The first pillar of salvation is the belief that Jesus, the man, is Lord. The second is related to the first. It is the practice of obedience, and it’s related to the first in the sense that it facilitates the power of that belief, the strengthening of one’s faith.

I say the practice of obedience because its rewards are gradual and cumulative rather than immediate. The strengthening of faith may be likened to the increased gravitational pull of Christ vis-a-vis the pulls competing with it, the steps of obedience to movement towards him, and away from oneself.

To switch to a different image, growth in faith may be likened to growth in bodily strength. The body grows stronger slowly and cumulatively, in response to a practice of obedience to a training program. A training program holds out the promise of greater strength, but the only way of testing that promise is to follow the program. Just so, the Christian promise is that growth in faith results from following a program of obedience to the discipline of Christ, but the only way of testing the promise is through obeying Christ. The results cannot be experienced prior to the practice. We live by faith, not by sight, is Paul’s way of describing the Christian life, the life of increasing attraction to Christ. Come, and see is Christ’s own formulation of the instruction.