How to walk by faith: following in the footsteps of the woman with the issue of blood

In episode 331 of the “No Doubt, No Fear, Only Believe” podcast, the host explores what true faith looks like by examining the story of the woman who suffered from a twelve‑year bleeding condition, as recorded in Mark, Matthew, and Luke. He highlights three key observations: (1) the woman’s spoken confession (“if I only touch his garment I shall be made well”) demonstrates that faith is activated by both belief in the heart and verbal declaration, echoing Romans 10:9‑10; (2) her humility—kneeling, touching the hem of Jesus’ robe despite social stigma—illustrates the willingness to act regardless of others’ opinions; (3) Jesus’ response (“your faith has made you well”) confirms that faith, not sight, brings healing. The host then connects this example to broader biblical themes, citing John 14:12 (the promise that believers will do the works of Christ) and John 16:7 (the coming of the Holy Spirit as a “one‑two punch” for spiritual victory). He urges listeners to take concrete steps of faith: hear God’s word, speak it, act on it, persist through failure, and rely on the Holy Spirit. Personal anecdotes of laying hands on people—both successful and not—are used to model perseverance. The episode concludes with a prayer and a reminder of Romans 8:1, emphasizing that believers are not condemned when they stumble while walking by faith.
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Welcome to episode 331. I want to get right into this episode and we're going to talk about faith some more. Imagine that, probably through the rest of December we're going to be dealing with faith and maybe even January, I don't know. This is a huge topic and in this episode I'm going to talk about the faith of the woman with the issue of blood. It's in 3 different gospels: Matthew, Mark, and Luke. And we're going to jump right into that, but first, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We're going to read about the woman with the issue of blood from 3 different writers. Now we got one author, and each one kind of gives us a different little picture, a little twist. And I want us to read, and I want to give you some homework. I know I probably can't do that, but I do it all the time. I'm trying to encourage you to get in the Bible and let the Bible get into you. You know the deal if you've been here before. But we're going to talk about this woman and what it is that she did as she walked in faith. And we're going to pick up on some of these things. We're going to talk about next week the laws of faith, and we're going to look at this and Father Abraham. We're going to look at these examples and we're going to pick out some things that you and I need to do if we're going to walk in faith. And that's the whole idea here, is to walk by faith and not by sight. We've got to learn to start taking steps in faith, and this is a great example. So let's go to Mark first, Mark 5:25-34. Now a certain woman had a flow of blood for 12 years, and she had suffered many things from many physicians, and she had spent all that she had and was no better, but rather grew worse. When she heard about Jesus, she came behind him in the crowd and touched his garment, for she said, 'If I only touch his clothes, I shall be made well.' Immediately the fountain of her blood was dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of the affliction. And Jesus immediately, knowing in himself that power had gone out of him, turned around in the crowd and said, "Who touched my clothes?" But his disciples said to him, "You see the multitude thronging you, and you say, 'Who touched me?'" And he looked around to see her who had done this thing. But the woman, fearing and trembling, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell down before him and told him the whole truth. And he said to her, Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace and be healed of your affliction. Now I want to stop there. We're going to go to Matthew next, but I want to pick out a couple of things. This lady, we've got to see that she spoke it with her mouth. And we've taught faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God, but faith is activated by believing and speaking it. And I'm sure you remember Romans 10:9-10 If we confess with our mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in our heart that God raised Christ from the dead, we shall be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. So we believe in our heart and then we confess it with our mouth. That's how we do it. And this is no different. This is how faith came. I just want you to see that this lady said with her mouth, if I but touch his clothes, I shall be made well. Let's go to Matthew Luke 8:20-22. And suddenly a woman who had a flow of blood for 12 years came from behind and touched the hem of his garment. For she said to herself, if I may but touch his garment, I shall be made well. But Jesus turned around, and when he saw her, he said, be of good cheer, daughter, your faith has made you well. And the woman was made well from that hour. Now I want you to see on this one, same lady Same story, just a different angle. And I want you to see this lady touch the hem. And where is the hem? I need you to picture that Jesus wearing a robe probably all the way down to the ground. And you know, I got to picture things. This lady was probably on her hands and knees. That is incredible. That is a picture of humility. That is a picture of, I don't care what it takes, I don't care what people I think this was a life or death situation for this lady. She knew it and she didn't care. And again, I've got a clothing line, Revelation 12:11, and they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death. This lady did not care. She had had it for over 12 years. She's had this issue of blood. She spent all her money and she probably said in herself I'm either going to do this or I'm going to die. But when you get to that point and when you're that fired up, we're going to get into faith. But that's one of the keys, is you've got to not care. Fear of man is a snare. You can't care what anybody thinks. You just got to act on what the word of God says. The last Bible verse is Luke 8:43-48. Now a woman having a flow of blood for 12 years who had spent all her livelihood on physicians and could not be healed by any, came from behind and touched the border of his garment, and immediately her flow of blood stopped. And Jesus said, 'Who touched me?' When all denied it, Peter and those with him said, 'Master, the multitudes throng you and press you, and you say, "Who touched me?"' But Jesus said, 'Somebody touched me, for I perceive power going out of me.' Now when the woman saw that she was not hidden, She came trembling and falling down before him and declared to him in the presence of all the people the reason she had touched him and how she was healed immediately. And he said to her, Daughter, be of good cheer. Your faith has made you well. Go in peace. Now I've read all three of those different looks at this same healing. This is the lady with the issue of blood. This is her faith In her mouth, she spoke it. She humbled herself. She got down on her hands and knees. She touched his garment because she said, look, if I but touch the hem— she had heard of Jesus. I think you've got to hear about this healing power. Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the word of God. So someone had told her about how Jesus was healing everybody. I believe that faith rose up in her and she just didn't care. The Bible is pretty clear that we're to ask and keep asking. We're to seek and keep seeking, and we're to knock and keep knocking. I believe most of us just go, "Well, if it's God's will." And I've heard that 100 times, maybe 1,000 times. It drives me crazy because every time I see Jesus, he always healed. Let's just put this to bed. It is God's will to heal you or I. If you look at what Jesus did, he healed all manner of sickness, all manner of disease. We need to just attack right here, and it's John 14:12 where Jesus said, 'Most assuredly all these works you will do, and greater works will you do also, because I go to my Father.' Jesus is at the right hand of the Father. Jesus is our intercessor, but Jesus is our example, and we are to do what Jesus did. Jesus said in John 14:12, I don't know how else to read that, if you believe in Jesus, the works that he did you will do also and greater works. We're not going to talk about the greater work, we're going to talk about all of the works that Jesus did. If you see Jesus doing it, you and I can do it. We've got to get to that place, and I believe sadly most of the people in the body of Christ, they go by their failure. Oh, I couldn't do that. Oh, whoa, whoa, is me, or I'm just but a worm. You just beat yourself up because you're listening the punk. You're not in the Word of God. You're not seeing who you are in Christ. In Christ, you can do all things. Everything's possible in Christ. And that is where I want us to get. We have got to get into Christ. Christ is already in us if you've accepted him as your Lord and Savior. You've got the Holy Spirit. John 16:7 is incredible. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I depart, I will send him to you. And if we combine John 14:12 with John 16:7, I believe that's the one-two punch that's gonna kick Satan in the teeth. And we're gonna need to start taking steps by faith. And I'm here to tell you that this Bubba fails miserably multiple times, but that doesn't stop me from keep trying to walk. If I fall down, I just pick myself up. I don't lay around in the mud wallowing around. Oh, woe is me. I get up, dust myself off, and get after it again. And that's what I encourage you to do. We get in this word of God and we start meditating on it. We start seeing ourselves in this word. And if you can see yourself as this woman with the issue of blood, if you can see yourself as saying, I don't care, I don't care what the world's saying, I don't care what the doctor says, I know that if I but touch the hem of Jesus' garment, I shall be made well. And here's a news flash: Jesus is gone. But Jesus said in John 14:12, before he left, most assuredly I say to you, he who believes in me, the works that I do, he will do also. So we've got to embrace that. We have got to believe this word of God, and we've got to not waver. And one of the things that we found out in that last episode with Father Abraham is that it takes time for this faith to grow. And it's like a seed, and it's gonna grow. It takes time. You're gonna mess up, you're gonna fail. And again, I'm here to tell you that I am just an imperfect man following after a perfect example. And that's the only reason I'm here, is to encourage, empower, and inspire you to do the same thing. God's not counting how many times we fall down. Now I'm going to conclude this episode with Romans 8:1 because I love that scripture. There is therefore now no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. And that's what we're doing. We're taking steps. God's not going to condemn us if we fall down. If we're trying to take a step of faith, God's not there to pound us. Now, the punk's going to pound you. The punk, if you listen to the condemnation, he's going to tell you you're stupid, you're not worthy, You've got sin in your life. God doesn't heal anymore. He's going to tell you all kinds of lies, but Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. God is here. He's here to stay. Holy Spirit is here, and he's here to help. Jesus said that to his disciples, it's to your advantage that I go away, because if I don't go away, I'm not going to send the Helper. But Jesus went away. Jesus is at the right hand of the Father. The Helper is here, and the Helper is just as much God as Jesus was God, as Father God is God. And if we don't start using the Holy Spirit to help us walk in faith, we're just going to get the crap kicked out of us by Satan. And we've got to start taking steps of faith. We got to quit worrying about how many times we fall down. We got to quit worrying about how messy it looks. We just need to love God and love your neighbor as yourself. We need to learn to love ourselves. And now I'm talking to myself now. Because I struggle all the time with trying to do this. I can see it in the Word, but having it manifest all the time, it's not happening. I just want to encourage you, I can see the faith in this Bible, and I'm bringing it out. I'm bringing it out in my life. I have laid hands on people and they have recovered. It is wonderful when it happens. I've also laid hands on people and they haven't recovered. I'm not here to tell you that I've got this all figured out. But I'm here to encourage you to keep trying to take that step. And if you fall down, pick yourself up. Father God is just out there holding his hands out, saying, take another step, take another step, because it's impossible to please God without faith. And the just shall live by faith. We're called people of faith, so we need to start walking in faith. And I'm rambling, I know. Let's pray real quick. God, I thank you so much for your word. I thank you for the example of your life that you gave us. And your word. God, you are the word. Jesus, you are the word of God. You are the Bible. Lord, we don't understand it all, but we love it. We like spending time with you and in your word. Holy Spirit, help us to understand what it is you want us to learn about faith. And God, I pray that you would just continue to encourage, empower, and inspire us to dig into your word and just believe that your word is the truth and it is true and you are love. And you're not condemning us. God, we thank you, we love you. We ask it all in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, thank you for being a part of this, and I look forward to visiting with you in the next episode. Thanks for listening to the No Doubt, No Fear, Only Believe podcast at www.nodoubtonlybelieve.com.
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