There was a belief that works provided salvation more so than faith. But as Paul has explained in Romans 4, by Abraham's example, his actions (such as circumcision) came from his faith in God. People (Pharisees and religious leaders) had things twisted. Paul explains to them that it was not Abraham's circumcision that made him faithful to God, but his faith in God is what led to him to be circumcised.
The same goes with us. It is not our works that will save us and give us salvation. We are blessed to have Jesus save us from the death of our sins so that we could be redeemed to God (Romans 4:7-8), before him people had to have faith in God as is. God had not sent Jesus yet so Abraham could not follow Jesus as the disciples could or as you and I can. But that still did not keep Abraham from having faith in God who came to later in human form as Jesus.
You can go to church every day of the week. You can feed every homeless person. You can care for every orphan and widow and visit the sick, but without faith in God those works do not symbolize anything about the Kingdom of Heaven. As we will read later in James 2:26, faith without works is dead as the body is dead apart from the spirit.
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