Description
Obedience alone cannot save man. Man is born into the sinful nature of Adam and cannot be saved until he receives the sinless nature of God. Even if the entire Law of Moses were obeyed perfectly, the individual would still be an unrighteous sinner by nature. Accordingly, ‘human’ obedience to the law is merely the sin of trusting in self instead of obeying God’s plan to recreate the believer with the sinless nature of God. This is what is meant when scripture teaches that the ‘tree of good1 works,’ which Adam ate from in the Garden of Eden, can only produce eternal death. ~ “And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die” (Genesis 2.16-17).