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2. THE PROMISE OF THE COVENANT.
The great promise of the covenant of works was the
promise of eternal life. They who deny the covenant of works generally base their denial in part
on the fact that there is no record of such a promise in the Bible. And it is perfectly true that
Scripture contains no explicit promise of eternal life to Adam. But the threatened penalty
clearly implies such a promise. When the Lord says, “for in the day that thou eatest thereof
thou shalt surely die,” his statement clearly implies that, if Adam refrains from eating, he will
not die, but will be raised above the possibility of death. The implied promise certainly cannot
mean that, in the case of obedience, Adam would be permitted to live on in the usual way, that
is, to continue the ordinary natural life, for that life was his already in virtue of his creation, and
therefore could not be held out as a reward for obedience. The implied promise evidently was
that of life raised to its highest development of perennial bliss and glory. Adam was indeed
created in a state of positive holiness, and was also immortal in the sense that he was not
subject to the law of death. But he was only at the beginning of his course and did not yet
possess the highest privileges that were in store for man. He was not yet raised above the
possibility of erring, sinning, and dying. He was not yet in possession of the highest degree of
holiness, nor did he enjoy life in all its fulness. The image of God in man was still limited by the
possibility of man’s sinning against God, changing from good to evil, and becoming subject to
the power of death. The promise of life in the covenant of works was a promise of the removal
of all the limitations of life to which Adam was still subject, and of the raising of his life to the
highest degree of perfection. When Paul says in Rom. 7:10 that the commandment was unto
life, he means life in the fullest sense of the word. The principle of the covenant of works was:
the man that does these things shall live thereby; and this principle is reiterated time and again
in Scripture, Lev. 18:5; Ezek. 20:11,13,20; Luke 10:28; Rom. 10:5; Gal. 3:12.
3. THE CONDITION OF THE COVENANT.
The promise in the covenant of works was not
unconditional. The condition was that of implicit and perfect obedience. The divine law can
demand nothing less than that, and the positive command not to eat of the fruit of the tree of
the knowledge of good and evil, relating as it did, to a thing indifferent in itself, was clearly a
test of pure obedience in the absolute sense of the word. Man was, of course, also subject to
the moral law of God, which was written on the tablets of his heart. He knew this by nature, so
that it did not have to be revealed supernaturally, as the special test was. Essentially, the moral
law, as Adam knew it, was undoubtedly like the ten commandments, but the form was
different. In its present form the moral law presupposes a knowledge of sin, and is therefore
primarily negative; in Adam’s heart, however, it must have had a positive character. But just
because it was positive, it did not bring to his consciousness the possibility of sin. Therefore a
negative commandment was added. Moreover, in order that the test of Adam might be a test
of pure obedience, God deemed it necessary to add to the commandments of which Adam
perceived the naturalness and reasonableness, a commandment which was in a certain sense