any will be made (_katastathesontai_) righteous through the
obedience of Jesus Christ. The future tense is particularly to be
noticed.

As soon as it was shown by the sin of Adam that the natural man is
incapable of obedience to the will of God, a preordained dispensation
was begun, whereby the natural man is converted into the spiritual man
and made fit for immortality. This dispensation was introduced by a
_promise_, the terms of which could be understood by Adam and Eve after
they had learned that the spirit of evil (in whom is "the power of
death") through their disobedience brought death into the world. The
promise was given in the words "he (_autos_, _Sept._) shall bruise thy
head, and thou shalt bruise his heel" (Gen. iii. 15). Hebrew
commentators have, I think, rightly taken this passage in the sense--he
("the seed of the woman") shall bruise thee at thy _ending_, and thou
shalt bruise him at his {20} _beginning_. The promise, accordingly,
signifies that the power of Satan would prevail _at first_, and for a
time, even to putting to death the Son of God (Luke xxii. 53), but that
_in the end_ that power would by the Son of God be overcome (Luke x.
18). And since with the victory over the spirit of evil an end is put
to evil itself, the promise is, in effect, that Adam and his race shall
eventually be exempt from death and evil, and partake of a happy
immortality.

But in the very next sentence _conditions_ are annexed (Gen. iii.
16-19). Because of the imperfection of the natural man, and his
opposition, through the subtlety of Satan and the desires of the flesh,
to the will of his Maker, labour and sorrow, pain and _death_, were
ordained to be his lot, in order that he may _thereby_ be made meet to
partake of the promise. It is by reason of these conditions that the
promise becomes, in effect, a _covenant_, in which of necessity two
parties are concerned: God on His part promises happiness and
immortality, but to be received only on the above-stated conditions;
and man's part is to submit to the conditions, as being ordered by a
"faithful Creator," and to look in faith for the fulfilment of the
promise. Here, then, are all the essentials of a covenant, excepting
_surety_ for its fulfilment, which on acknowledged principles of
justice might be asked for by man, seeing that he has to satisfy the
conditions before he enjoys the benefit. Such security is amply {21}
given by God, as will be shown in the se