How many good works are enough? How does a person know if they have committed enough good works to become that new creature? Doesn’t working in order to become a new creature directly contradict Ephesians 2:8-9?
All it takes is small change in perspective... Read Eph 2:4-7... we do not boast in our work and our work is not of our own doing. It is by the work God accomplishes through us that He is building us to maturity in the Spirit (Eph 4). We do not labor to achieve salvation... we labor to discipline our flesh in obedience to the Spirit. From here we will likely launch into a discussion of concupiscence where the fleshly appetites are still weak and we have to be diligent.