The way in which works don't have merit

• "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" and no amount of good and law-abiding works can compensate for sin and broken law. If a person wants to be justified, made righteous in God’s sight, it will have to be "as a gift by his grace" — you cannot earn it (Rom 3:19-28).
• James points out that if you break one of God’s laws and break it only once, you are still a law breaker, even though you might have kept every other law (Jas 2:10-11).
• David is commended in the Bible as a man who used to "follow God fully" (1Kg 11:6). If anyone had merit points stored up, then the good king David did. Yet when he sinned with Bathsheba, he was condemned. His good works did not serve to cover his sins (2Sm 12:9-10).
• Take another example, that of Cornelius. We read of him in Acts 10:22, where he is described as "a righteous man" who did good works. (Acts 10:1-2,22). Yet for all his righteousness he was still not saved, because the angel commanded him, "Send for Simon Peter who will tell you words whereby you and all your household will be saved" (Acts 11:13-14).
• We even follow this principle in everyday life. Who would say that a man who does a hundred gallant and loving deeds for his wife has stored up enough merit to justify spending a night with another woman? Or who would think that obeying twenty stop signs gives you the right to drive through the next one without stopping? Perhaps some people think like that, but not many, and most people would think them mistaken.
• Paul claims that in keeping the law of Moses he was "blameless" yet he could see no merit points awarded to him on that basis, "not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but a righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith in Christ" (Php 3:6,9).
• It was because there is no merit points system with God, that he sent his Son to die on the cross. "He himself is the propitiation (atoning sacrifice) for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world" (1Jn 2:2). We cannot be our own propitiation by anything we do. Only Jesus, by what he did, can atone for our sins.
• Paul teaches that in order to merit our salvation, or be counted worthy, we rely upon the righteousness of Jesus who became the perfect sacrifice for us, and rose from the dead to empower us for eternal life (Php 3:9-11). Yet he has already exhorted us, "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling" (Php 2:12).
• We should expect God to require good works, and having required them to value them when we do them. We should not expect him to accept them as an atonement for our sins, for he accepts only what Christ did as sufficient for that. Thus we avoid the two great mistakes people make about good works, and instead believe in the value and necessity of obedience and service to God without thinking we can be saved by that alone without faith in Christ.