Faith and Holiness By faith Abraham obeyed. (Hebrews 11:8) Obedience to the revealed will of God is often just as much a step of faith as claiming a promise from God. In fact, one of the more intriguing thoughts from the book of Hebrews is the way the writer appears to use obedience and faith interchangeably. He spoke of the Old Testament Hebrews who would never enter God’s rest because they disobeyed (3:18). Yet they were not able to enter because of their unbelief (3:19). This interchange of unbelief and disobedience also occurs later in the book (4:2, 6). The heroes of faith in Hebrews 11 were said to be “still living by faith when they died” (11:13, niv). But the element of obedience—responding to the will of God—was just as prominent in their lives as was claiming the promises of God. They obeyed by faith. And since obedience is the pathway to holiness—a holy life being essentially an obedient life—we may say that no one will become holy apart from a life of faith. Faith enables us to claim the promises of God, but it also enables us to obey the commands of God. Faith enables us to obey when obedience is costly or seems unreasonable to the natural mind. The path of obedience in the pursuit of holiness is often contrary to human reason. If we don’t have conviction in the necessity of obeying the revealed will of God as well as confidence in the promises of God, we’ll never persevere in this difficult pursuit. We must have conviction that seeking holiness is God’s will for us—regardless of how arduous and painful the seeking may be. And we must be confident that the pursuit of holiness results in God’s approval and blessing, even when circumstances make it appear otherwise.