Belief Equals Obedience

There is no shortage of scriptures in the Bible that points to belief as a precondition to salvation. The Gospel of John alone has over 90 instances where the greek verb for “believe” is indicative of salvation. John 3:16 immediately comes to mind, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.” And this is great assurance for all believers in Jesus Christ. But what does it mean to believe? 

I’m afraid there are many who think that to believe is merely to have a cognitive understanding of a subject matter. When I was a child I became a huge Boston Celtics fan in large part due to the competitive greatness embodied in the person of Larry Bird. But in recent decades I’ve lost a taste for the NBA for various reasons, so this past June when the Boston Celtics won their 18th NBA championship I wasn’t watching. Now, I believe they did win this championship. I was first told that they won by a news source, and then I even saw some of the players interviewed about their experience of winning, and I’ve since seen a few highlights of the organization raising their championship banner in their stadium. So I have enough of a cognitive understanding of the subject matter to believe that the Boston Celtics won the 2024 NBA championship. Likewise, is a cognitive understanding that Jesus is the Son of God, that He died for my sins, and that He arose from the grave, all that is necessary for me to receive eternal life?

Others seem to think that this cognitive understanding should generate some emotional bond to the object of our belief, in this case Jesus, that brings about salvation. The feelings of an individual tied to the cognitive understanding then are the evidence of the true meaning of belief that leads to salvation. The danger with this idea is that we might subconsciously base God’s love for us at any given time on our current emotional state. The news that my favorite NBA team won the championship gave me a small, fleeting feeling of happiness. But that feeling can’t be sustained, and know one would expect the knowledge alone, or the knowledge and feeling together to change my life. So why do people think that the right knowledge and right feelings change a person’s eternal life? Remember that even Satan’s servants, the demons, have the right knowledge and strong emotional responses to the point of trembling at this knowledge, but it’s not because they are saved (James 2:19).

Still others think that if they are just attached to the right group of good people who also have this cognitive understanding of who Jesus is, and behave themselves in a morally acceptable way by the standards of the society in which they live, then feelings are nice, but not necessary. This is arguably the most dangerous concept of all. A person with this line of thinking becomes complacent in their faith and bases their salvation on other people that they are surrounded by rather than on the Lord of the Universe. I, for one, do not want to be so glib about my eternal destination that I put my fate in the hands of anyone but the Savior of the world, Jesus Christ. So what is the understanding of belief that Jesus intended for us to grasp?

I mentioned John 3:16 above, which many in all camps of understanding will quote for good reason. However, further down in John 3:36, the prophet, John the immerser, gives a clear understanding of the proper definition: “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (ESV). Therefore, John knits belief together with obedience. There cannot be one without the other. The wrath of God is incurred upon anyone who ignores either.

I think this is masterfully illustrated in Hebrews 3:16-19 by delivering to us the example of the Israelites in the Wilderness. We can ask a series of rhetorical questions to gain applicable insight to modern christian beliefs. First, did the Isralites have a cognitive understanding that God was who He said He was? Yes, they had witnessed His power over every god the Egyptians had to offer, they experienced His deliverance from bondage and were miraculously saved from the hand of their enemy through baptism in the Red Sea (1 Cor. 10:1-2). They, therefore, had more than just a cognitive understanding of who God was, but real lived experience of His claims. 

Second, did they hear His expectation? Yes, God not only spoke these expectations to them, but gave them His expectations written on stone tablets written by His own finger, so as not to be changed or altered by man. 

Third, were these wanderers attached to the right group of good people? The Israelites were the chosen people of promise through the seed of Abraham. These wilderness wanderers knew themselves to be the chosen race of God whom He favored. There were really no other choices in the matter of groups to attach to. There were no denominations of Israelites. You were a seed of Abraham or you weren’t. A stranger could be accepted under certain conditions, but there were no doubts that the Hebrews were the right group of good people to be attached to and that they were God’s specially chosen people.

So why were they not all saved and able to enter the Promised Land of rest which represents to christians the Heavenly reward promised to us by our Savior? Hebrews 3:18 clearly states that they did not obey. And the unknown author follows this verse with further clarification by claiming they could not enter because of unbelief. Therefore, we can confidently declare that belief equals obedience. Remember also the words of our Lord’s brother, in James 2:24, “So you see that a person is shown to be righteous through faithful actions and not through faith alone” (CEB).

None of this is to suggest that our actions are a cause of God’s decision to save us. God certainly didn’t sit back and wait for us to become obedient before dispensing His grace upon mankind through the events of the Cross. But our belief is realized in our initial obedience to the gospel (2 Thess. 1:8), which is the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus (1 Cor. 15:1-4) through water baptism (Rom. 6:1-4); and our subsequent obedience to His will in our daily walk of life (1 John 2:3-6). 

It is important to note that there is a perversion of this gospel that turns people away from obedience to Christ. Many people place their trust in someone who eloquently, even boldly proclaims Christ, but is following, even promoting a gospel other than the one Jesus called us to and the one Paul preached in the grace of Christ. (Gal. 1:6-9). Belief is obedience.

We should not be so arrogant to think that we can pick and choose which teachings of Jesus to be obedient to; or, so nonchalant about our salvation that we leave the fate of our souls in the hands of other people and what they think we should or shouldn’t do or think. Seek the truth in His word. 

Jesus, Himself displayed a belief in God by doing something He did not want to do. Philippians 2:8 says “He became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.” We can be assured that our obedience to the teachings of Jesus Christ is our belief in a relentlessly merciful, all powerful God that desires all men to be saved.