In Defense of the Gospel and of Covenantal Merit | Pastor Patrick Hines Reformed Christian Podcast
In Defense of the Gospel and of Covenantal Merit | Pastor Patrick Hines Reformed Christian Podcast
Sacrifice, propitiation, reconciliation, and redemption. None of these key words which describe the cross-work of Christ can be understood without the concept of merit in the pre-fall covenant of works with Adam and with all of Adam's posterity in him. What Adam failed to do in the Garden of Eden, Jesus Christ, the last Adam, did perfectly. Jesus achieves the perfect righteousness, aka "the righteousness of God" (Romans 1:17; 3:20-31; 2 Corinthians 5:21; etc.) which is then imputed to us (11 times in Romans 4 alone) by faith alone apart from works (Romans 4:6). Jesus also satisfies the divine curse of God against all of our disobedience in Adam and our own transgressions by dying on the cross in our place and stead (Galatians 3:13). Without the concept of merit, the gospel has no context in which it can make any sense whatsoever. All of the Reformed Confessions teach the concept of pre-fall merit with Adam wherein he could have earned by works and his own merit a legal right to take from the tree of life, eat, and live forever:
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Genesis 2:9 Out of the ground the Lord God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Genesis 3:24 So He drove the man out; and at the east of the garden of Eden He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life.
This passage is frankly impossible to understand without the concept of merit attached to Adam's pre-fall works, and merit attached to Jesus Christ's life of obedience to God's law:
Romans 4:4-8 Now to the one who works, his wage is not credited as a favor, but as what is due. [5] But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness, [6] just as David also speaks of the
