It really does make sense, faith must be the first principle in revealed religion. As soon as truth is revealed and made public, people are to evaluate it by acquiring faith in this revealed truth.
With no such faith righteousness is not attainable. Thus, it is really the base of righteousness. Acts that at a first glance has the appearance of being righteous acts will not blessed as righteous if driving force behind them is anything but faith, performed as an expression of free agency. Paul's taught;
"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1).
From this we learn that faith is the conviction which men can have of the veracity of things which which they cannot see yet. This assurance is bestowed by God to the individual through the Holy Ghost, and it is the result that comes from asking God for a witness of the truth.
Faith is the principle of action in all intelligent beings. And since it is what causes every action in temporal concerns, so it is in spiritual concerns.
Let me give an example of faith in temporal things is when the farmer prepares the soil for planting, and then throws seeds into the ground, whereupon he waters the fields and gives them proper nourishment. All this hard work, filled with faith that comes fall, he will have a harvest to bring home.
Faith is also a principle of power. When Jesus created the universe he commanded the elements, filled with faith that they would obey his commandments then, and forever. In that, and every other situation where the result of an action is critical, it is important to differentiate “faith" from “hope". “Take up thy bed and walk into thine house" would have been something of a fiasco if Jesus would not have had the power of faith. The same would have been true with every act of power that have been performed by the apostles and prophets ever since.
Faith, then, is the first great governing principle which has power, dominion, and authority over all things; by it they exist, by it they are upheld, by it they are changed, or by it they remain, agreeable to the will of God. Without it there is no power, and without power there could be neither creation nor existence.
Faith is based on truth and is preceded by knowledge. Not until a person gains an understanding of the truth he can have faith.
Faith unto life and salvation is buit upon Christ. Salvation can not be had through the general principle of faith alone, that moving cause of action, which causes the farmer to plant his seed with the unseen hope that it will bear grain. But there is faith unto salvation when Christ is the focal point in which the unseen hope centers.