'Merit' in the Bible

So you also, when you have obeyed all the orders given you, must say, "'There is no merit in our service: what we have done is only what we were in duty bound to do.'"

Where then is there room for your boasting? It is for ever shut out. On what principle? On the ground of merit? No, but on the ground of faith.

And why? Because they were pursuing a righteousness which should arise not from faith, but from what they regarded as merit. They stuck their foot against the stone which lay in their way;

For it is by grace that you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves. It is God's gift, and is not on the ground of merit--