually the people who were supposed to be for you from the start.I think God knows this about family, which is why so much of scripture is not just about loving strangers, it is about how we treat the people closest to us. Psalm 133 says how good and how pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity. That verse would not need to exist if unity between siblings came easy. God wrote it because He knew how rare it actually is.If you carry a wound from a sibling or a family member who should have been your biggest support, you are not the only one, and you are not imagining how deep that kind of hurt runs. It has been happening since the first family on earth.I am not saying my family has this fully figured out. I am saying I see the pattern now in a way I did not before. Brother against brother is not new. It is not just a modern family problem. It goes all the way back to the beginning, and it shows up in some of the most important stories in the Bible. Maybe the point is not to expect perfect agreement from the people closest to you. Maybe the point is figuring out who still shows up for you even when they do not agree, because that is a different kind of love than the kind that only shows up when it is easy.Peace, Love and Joy always.Infinite Faith and Favor | InfiniteFaithandFavor.com

Every time I read Ephesians 3:20-21, I pause. Same verse, same pause, every single time. It happened again this morning and I finally stopped to think about why. The verse says God is able to do far more than we could ever ask, think, or imagine. And the more I think about that, the more it changes the way I plan my life. Think about your biggest, greatest fantasy. The version of your life where everything works out exactly how you wanted it. Now realize that picture is still small compared to what He actually has for you. Not because your imagination is weak, but because He isn't limited to what you can dream up. He knows about resources and possibilities I don't even have a clue exist. I'm sitting here with my own plans and expectations thinking I'm dreaming big, and He's working from a completely different scale. I keep reading this verse because I have big expectations for the rest of my life. I want to believe for more, not less. And what this verse keeps telling me is that wanting more isn't the problem. My ceiling is His floor. He can come in and do it bigger and better than anything I asked for, because He isn't working with what I have. He's working with what He has. This is the same God I wrote about earlier today, the one who delights in me. That's the part that gets me every time. The same God who can do immeasurably more than I could ever imagine, with access to resources and possibilities I can't even comprehend, is the same one who cares about me specifically. My next-door neighbor doesn't know who I am. They don't owe me anything and they're not thinking about me. But He does. He knows me completely. And here's the part that's hard to say out loud. As much as I've messed up, as many things as I've done or said or thought that I'm not proud of, He's still right here in it with me. He didn't step back. He wants me to flourish anyway. Not the polished version of me. Me. That's what makes this verse different from just words on a page. It's not abstract theology. It's personal. The God who has more resources than I can fathom is the same God who looks at someone like me, messy parts included, and still delights in me. It's overwhelming to actually think through that. Not in a bad way. The kind of overwhelming where you have to put the phone down for a second because your heart can't hold the size of it. If you're reading this with big expectations for your life, good. Keep them. Just know they're still too small. And if you're reading this feeling like you've done too much for God to want anything to do with you, that's not how He works. He isn't waiting for you to clean up first. He's already in it with you, wanting more for you than you've even asked for. Peace, Love and Joy always, Infinite Faith and Favor | InfiniteFaithandFavor.com

I have read Romans 8:18 before, but something different happened the morning I actually slowed down on it. I always pictured glory as something that gets revealed to me. Something I'll witness one day, like a curtain pulling back. But the verse doesn't say that. It says the glory will be revealed in us. That one word changes everything. If glory is happening in me, then it's not just a future event I'm waiting on. It's something being formed right now, inside the actual suffering I'm walking through. The pain isn't separate from the glory. It's part of how the glory gets built. That hit different once I thought about who wrote this. Paul wrote it. The same Paul who was beaten, shipwrecked, imprisoned, and run out of cities for preaching the gospel. He had every reason to measure his suffering against anything and call it unbearable. Instead he says it's not even worth comparing to what's coming. If Paul can say that with everything he carried, that's not a throwaway line. That's a man who tested this truth against real pain and found it still held. I think about Dr. Bianca Neel's testimony when I read this. She walked through a season that should have broken her, and instead she became a walking, talking testimony that recovery is possible and that prayer works. She didn't get there by ignoring what she went through. She got there by refusing to let the hard season be the loudest voice in the room. God stayed louder. And honestly, that's the invitation for all of us. We are all walking, talking testimonies just by waking up every day. That alone is a miracle. Look around at the people in your life and you'll find someone, maybe yourself, who has dealt with suffering, grief, or injustice that never got a clean explanation. Some questions don't get answered on this side of eternity. This verse doesn't promise you'll understand the why. It promises a perspective that carries you through the season anyway. I think about my own life when I read this. Sexual assault. Unemployment. Living paycheck to paycheck. Seasons of health struggles and pain that didn't make sense at the time. None of that disappeared because I found this verse. But here's what's true now. As I stay focused on God today, I genuinely don't spend much time thinking about those things anymore. I'm excited every day I wake up, because being here still means I have purpose. Whatever I'm walking through is leading somewhere better. Jesus is coming back to finish what He started. When He does, suffering ends. Sickness ends. Pain ends. We join Him in a glory that makes whatever we walked through on earth feel like nothing in comparison. That's not me minimizing what hard seasons cost you. It's Paul telling us the scale is so lopsided in favor of what's coming that the comparison barely makes sense. So if you're in a season right now where the questions aren't getting answered and the pain feels louder than anything else, keep your eyes on Him anyway. Your setbacks are setups. Eternal life is waiting. And the glory being revealed isn't just going to happen to you. It's already being formed in you. Peace, Love and Joy alwaysInfinite Faith and Favor | InfiniteFaithandFavor.com

Peace is not found in control, but in God.Nicole Salmon said that on a devotional I listened to recently, and it has stayed with me.In peace, I will lie down and sleep, for you alone, Lord, make me dwell in safety. Psalm 4:8 NIVDavid wrote that verse during one of the hardest stretches of his life, with real threats coming at him from every direction. And he could still sleep, because his peace was not tied to his circumstances. It was tied to God.Peter is another example of this. The night before he was scheduled to be executed, chained between two guards in a prison cell, he was sleeping so deeply that an angel had to physically strike him to wake him up. That is what real surrender looks like. Not the absence of danger, but peace that holds steady inside of it.David and Peter both had every reason to lie awake. Neither of them did, because their trust was not in their circumstances changing. It was in God.The devotional walked through something I had never thought about this clearly before. Most of what we worry about is completely outside of our control. And worry does not add a single day to your life. It only takes away from the one you are living right now. When you worry over something you cannot control, you do not gain control. You just gain more worry, more anxiety, and less peace.That is why we are told to surrender our troubles to God instead of carrying them ourselves. He fills the gap between where we are and where we want to be. He is the one with control over everything, especially the things we cannot see coming.The devotional said something else that stopped me: the quality of your sleep is often a reflection of how much you actually trust God. If you are anxious and restless at night, it might mean there is something you have not fully handed over to Him.That one made me think harder than I expected to. I have not felt anxious lately, at least not in any way I could name. But these past couple of nights I have had a hard time falling asleep, even when my body felt tired. So I started asking myself the real question. Was this just my body, or was there something underneath it I had not turned over to God yet.I do not have a tidy answer to that yet. What I do know is I took it straight to Him instead of trying to figure it out on my own first. I am praying that He reveals whatever anxiety might be there, known or unknown to me, and that He removes it. I am trusting that He will fill me with His peace and the assurance that He already has complete control over my future. I am holding onto the promises He has already given me in scripture, trusting Him as my Creator, my Father, and the One who sustains me.In Jesus name. Amen.Peace, Love and Joy always,TanyaInfiniteFaithandFavor.com

Worship in spirit and truth is not a special skill you are missing. It is worship that comes from the heart and is real, not performed.

Matthew 6:33 says to seek His kingdom and His righteousness first, and everything else will be taken care of. It doesn’t mention money, success, power, or even love. Just His kingdom and His righteousness. So what does that actually mean? I was reading this through YouVersion guided scripture, and the narrator, AXIS, asked a question I hadn’t thought about. He asked what “all these things” actually refers to. I assumed it meant His kingdom and righteousness, which led to the real question: what is His kingdom, and what is His righteousness? The answer given was that it means prioritizing the way of being in the world that Jesus modeled. Trusting the Father to generously care for us as we generously care for others. That wasn’t what I would have guessed. This is also why context matters so much when reading scripture. Understanding what was happening before a verse was written changes what it actually means, and sometimes the meaning people assume isn’t the correct one at all. The devotional Seek This First breaks it down further. Instead of worrying about our basic needs, we’re called to seek His kingdom and righteousness first. Worldly things will always fight for our attention. Our schedules fill up, our responsibilities pile on with different levels of urgency, and what we should be seeking instead is the work of the kingdom, which is telling others about the hope of Jesus and teaching what He commanded. Seeking His righteousness means desiring to live the way God intended, according to His word, and making decisions that align with it. That part still feels like a puzzle to me. It’s one thing to say live according to His word. It’s another to actually live it out. And only when we put Him first do the other areas of life make sense. I’ll say this plainly. I don’t fully know if I understand what it means for every area of my life to make sense. Losing my brother still doesn’t make sense to me. But I do believe that once someone fulfills their purpose, their time on earth ends. I think about that a lot when I think about him. I’m in a season of uncertainty and struggle that’s gone on for a long time. I don’t like it. But deep down I know there’s a reason for it, an end to it, and that it’s growing me into something greater. The call to action from the devotional is to think about how you spend your time, and whether you’re worrying about things outside your control. I’m learning this gradually. When I hit a red light while I’m in a rush, my first reaction is still frustration, and then I remind myself I’ll get there when I get there. When my computer is slow and I’m trying to get something done, I get frustrated first, then I ask myself if maybe I’m not supposed to be working on this right now, or what I’m supposed to learn from the delay. I can’t make the computer move faster. I can only decide how I respond to the wait. This isn’t a lesson you learn overnight. It’s one I’m still learning, one red light and one slow loading screen at a time. The devotional also points out that when seeking God becomes your top priority, a desire to tell others about Him naturally overflows. I can testify to that. I’m not out here preaching at people, but I am quicker to talk about what He’s doing, because I genuinely believe everything that happens is for me, not to me. So when something good happens, it’s praise be to God. When someone needs something to go right, it’s let’s pray about this in Jesus’ name. That’s how I share my faith. Not by forcing it, but by living grateful, knowing life isn’t guaranteed, and that I get to live the life I’m living. Peace, Love and Joy always,Tanya / InfiniteFaithandFavor.com

Breaking down Hebrews 12:28-29, a verse that sounds simple until you really look at what it is asking. What does it mean to worship with reverence and awe, and why does it call God a consuming fire?

I have started reading the Bible all the way through more times than I can count. Most of those attempts stopped somewhere in Genesis. So when I tell you I have read this part before and never seen it the way I am seeing it now, that is saying something.Adam and Eve ate the fruit they were told not to eat. The moment they did, they knew they were naked, and they hid. God comes looking for them and asks how they knew they were naked in the first place. They were hiding to cover themselves, which if you think about it, is the opposite of what we should do when we mess up. Hiding feels natural. Running toward God does not. But running toward him is what he is actually asking for.Here is the part that got me. God does not judge them for it. He does not chastise them or tell them how wrong they were. He asks one question, and then he makes coverings for them.The word for what he made is kethonet. Royal robes. He could have given them something basic. They had nothing to offer, no skill to make a covering themselves. They had been walking around enjoying the garden, not preparing for this. God did not make them earn it or figure it out. He gave them his best while they were standing there in the aftermath of their biggest mistake.That is what real love looks like. Not overlooking the sin. Responding to it with patience, abundance, and kindness instead of condemnation.This is exactly what 1 John 1:9 is telling us. "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness." Faithful. Not occasionally generous. Faithful, every time we come to him honest about what we have done.He knew we would sin before we ever did. That is why he sent his son. Christ took the weight so we would not have to carry shame or guilt as a permanent address. We are free. And that freedom is not a free pass to keep doing the same thing. It is supposed to push us to live different, to walk in who he made us to be, knowing we are forgiven and chasing righteousness anyway.So if there is something in your head telling you that you are too far gone, that you have messed up too many times, that is not God talking. Let it go. Lean into him. Let him purify you from it. He already made your covering. He made it royal, not because you earned it, but because that is who he is.Take a minute today. Whatever it is you are carrying, forgive yourself for it. Ask God to forgive you. Forgive the people who wronged you too, because we cannot ask for grace we are not willing to extend. Then thank him. Thank him for the forgiveness, for making you his child, for the freedom you already have. Ask him for the courage to actually walk in it.Peace, Love and Joy always,Tanya / InfiniteFaithandFavor.com#InfiniteFaithandFavor #ComeAsYouAre #GraceNotGrind #ChristianWomen #FaithInAction

The Lord is like a father to his children, tender and compassionate to those who fear him.Psalm 103:13 NLTToday is Father's Day, and for the first time I said happy Father's Day to my Heavenly Father. There's a scripture that says He's a father to the fatherless, and that's what makes Him different. If you don't know your earthly father, if the relationship was never what it should have been, if he's passed, or if he just wasn't available to you for whatever reason, you still have a Father. The best Father you could ever have. He does for you everything you'd expect an earthly father to do, but elevated. On a different level.I read a devotional that walked through what fathers do for their kids at every stage. Baby, child, teenager. They provide. They clothe. They feed. They discipline. They comfort. They play, teach, listen, guide, forgive, empower. It pointed to Matthew 7:9-11, where Jesus asks what father would give his child a stone when they ask for bread, or a snake when they ask for fish. If we, as flawed as we are, know how to give good gifts to our children, how much more will our Father in heaven give good gifts to us.Here's where it got me. The devotional said a parent's love for their child can only be compared to God's love for us, and even then, it's a mere shadow. I think about that next to the parable of the mustard seed, where Jesus says even a faith that small can move mountains. As much as I love my son, I believe what I feel for him is the mustard seed next to what God feels for him. My love is the seed. His love is the whole tree.I also want to clear something up while I'm here. Scripture tells us to fear the Lord, and I think that word trips people up. When I read fear, I used to picture being scared, the way you're scared of the dark or scared of getting hurt. That's not it. Fear of the Lord is reverence. It's respect. It's standing in front of something so much bigger than you and finally understanding the size of the room you're in.The devotional closed with something I needed. If you're feeling loss, if you feel like you've messed up, if you're heartbroken or defeated, God wants to meet you exactly where you are. Sometimes that looks like Him leading you toward life. Sometimes it's mercy. Sometimes it's just the reminder that you are still His child, and He is still available to you.It also asked us to pray that God would reveal any untruths or half-truths that have kept us from Him, to help us break down the walls we've built, and to restore the kind of trust we had as children. Simple trust. The kind that doesn't ask questions before it reaches for the hand that's holding it.Peace, Love and Joy always,TanyaInfiniteFaithandFavor.com

I have started reading the Bible all the way through more times than I can count. Most of those attempts stopped somewhere in Genesis. So when I tell you I have read this part before and never seen it the way I am seeing it now, that is saying something. Adam and Eve ate the fruit they were told not to eat. The moment they did, they knew they were naked, and they hid. God comes looking for them and asks how they knew they were naked in the first place. They were hiding to cover themselves, which if you think about it, is the opposite of what we should do when we mess up. Hiding feels natural. Running toward God does not. But running toward him is what he is actually asking for. Here is the part that got me. God does not judge them for it. He does not chastise them or tell them how wrong they were. He asks one question, and then he makes coverings for them. The word for what he made is kethonet. Royal robes. He could have given them something basic. They had nothing to offer, no skill to make a covering themselves. They had been walking around enjoying the garden, not preparing for this. God did not make them earn it or figure it out. He gave them his best while they were standing there in the aftermath of their biggest mistake. That is what real love looks like. Not overlooking the sin. Responding to it with patience, abundance, and kindness instead of condemnation. This is exactly what 1 John 1:9 is telling us. "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness." Faithful. Not occasionally generous. Faithful, every time we come to him honest about what we have done. He knew we would sin before we ever did. That is why he sent his son. Christ took the weight so we would not have to carry shame or guilt as a permanent address. We are free. And that freedom is not a free pass to keep doing the same thing. It is supposed to push us to live different, to walk in who he made us to be, knowing we are forgiven and chasing righteousness anyway. So if there is something in your head telling you that you are too far gone, that you have messed up too many times, that is not God talking. Let it go. Lean into him. Let him purify you from it. He already made your covering. He made it royal, not because you earned it, but because that is who he is. Take a minute today. Whatever it is you are carrying, forgive yourself for it. Ask God to forgive you. Forgive the people who wronged you too, because we cannot ask for grace we are not willing to extend. Then thank him. Thank him for the forgiveness, for making you his child, for the freedom you already have. Ask him for the courage to actually walk in it. Peace, Love and Joy always,Tanya / InfiniteFaithandFavor.com #InfiniteFaithandFavor #ComeAsYouAre #GraceNotGrind #ChristianWomen #FaithInAction

2 Corinthians 3:17 says, "Now the Lord is the spirit, and where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom."This verse excited me when I read it. I don't recall seeing it before, but I felt that excitement because the spirit lives in me, and if where the spirit lives there is freedom, that's what peace beyond understanding feels like. It feels like freedom. Freedom to surrender and let God take over, knowing I don't have to keep fighting or grinding. The fact that His spirit is in me makes me happy, because I'm where He dwells now. Not in some temple, but within me.I love that the narrator, Clarissa Burton, reminds us that before we get into the word, we believe we can find freedom through worldly things. When you turn your life over to God, you learn that true freedom is in that relationship. It's in allowing access to the Lord in your heart and choosing to follow Him.The devotional, True Freedom Is Here, talks about how many people define freedom differently. For some it's the absence of restraints or the things holding us back. For others it's being allowed to choose what they want. According to God's word, freedom is wherever God is, and freedom is found when we live according to God's original design for our life.I don't know that I've ever heard it described that way before. The original design for our life. So what is that?The devotional explains that when we begin our life with Jesus, He gives us a new heart and a new way to live. He sends the spirit of God to live within us, so anyone who believes in Jesus has access to this freedom, the freedom to live according to the spirit of God who lives within us.Paul reminds us that we should spend time in God's presence. It's only when we sit with God daily that we are transformed by Him, through His word and through talking with Him. That's where we have access to true life, transformation, and true freedom.This is a reminder that real freedom is found in surrender to God's design, in the peace of trusting Him instead of trying to control everything myself. I think about the times in my life when I felt like I had freedom. College, graduating, living on my own as an adult. But in those seasons I never felt the peace beyond understanding the way I feel today, after intentionally seeking a better understanding of what it truly means to be a Christian and to turn my life over to God.Can you identify one or two things holding you back from living in true freedom as defined by the word of God? Whatever it is, spend some time with God today. Ask for forgiveness and seek out your next steps. Spend time in His presence through prayer and reading scripture. Your life will be transformed if you continue to spend time with the One who can thoroughly and truly change you and give you real freedom.Peace, Love and Joy always, TanyaInfiniteFaithandFavor.com

2 Corinthians 3:17 says, "Now the Lord is the spirit, and where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom."This verse excited me when I read it. I don't recall seeing it before, but I felt that excitement because the spirit lives in me, and if where the spirit lives there is freedom, that's what peace beyond understanding feels like. It feels like freedom. Freedom to surrender and let God take over, knowing I don't have to keep fighting or grinding. The fact that His spirit is in me makes me happy, because I'm where He dwells now. Not in some temple, but within me.I love that the narrator, Clarissa Burton, reminds us that before we get into the word, we believe we can find freedom through worldly things. When you turn your life over to God, you learn that true freedom is in that relationship. It's in allowing access to the Lord in your heart and choosing to follow Him.The devotional, True Freedom Is Here, talks about how many people define freedom differently. For some it's the absence of restraints or the things holding us back. For others it's being allowed to choose what they want. According to God's word, freedom is wherever God is, and freedom is found when we live according to God's original design for our life.I don't know that I've ever heard it described that way before. The original design for our life. So what is that?The devotional explains that when we begin our life with Jesus, He gives us a new heart and a new way to live. He sends the spirit of God to live within us, so anyone who believes in Jesus has access to this freedom, the freedom to live according to the spirit of God who lives within us.Paul reminds us that we should spend time in God's presence. It's only when we sit with God daily that we are transformed by Him, through His word and through talking with Him. That's where we have access to true life, transformation, and true freedom.This is a reminder that real freedom is found in surrender to God's design, in the peace of trusting Him instead of trying to control everything myself. I think about the times in my life when I felt like I had freedom. College, graduating, living on my own as an adult. But in those seasons I never felt the peace beyond understanding the way I feel today, after intentionally seeking a better understanding of what it truly means to be a Christian and to turn my life over to God.Can you identify one or two things holding you back from living in true freedom as defined by the word of God? Whatever it is, spend some time with God today. Ask for forgiveness and seek out your next steps. Spend time in His presence through prayer and reading scripture. Your life will be transformed if you continue to spend time with the One who can thoroughly and truly change you and give you real freedom.Peace, Love and Joy always, TanyaInfiniteFaithandFavor.com

I am on day 168 of the Bible Recap with Tara-Leigh Cobble, reading through Proverbs 25 and 26 today, and one thing caught my attention.Proverbs 26:27 says that whoever digs a pit for someone else ends up falling into it themselves, and whoever rolls a stone to hurt someone else will have it roll back on them. Psalm 7:15-16 says nearly the same thing a different way. The trouble a person tries to set up for someone else becomes the trouble that lands on them.I could not have quoted either verse before today, but I have heard story after story of this same pattern showing up in real life. Someone sets out to hurt another person, and somehow it circles back on them instead. Today's reading gave me the actual words for something I already believed.The Hebrew word for pit in that verse is shuchah. It described the kind of trap a hunter would dig and cover so an animal would fall in without seeing it coming. That picture matters here. Whatever someone is digging to catch you in, they are the one who eventually falls into it.This makes me think about everything happening in our world right now. It can feel like some people believe the rules do not apply to them. But we were all created by the same God, and we all answer to the same standard. Anything someone is trying to do to you today is them digging their own ditch, not yours.We are still called to fight for justice. Micah 6:8 tells us to act justly, and that calling does not disappear just because we trust God with the outcome. We can stand for what is right and pursue it through legal, peaceful channels rather than trying to force someone into doing the right thing. The same goes for faith. 1 Peter 3:15-16 tells us to answer people with gentleness and respect, not pressure, whether the conversation is about justice or someone coming to know God. Romans 12:19 covers the rest of it. Vengeance belongs to God, not us.Here is something else I keep coming back to. Anyone trying to take your voice, your spirit, your independence, your energy, your love, your success, or your ability to flourish is dealing with something inside themselves first. A person full of joy wants other people to experience that same joy. They want others to feel the peace that goes beyond understanding and to flourish in life too.That actually makes me feel for the people who do this. They have life. Sometimes they even have power and influence. Instead of using any of it for good, they choose to oppress, suppress, belittle, victimize, or judge. That choice will affect them, and it can affect the generations that come after them. It looks like a lack of self-love to me. Who does that to themselves on purpose?Some of the people who do this carry the name Christian too. I will leave that there for today.If you are feeling concerned about what is ahead of you, I want you to have peace about it. Anything someone is trying to do to you right now cannot succeed the way they think it will. They are setting their own trap, not yours. You do not have to carry the weight of fixing it or proving anything to anyone. God already sees what you cannot see yet, and He is on your side.That is the peace I want for you today. Let God handle the ditch. Your job is to stay faithful, stay joyful, and keep flourishing anyway.Peace, Love and Joy always. Infinite Faith and Favor | InfiniteFaithandFavor.com

If you don't know where to start, start with love. That line has been on repeat in my head since this morning. A lot of us stand at the edge of faith wondering what we're supposed to do first, worried about getting it wrong, worried about some checklist we don't even know exists. The truth is simpler than all of that. My command is this: love each other as I have loved you. John 15:12. Jesus said a lot of things that carry weight, but this is the one that sums up everything else. If you're not sure where to begin, begin here. So what does loving the way he loved actually look like? I read something this morning called Love Compelled Him, and it broke it down in a way that finally made it click for me. Love compelled Jesus to give up his privileges. He could have done whatever he wanted with his power and his position. Instead he set his rights aside so we could be made right with God. Love compelled Jesus to prioritize people. The woman at the well. The man with leprosy. A Roman officer. A blind beggar. Peter's mother in law. A widow's son. A tax collector everyone else despised. The thief hanging next to him on the cross. He saw people instead of problems, every single time, no exceptions. Love compelled Jesus to serve. He washed his disciples' feet himself. He went after the people everyone else had given up on. He had compassion for the sick and the broken, and in the end he gave his own life for it. Love compelled Jesus to hold truth and grace together. He never picked one over the other. He was serious about God's word and just as serious about showing compassion to the people who needed it most. Here's where I had to think about it for myself for a minute. If love means prioritizing people, where does that leave me? Am I supposed to put everyone else first and forget myself in the process? The answer I came to is different than that. Jesus prioritized people, and he also walked away to pray by himself. He rested. He set boundaries when he needed to. Loving people well was never about emptying yourself out until there's nothing left to give. It's about loving yourself the right way so you actually have something real to offer. It's not you against everyone else competing for the same love. It never was that. So if you're wondering how to start, you don't need a theology degree and you don't need to have it all figured out first. Start with how you're loving the people in front of you right now. Are you patient with them. Are you kind. Are you generous and humble even when it's hard to be. Put yourself on that list too, because you matter just as much as the people you're trying to love well. This is the prayer I'm carrying today, and maybe it's yours too. Holy Spirit, thank you for helping me live this out. I want to prioritize others, serve the people around me, and share the love of Jesus with the people who need it first. That's the whole starting point. Love serves. Love gives grace. Love tells the truth. Start there, and let everything else build from it. Peace, Love and Joy always, TanyaInfiniteFaithandFavor.com

If you don't know where to start, start with love.That line has been on repeat in my head since this morning. A lot of us stand at the edge of faith wondering what we're supposed to do first, worried about getting it wrong, worried about some checklist we don't even know exists. The truth is simpler than all of that.My command is this: love each other as I have loved you. John 15:12. Jesus said a lot of things that carry weight, but this is the one that sums up everything else. If you're not sure where to begin, begin here.So what does loving the way he loved actually look like? I read something this morning called Love Compelled Him, and it broke it down in a way that finally made it click for me.Love compelled Jesus to give up his privileges. He could have done whatever he wanted with his power and his position. Instead he set his rights aside so we could be made right with God.Love compelled Jesus to prioritize people. The woman at the well. The man with leprosy. A Roman officer. A blind beggar. Peter's mother in law. A widow's son. A tax collector everyone else despised. The thief hanging next to him on the cross. He saw people instead of problems, every single time, no exceptions.Love compelled Jesus to serve. He washed his disciples' feet himself. He went after the people everyone else had given up on. He had compassion for the sick and the broken, and in the end he gave his own life for it.Love compelled Jesus to hold truth and grace together. He never picked one over the other. He was serious about God's word and just as serious about showing compassion to the people who needed it most.Here's where I had to think about it for myself for a minute. If love means prioritizing people, where does that leave me? Am I supposed to put everyone else first and forget myself in the process?The answer I came to is different than that. Jesus prioritized people, and he also walked away to pray by himself. He rested. He set boundaries when he needed to. Loving people well was never about emptying yourself out until there's nothing left to give. It's about loving yourself the right way so you actually have something real to offer. It's not you against everyone else competing for the same love. It never was that.So if you're wondering how to start, you don't need a theology degree and you don't need to have it all figured out first. Start with how you're loving the people in front of you right now. Are you patient with them. Are you kind. Are you generous and humble even when it's hard to be. Put yourself on that list too, because you matter just as much as the people you're trying to love well.This is the prayer I'm carrying today, and maybe it's yours too.Holy Spirit, thank you for helping me live this out. I want to prioritize others, serve the people around me, and share the love of Jesus with the people who need it first.That's the whole starting point. Love serves. Love gives grace. Love tells the truth. Start there, and let everything else build from it.Peace, Love and Joy always, TanyaInfiniteFaithandFavor.com

I have been thinking about this for a few days and I could not shake it.When someone asked Jesus which commandment was the greatest, He did not hesitate. Love God with everything you have. And then love the people around you the same way you love yourself. He said the entire law, everything else in scripture, hangs on those two things.That is Matthew 22:36-40. And the more I think about it, the more I think we have made the faith life so complicated that we have buried the main thing.I have met people who know the Bible front to back. People who can quote chapter and verse, who have been in church their whole lives, who have perfect attendance on their spiritual resume. And some of those same people are the hardest people to be around. Not because they are bad people. But because they were so focused on the knowledge that they skipped the part where you actually love people.Jesus said something in John 13:35 that gets me every time I read it. He said people will know you belong to Him by how you love one another. Not by what you know. Not by how long you pray. Not by how many conferences you attend. By how you love.That is the test. That is the whole thing.And listen, I have failed that test. More than once. I have held onto things. I have been short with people I love. I have found it genuinely hard to extend grace to people who I feel wronged me, and some of those feelings are not small.Peter says in 1 Peter 4:8 that love covers a multitude of sins. The word he uses in the original Greek is ektenes. It means stretched out, strained. Like a muscle working hard to reach something. That word tells me love is not supposed to be passive. It is not a feeling you stumble into. It is a choice you make, and sometimes it is a hard one.Forgiveness is one of the hardest expressions of that love. I know this personally. I have had to forgive people who I am not sure deserve it by any human standard. What I have learned is that forgiveness is not about them. It is about keeping my heart soft enough that God can still reach me. Bitterness closes a door that I want to stay open.Here is what I want to say plainly: God does not lead with a checklist. He leads with love. And He asks us to do the same.That does not mean none of the other things matter. Knowing scripture matters. Being in community matters. Prayer matters. But if none of those things are producing love in you, something is off. The fruit of all of it is supposed to be love.Today I want to ask you to do one thing. Ask God to show you how He wants you to love the people in your life, and then ask Him to grow that capacity in you. Not because you can manufacture it on your own. But because He can, and He will, if you let Him.And if you are struggling to forgive someone right now, I see you. I have been there. The wrestling is not failure. The wrestling means you still care about getting it right.That is faith in motion.Peace, Love and Joy always, TanyaInfiniteFaithandFavor.com

Matthew 22:36-40. Someone asked Jesus which commandment in the entire law was the greatest, and He did not make them wait for the answer. Love God with everything you are. And love the people around you the same way you love yourself. That is it. That is the whole thing.The Bible keeps coming back to this. John 13:35 says people will know we belong to Jesus by how we love one another. 1 Peter 4:8 says love covers a multitude of sins. Over and over, scripture points us back to the same place.Love is the center of what it means to follow Jesus.And one of the hardest ways to live that out is forgiving people who hurt you. I want to be clear that I am not talking about easy forgiveness, the kind that does not cost you anything. I am talking about the kind where you genuinely feel the weight of what someone did and you choose love anyway. That is where the rubber meets the road.I have struggled with that. I will not pretend I have not. Forgiving people who I feel hurt me has been a real challenge. It is less of a challenge than it used to be, and I give God credit for that, but I am not going to stand here and tell you it has been simple.Here is what I think though. If you nail loving people the way God loves you, I think you are golden.Not because you have perfect church attendance. Not because you can recite chapter and verse. Not because your career is impressive or your family looks right from the outside. God is not keeping score on any of that. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love is generous. Love does not judge. And if that is not what is coming out of us, none of the other stuff is going to matter the way we think it does.So today, ask God to show you how He wants you to love the people in your life. Ask Him to fill your heart with a deep love for others. Not a love you manufacture on your own, because that runs out. A love He grows in you.That is the assignment.Peace, Love and Joy always, TanyaInfiniteFaithandFavor.com

Romans 8:31 is one of those scriptures that almost everyone has seen at least once. On a church wall, a phone case, a motivational graphic somewhere. But when you actually read it, and I mean really read it, it does not feel like decor. It feels like a battle cry."What then shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?"That is a dare. That is someone writing with their chest out. And when I came across it recently, something in me stood up straight.Here is what Paul was actually doing when he wrote this. He was writing to believers in Rome who were not living comfortable lives. They knew trouble. Real trouble. And into that trouble, Paul asks this question not to minimize what they were going through, but to reframe what it meant.The existence of trouble does not cancel God's promise. That is the whole point.When you are in the middle of a long season and it has been hard and slow and quiet, it is very easy to wonder: Is He still here? Is He still working? Am I still on the right track? I have been there. More recently than I am always comfortable admitting. Within the last 30 days I was asking God for a sign. Asking Him to let me know something. And this scripture came right on time.The verse is not promising a life without opposition. It is promising that nothing that comes against you can win.There is a picture in the devotional that I keep thinking about. Imagine a bully twice your size is harassing you. Fear makes sense. But now imagine your best friend is standing next to you, and your friend is twice as big as the bully. The dynamic changes instantly. The bully is the one who should be afraid now.That is the position you are in when God is for you. He is the Creator, which means He made everything. He is the Sustainer, which means He is actively holding everything together right now. And He is on your side. Why would you pick a fight you cannot win? Why would anyone?Now, I want to address something because I was thinking about it. Does this mean everyone gets to walk in this kind of confidence?I believe the victory is most fully experienced when you are aligned with Him. Not checklist-aligned. Not performance-based. Heart-aligned. When you are genuinely walking in love, when your intentions are not to oppress or harm or manipulate, when your heart is toward Him, that is when this promise becomes your daily reality. I think people who spend their time being oppressors or judgmental without accountability are not walking in this same kind of victory, and I say that with grace rather than judgment, because God can reach anyone. But the promise of Romans 8:31 is most alive in the person who has said yes to Him.And for those who have trusted Jesus, the bottom line is this: someone who is bigger, greater, and more powerful than anything you will ever face is standing with you. He has already defeated the worst thing that could happen, which is separation from God, on the cross. If He handled that, He can handle what is in front of you.Your soul is untouchable. Your standing is secure. Whatever wrong has been done to you can be left in His hands, because He is both your defender and your Father.So when the morning feels heavy and the breakthrough feels far away, read this verse like it is your armor. Because it is.If God is for us, who can be against us? The answer is no one that matters.Peace, Love and Joy alwaysInfinite Faith and Favor | InfiniteFaithandFavor.com