Of the Law of God<\/p>\n
God gave to Adam a law, as a covenant of works, by which He bound him and all his posterity, to personal, entire, exact, and perpetual obedience, promised life upon the fulfilling, and threatened death upon the breach of it.<\/em><\/p>\n Our God is a covenant-making God, to be sure. \u00a0The Scriptures bear witness to this truth in both the Old and New Testaments. \u00a0I am not convinced, however, that a “covenant of works” was explicitly established with Adam, as this chapter indicates.<\/p>\n I also do not believe it is quite correct to say that God “threatened” Adam with death upon the breach of this covenant. \u00a0It wasn’t so much a threat as a warning—one might even say a gracious, albeit firm, warning. \u00a0For God did not say, “On the day you eat of the fruit I will kill you”, but rather, “On the day you eat of the fruit you will surely die.” \u00a0This warning<\/em> is essentially the same warning God would later give the Israelites through the mouth of his servant Moses:<\/p>\n “See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil, in that I command you today to love the\u00a0Lord\u00a0your God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments, His statutes, and His judgments, that you may live and multiply; and the\u00a0Lord\u00a0your God will bless you in the land which you go to possess. But if your heart turns away so that you do not hear, and are drawn away, and worship other gods and serve them, I announce to you today that you shall surely perish.” \u00a0(Deuteronomy 30:15-17)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Of the Law of God God gave to Adam a law, as a covenant of works, by which He bound him and all his posterity, to personal, entire, exact, and perpetual obedience, promised life upon the fulfilling, and threatened death upon the breach of it. Our God is a covenant-making God, to be sure. \u00a0The … <\/p>\n