Mike Focht 4/18/2025
Faith and obedience are two sides of the same coin. Though different, they are always working together. They are the spiritual arms and legs we use to live Christian life. In the simplest terms, we can connect to every truth in the Scripture through either faith or obedience. It might help some believers to think about biblical truth through either lens. Ask yourself, Is this truth appealing to my faith or obedience?
What does that look like? Commands are to be obeyed. Promises are to be believed.
Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need (Ephesians 4:28). This is a command. Paul is appealing to the Ephesian saints in terms of obedience. It is not enough to believe that not stealing and working an honorable job to provide for myself and others is a good idea. I am not called to put my faith in this truth. I am called to obey it. It might require faith to trust that God knows what He is talking about and working is better for my life than stealing, but if I only believe and do not obey, then I am still lacking.
A.W. Tozer puts this well in his book Keys To The Deeper Life when he writes: “If we are alert enough to hear God’s voice, we must not content ourselves with merely “believing” it. How can any man believe a command? Commands are to be obeyed, and until we have obeyed them we have done exactly nothing at all about them. And to have heard them and not obeyed them is infinitely worse then never to have heard them at all, especially in light of Christ’s soon return and judgment to come.”
But not everything in the Word of God is a direct command. Some truths are statements of fact, promises of God, and declarations of spiritual reality. How do we connect with these? We respond to them in faith. We believe Him.
But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin (1 John 1:7). This is a promise. How does one do the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin? I cannot do this truth. I can only believe it. I must accept it as the Word of God and live my life holding to the character of the One who promised.
If I try to believe what I should obey, or obey what I should believe, I will stumble and find myself condemned or confused. But if I obey Christ’s commands and put my faith in His promises, I will walk uprightly on the good and right way and find the blessing of the Lord.