What does it mean to believe? How is believing related to listening to God's Word?
To believe means taking God at His Word: hearing the message that Christ died and rose, contemplating it, and accepting it without adding works. Believing is listening to the Word of God, because faith comes by hearing, not by the works of the Law, and God recognizes that faith.
Les explains that there is no work whatsoever in hearing, and that is how faith comes. We contemplate it, recognize that Christ died and rose from the dead, and believe it; by believing it, we are listening to the Word of God. He defines faith as taking God at His Word: God said it, we believe it, and God recognizes it, and on that basis He moves in and does everything that needs to be done. Les acknowledges this is simplification that many cannot buy, but Scripture says it is by faith and not the works of the Law. Repetition is the mother of learning, so these things must be heard over and over. He then applies it: having begun in the Spirit, are you now made perfect by the flesh, that is, the Law, which was fleshly, weak, and beggarly? The Spirit is received by the hearing of faith, not by the works of the Law.