Is having faith/belief obeying?

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mailmandan

mailmandan

Senior Member
#81
Apr 7, 2014
25,781
13,707
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#81
Believer08 said:
Hebrews 11 teaches the connection between faith and obedience. You cannot have one without the other.
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Faith is the root of salvation and obedience which followed in Hebrews 11 is the fruit. It was by or out of faith that obedience was produced by Noah, Abraham and others in Hebrews 11 yet the obedience/works that were produced were not the very essence of faith but the fruit, by product and demonstrative evidence of their faith.
 
S

Soyeong

Active member
#84
Oct 11, 2023
950
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#84
The way to believe in God is by directing our lives towards being in His likeness through being a doer of His character traits. For example, by being a doer of good works in obedience to God's law we are testifying about God's goodness, which is why our good works bring glory to Him (Matthew 5:16) and by testifying about God's goodness we are also expressing to belief that God is good, or in other words, we are believing in Him. Likewise, the way to believe that God is a doer of justice is by being a doer of justice in obedience to Him, the way to believe that God is holy is by being a doer of His instructions for how to be holy as He is holy, and so forth. This is exactly the same as the way to believe in the Son because the Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact likeness of His character (Hebrews 1:3), which he expressed through his works by setting a sinless example for us to follow of how to walk in obedience to God's law.

This is why Bible frequently connects our faith with our obedience, such as in Matthew 23:23, Jesus said that faith is one of the weightier matters of the law. In James 2:18, he said that he would show his faith by his works. In Revelation 14:12, those who kept faith in Jesus are the same as those who kept God's commandments. In Romans 1:5, we have received grade in order to bring about the obedience of faith. In Romans 3:31, our faith upholds God's law. In John 3:36, it equates believing in Jesus with obeying him. In Psalms 119:30, he chose the way of faith by setting God's law before him. In Hebrews 11, every example of faith is of someone doing works. In Numbers 5:6, disobedience is referred to as breaking faith. In Hebrews 3:18-19, it equates disobedience with unbelief. And so forth.

Likewise, the reason why there are many verses that say that the way to have eternal life is by believing in Jesus and many verses that say that the way to have eternal life is by obeying God's law is because God's law is His instructions for how to believe in Jesus, or in other words, embodying God's word is the way to believe in God's word made flesh.
 
G

GWH

Groovy
#85
Oct 19, 2024
3,387
786
113
#85
Kroogz said:
Give us the detailed and specific list of works and amount of works to get saved.

Humanity is counting on you!
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At the moment of repentance/acceptance, God’s Holy Spirit (HS) enters believers’ spiritual hearts (RV 3:20), uniting them with God as heavenly Father (RM 8:9) and identifying them with Christ’s worldwide/catholic body or church (CL 1:18). As noted, Paul refers to the comparable moment for Abraham as spiritual circumcision. This manifold event is also called spiritual birth or baptism (1CR 12:13).

Instead of commanding water baptism for salvation, Paul said in one place (RM 10:9-10) that a convert should confess “with your mouth” in order to be saved, even though elsewhere (EPH 2:8-9) he taught that one is saved by faith. Both outward confession and water baptism may be seen as works manifesting love for God that every new Believer will want to (but we cannot say “must”) perform as soon as possible following his/her decision to have saving faith (cf. MT 3:13-15, ACTS 2:38).

The relationship between Believers/Christians and God may be viewed as having three stages. The first stage is the moment of conversion or repentance (ACTS 20:21), when a person “plugs in” to the power of God’s HS by accepting Christ Jesus as Lord. Because a person’s commitment to Christ is in accordance with God’s perfect will and the response of yielding to His calling (1TM 2:3-4), the moment of spiritual baptism fulfills the command of Ephesians 5:18 to be filled (cooperate fully) with the Spirit. For Christians, this stage occurred in the past historically and grammatically; we were saved when we repented and accepted Christ. It should be noted that the indwelling of the HS does not obviate the need for faith, which is the way God makes or provides for keeping believers standing firm (1CR 1:8, 10:12 & 15:58, 2CR 1:20-24).
 
G

GWH

Groovy
#86
Oct 19, 2024
3,387
786
113
#86
GWH said:
At the moment of repentance/acceptance, God’s Holy Spirit (HS) enters believers’ spiritual hearts (RV 3:20), uniting them with God as heavenly Father (RM 8:9) and identifying them with Christ’s worldwide/catholic body or church (CL 1:18). As noted, Paul refers to the comparable moment for Abraham as spiritual circumcision. This manifold event is also called spiritual birth or baptism (1CR 12:13).

Instead of commanding water baptism for salvation, Paul said in one place (RM 10:9-10) that a convert should confess “with your mouth” in order to be saved, even though elsewhere (EPH 2:8-9) he taught that one is saved by faith. Both outward confession and water baptism may be seen as works manifesting love for God that every new Believer will want to (but we cannot say “must”) perform as soon as possible following his/her decision to have saving faith (cf. MT 3:13-15, ACTS 2:38).

Although perfection is not achieved in this life, the necessity of learning the didache in order to strive for perfection indicates the need for perseverance or to keep on learning and growing spiritually until we die physically (PHP 3:12-14). Thus, although learning any specific part of the didache is not GRFS, a person who does not “hunger and thirst for righteousness” (MT 5:6) or want to learn “every word that comes from the mouth of God” (MT 4:4) fails the self-examination Paul commanded and Jesus implied (mentioned previously).

The relationship between Believers/Christians and God may be viewed as having three stages. The first stage is the moment of conversion or repentance (ACTS 20:21), when a person “plugs in” to the power of God’s HS by accepting Christ Jesus as Lord. Because a person’s commitment to Christ is in accordance with God’s perfect will and the response of yielding to His calling (1TM 2:3-4), the moment of spiritual baptism fulfills the command of Ephesians 5:18 to be filled (cooperate fully) with the Spirit. For Christians, this stage occurred in the past historically and grammatically; we were saved when we repented and accepted Christ. It should be noted that the indwelling of the HS does not obviate the need for faith, which is the way God makes or provides for keeping believers standing firm (1CR 1:8, 10:12 & 15:58, 2CR 1:20-24).
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S

Soyeong

Active member
#87
Oct 11, 2023
950
121
43
#87
Kroogz said:
Give us the detailed and specific list of works and amount of works to get saved.

Humanity is counting on you!
Click to expand...
The goal of obeying God's law has absolutely nothing to do with trying to do enough works to get saved.
 
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