Adam vs Jesus

We just talked about boasting in the hope we have, and in our trials. We talked about boasting in God and knowing that our future hope is assured and will not disappoint. We know this because God has demonstrated how much he loves us and how much he sacrificed for us to pay for that future hope.

Now, Paul goes into legal defense mode.

First -> WHY do we need to be saved?

Second -> HOW is it possible to be saved?

Third -> WHAT does it look like if we are truly saved? – which we will look at next week 😉

Let’s read our passage:

Romans 5:12–21 CSB

¹² Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, in this way death spread to all people, because all sinned. ¹³ In fact, sin was in the world before the law, but sin is not charged to a person’s account when there is no law. ¹⁴ Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin in the likeness of Adam’s transgression. He is a type of the Coming One. ¹⁵ But the gift is not like the trespass. For if by the one man’s trespass the many died, how much more have the grace of God and the gift which comes through the grace of the one man Jesus Christ overflowed to the many. ¹⁶ And the gift is not like the one man’s sin, because from one sin came the judgment, resulting in condemnation, but from many trespasses came the gift, resulting in justification. ¹⁷ If by the one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive the overflow of grace and the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. ¹⁸ So then, as through one trespass there is condemnation for everyone, so also through one righteous act there is justification leading to life for everyone. ¹⁹ For just as through one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so also through the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous. ²⁰ The law came along to multiply the trespass. But where sin multiplied, grace multiplied even more ²¹ so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace will reign through righteousness, resulting in eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

WHY do we need be saved?

In many churches, the word “sin” is never brought up. So if you have come from one of those churches you are about to get ten years worth of “sin” in one passage!  Let me highlight “sin” in this passage.

SIN – 19 times in one form or another!

Why do we need to be saved? Well, because we are sinners who deserve the wrath of God. But this passage on sin is different from chapter 3. In chapter 3 Paul says:

Romans 3:23 CSB

²³ For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God;

We all have sinned. But there is another aspect to this sin thing.

Romans 5:12 CSB

¹² Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, in this way death spread to all people, because all sinned.

What does Paul mean when he wrote, “all sinned”?  He didn’t write:

• all HAVE sinned
• all MIGHT sin
• all WILL sin

He wrote, “all sinned” – past tense.  That is an interesting way to phrase it.

If I said, “all eat” it could mean past, present, or future, right? Everyone has eaten, does eat and will eat.

Paul didn’t say “all sin”. He said, “all sinned”, past tense. Every major translation of the Bible I compared have this in the past tense. All sinned. The phrase that Paul used at the end of verse 12 is “ all sinned”. He didn’t say that all will sin in the future, or that all are sinning present, but that all sinned past tense. But this passages goes back much further than just last week, or 40 years ago. It even goes back BEFORE Jesus was crucified!

WHAT IS SIN?

To continue making his point, Paul goes back in history. To the Jews the law represented what was right and to disobey the law was to sin. All sin is therefore judged against the law. Of course they also added many oral traditions and rabbinic traditions to the Torah making even more laws. What mattered to them was the keeping of the law, and sin was breaking that law in any way.

The Torah had about 613 Laws in it, according to some. These 613 laws break down into:

• 248 positive commandments (things one must do)
• 365 negative commandments (things one must not do)

According to one search I did, “Most scholars conclude that a devout Jew in Jesus’ day was expected to navigate well over a thousand total obligations, once all written and oral requirements were combined.”

So, it was a pretty good bet that you could say everyone sinned.  But what about before the Law was given to Moses?

Romans 5:13–14 CSB

¹³ In fact, sin was in the world before the law, but sin is not charged to a person’s account when there is no law. ¹⁴ Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin in the likeness of Adam’s transgression. He is a type of the Coming One.

So, if there was no law, there would be no sin, right? Well, we would like to think that.

Actually, the removal of all law is exactly what many on our culture want. A system where each person establishes the law for themselves. We call this anarchy. The purpose of it is to try to erase guilt from ourselves.

Now that law came from Moses. Actually it came from God through Moses when God spoke to Moses on the mountain. So what about before then? What happens if you go back before the law? What happens if you go all the way back to Adam and the garden? Verse 14 says that even Adam broke the law. Lets go back and read that passage in Genesis:

Genesis 2:8–9 CSB

⁸ The Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he placed the man he had formed. ⁹ The Lord God caused to grow out of the ground every tree pleasing in appearance and good for food, including the tree of life in the middle of the garden, as well as the tree of the knowledge of good and evil

Genesis 2:15–17 CSB

¹⁵ The Lord God took the man and placed him in the garden of Eden to work it and watch over it. ¹⁶ And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree of the garden, ¹⁷ but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for on the day you eat from it, you will certainly die.”

God gave Adam several commands of things to do

1. be fruitful and multiply (1:28)
2. rule the earth (1:28)
3. subdue the earth (1:28)
4. work and watch over the garden (2:15)
5. Name all the animals (2:19-20)

NOTE:  work was a gift from God, before sin entered the world! Work is not a curse! God made mankind and gave him a job, and it was good.

AT LEAST 5 things that Adam was to do. And it appears as though he did those 5 things.  BUT there was one command given, or one thing Adam was NOT to do:

“you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for on the day you eat from it, you will certainly die”

DID YOU KNOW: There is a tree that poisonous enough that you can die if you eat from it? The Manchineel, or ‘Death Apple,’
https://science.howstuffworks.com/life/botany/manchineel-tree.htm   Seriously! There are warning not to be under it during rain, or to touch the bark of the tree, and if you ear it’s fruit there is a good change you will die. I do not think THAT is what God was referring to in the garden!

The one DO NOT command is the one that Adam broke.

If God had not said, “don’t eat it” then it would not have been a sin to eat it, right? You can only be a rule breaker if there is a rule to break. THAT is one of the points Paul was trying to make.

BEFORE the Law was given to Moses, there were still rules. And the very first man created by God broke the rules. ⭐

NOTICE -> What was the other tree, the tree in the middle of the garden? Tree of Life. Was that forbidden? NO!

It is amazing. You can have any fruit from any tree, including this special tree in the middle of the garden, and yet the one tree we want to eat from is the one that is forbidden. The “forbidden fruit” – that is where we get the saying from.

We know how the story goes, right?

• The serpent tricked Eve, and she ate. Eve gave it to Adam, and he knowingly disobeyed God and ate.

Then God showed up and asked what happened and if they ate the fruit.

• Adam blamed Eve
• Eve blamed the serpent
• And the serpent didn’t have a leg to stand on

They were all punished, and part of that punishment was this:

Genesis 3:22–24 CSB

²² The Lord God said, “Since the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil, he must not reach out, take from the tree of life, eat, and live forever.” ²³ So the Lord God sent him away from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. ²⁴ He drove the man out and stationed the cherubim and the flaming, whirling sword east of the garden of Eden to guard the way to the tree of life.

God gave the tree of life as a gift, but the sin blocked us from the gift. Adam was banned from the tree of life because of disobedience. Hold that thought… we will come back to it.

Back to Romans… THAT sin of Adam was unique. That one sin has affected, or infected all of mankind. This is often referred to as “original sin”. I want you to notice Paul’s words as he talks about this:

Romans 5:14–16 “14 Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin in the likeness of Adam’s transgression (singualr). He is a type of the Coming One. 15 But the gift is not like the trespass (singular). For if by the one man’s trespass (singular) the many died, how much more have the grace of God and the gift which comes through the grace of the one man Jesus Christ overflowed to the many. 16 And the gift is not like the one man’s sin, because from one sin came the judgment, resulting in condemnation, but from many trespasses came the gift, resulting in justification.”

While we might be tempted to think, yes, that is exactly what happened to Adam! He was judged and punished and eventually he died! There is one other verse in this passage that we have to really chew on:

Romans 5:18 CSB

¹⁸ So then, as through one trespass there is condemnation for everyone, so also through one righteous act there is justification leading to life for everyone.

Whoah.… through Adam’s one sin everyone is condemned.  One man’s sin affects us all. His sin is counted against YOU AND ME even today.

Imputation of Adam’s Sin

Justin talked about church language, we call it “Christianese”. Words that we use that we understand that others may not.

[BTW – this is on par with many of the military here speaking in acronyms.]

This particular concept that Paul is teaching, is referred to as “Imputation”. Adam’s sin is “imputed” to us, placed upon it. It is a very legal word, and this is a very legal part of the letter.

Imputation is the act in which somebody’s actions are transferred to someone else, and in Adam’s case it’s a biological transfer so we would talk about this as being a “seminal” imputation since all of us existed in Adam as he was the first of all mankind and we all came from him.

The reality Paul is stating here, is that when Adam sinned everyone who was inside of him also sinned. His sin is our sin.

This is not a new teaching from a biblical perspective. In the book of Hebrews:

Hebrews 7:9–10 CSB

⁹ And in a sense Levi himself, who receives a tenth, has paid a tenth through Abraham, ¹⁰ for he was still within his ancestor when Melchizedek met him.

Levi himself paid a tithe to Melchizedek through Abraham who existed 4 generations before him. The life of Levi was still inside of Abraham. Abraham was 3 generations removed = Abraham -> Isaac -> Jacob -> Levi. (1 Chronicles chapters 1-2) YET, the understanding was that Levi was present when Abraham gave a tithe to Melchizedek because he was IN him.

While we don’t view the passing on of life the same way, our culture has gotten used to thinking about DNA and how our DNA passes on from generation to generation. As a matter of fact you can take a DNA test and go back generations to see who you’re related to and where you came from. So there is something inside of us, a code or whatever you want to call it, that is passed down from those that came before us and in that sense we are related to them and we are fruit of them and carry part of their makeup and of their person-hood.

There are a couple of thoughts when it comes to this. If eve sinned before Adam, then why is sin transferred through atom? Part of it I believe is because Adam was created first and eve came from Adam. Adam is the original life form and the source of all life thereafter including eve which came from his very body.

That means that it doesn’t matter how good of a person you are presently or how well you behave in the future, you and I are sinners because of Adam. His sin is charged to our account.

So basically, because all of us are in Adam, because all of us received life through Adam (if he never existed we would not exist) we therefore share his DNA the sin, and we share in that was present in him and charged to our account through him. Our earthly lives, our biology, implicate us as sinners.

Note: we see this in a lot of Paul’s writings where he talks about the sin that’s in his flesh and the battle against flesh and spirit and the sin nature that he has all of these things speak to sin coming through our biological connection to Adam.

If this were the end of the passage, it would be a very depressing passage. It would be a very hopeless passage. It would not make me want to continue reading this letter at all.

At the end of verse 14 Paul says that Adam is a type of the “coming one” or the one to come.

Romans 5:14 CSB

¹⁴ Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin in the likeness of Adam’s transgression. He is a type of the Coming One.

So how is Adam a type of the Messiah?

Your translation of the Bible may have “Coming One” capitalized because it refers to not just a person but a divine person, the Messiah.  Adam is a type of Messiah. So what does Paul mean when he says Adam is a type of the Messiah or a shadow of the Messiah?

In verses 15-19 Paul explains the contrast between Adam and Jesus.

VERSE      ADAM                                                                   JESUS

15              Many died                                                           grace overflowed to many

16              judgment resulting in condemnation     gift resulting in justification

17             death ruled                                                          life rules

18             condemnation for everyone                         justification leading to life for everyone

19            The many were made sinners                       the many will be made righteous

In verses 15 through 18 it appears as though Paul is saying the same thing just in different ways. Through one man’s sin death reigned through one man’s gift righteousness reigns. Through one man’s sin there’s judgment through the other man’s life there is justification.

SO HOW IS ADAM A TYPE OF THE MESSIAH? All Paul has shown is how different they are!

Romans 5:19 CSB

¹⁹ For just as through one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so also through the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.

Adam is a type of Messiah in that just as his actions affected all of those born of him, the Messiah’s actions affect all of those born of Him.

Just as sin is imputed to us because of our biological life connected to Adam, righteousness will be imputed to us because of our new life connected to the Messiah. Just as death is imputed to us because of our ancestor Adam, life is imputed to us if we are part of the family of the Messiah.

• From the one man Adam sin is imputed to our account and because of that we inherit death.
• From the one man Jesus righteousness is imputed to our account and because of that we inherit life.

The gift that we receive from the Messiah is not like the sin that we received from Adam. It is similar in that it is something passed on to us or imputed to us, but it’s different in the way that it affects us. Paul wants us to see just how much greater the gift is.

• “From one man’s sin many died”. One sin affected all of mankind which led to death.
• “Many sins came the gift”. Many sins affected one man, who acted in grace Which leads to life.

THERE IS A CAVEAT:

Have Adam’s sin. Not all will be saved from God’s wrath upon that sin.

How can one be saved?

We are “saved” from wrath by accepting the Gift of God. We know this already from Romans. but how it actually takes place is something I think we often struggle with.

“How can my accepting Jesus actually save me?”

When we accept the gift from God, when we choose to believe and follow Jesus, his righteousness is passed on to us. It is imputed to us. And it is so much better and greater than what we received from Adam that it trumps it!

All of us are FROM Adam and  the sin that Adam committed to imputed or passed along to us. That means that is does not matter what sins I commit – or what sins I do not commit – I am still guilty as a transgressor of God’s law because the Sin of Adam is placed upon me.

If I accept the gift of God through faith in Jesus, righteousness is imputed to me because I am not born into the family of God, a spiritual birth, with God as my Father.

John 3:5 CSB

⁵ Jesus answered, “Truly I tell you, unless someone is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

I now have his righteousness imputed to me because of Jesus. However, there are 3 parts of imputation brought out in the scriptures: and the last one is the one I want to finish with:

1. Adam’s sin is imputed to us.
2. Christ’s righteousness is imputed to those who accept the gift.
3. Our sins are imputed to Jesus.

But in order for our spiritual birth to even be possible there was one other imputation that had to take place. Our sins had to be imputed to Jesus. This would be a type of “federal” imputation.

In the Old Testament we see this principle played out during the year of atonement where the priest lays the sins of the people on a goat that is then taken out in the wilderness with the weight of the sins of the people in order to die.

Leviticus 16:20–22 CSB

²⁰ “When he has finished making atonement for the most holy place, the tent of meeting, and the altar, he is to present the live male goat. ²¹ Aaron will lay both his hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the Israelites’ iniquities and rebellious acts—all their sins. He is to put them on the goat’s head and send it away into the wilderness by the man appointed for the task. ²² The goat will carry all their iniquities into a desolate land, and the man will release it there.

On the day of atonement, the sins of the people were imputed to the goat that was let go into the wilderness. This is often referred to as “federal” imputation. It is not passed on through DNA, it is conferred to us by role or appointment.

The practice was a foreshadowing of what would happen with Jesus when the sins of all people would be placed upon him and he would be killed for the sins of the people.

2 Corinthians 5:21 CSB

²¹ He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

In second Corinthians Paul explains this imputation. “He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us” – in other words Jesus did not sin but our sin was placed upon him.

Isaiah 53:4–6 CSB

⁴ Yet he himself bore our sicknesses, and he carried our pains; but we in turn regarded him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. ⁵ But he was pierced because of our rebellion, crushed because of our iniquities; punishment for our peace was on him, and we are healed by his wounds. ⁶ We all went astray like sheep; we all have turned to our own way; and the Lord has punished him for the iniquity of us all.

So we find in this chapter several judicial actions. Through our biological relationship to Adam, we have sinned past tense as Adam’s sin is imputed to us. If we will accept the gift of grace that God offers, righteousness will be imputed to us because our new life is born of the spirit, and we are God’s children not Adams.

And that 2nd imputation is only possible Because our sins were imputed to Christ when he hung on the cross and died for the sins of the world. He did not sin, but he took our sins upon himself judiciously to pay the penalty for them.

I think imputation is one of the most powerful theological concepts that you can try to grasp.

From it we understand our own human fallibility, but we also understand the amazing, overwhelming, over the top grace that God has afforded to those who will receive his gift.

Romans 5:6 “6 For while we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly.”

I think many people are under the impression that they have to clean up their act to be good enough for God to accept them. It’s easy to believe that there’s no way that God would ever allow you to be a part of his family. But God knew from the time of Adam all of our sinfulness corporately and individually. There is nothing that you have thought there is nothing that you have said there is nothing that you have done that he did not know about before you were ever even born. There is nothing that you can do to surprise him even the sins that you don’t even know you’re going to commit yet he already knew about when Jesus died for our sins.

It’s not about the power of our sins. It’s not about how much of an effect sin has on us. It’s how much more powerful the gift of God is. It’s about how much more effective the sacrifice of Jesus is. And it’s not about what we deserve, it’s about what he wants us to have:

9     How much more will we be saved from wrath

10     how much more will we be saved by his life

15     How much more will the gift overflow too many

17     How much more will we reign in life

Romans 5:17 CSB

¹⁷ If by the one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive the overflow of grace and the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.

What does the gift of God provide? LIFE through Jesus Christ. Through Adam we inherit sin and death. Through the law we inherit more guilt and punishment. But through the gift of grace, we are offered reconciliation and eternal life:

Romans 5:20–21 CSB

²⁰ The law came along to multiply the trespass. But where sin multiplied, grace multiplied even more ²¹ so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace will reign through righteousness, resulting in eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

This doctrinal masterpiece needs to end back in the beginning… I mentioned we would go back there.

Adam’s sin brought judgement and he was estranged from God and given death (as well as being prevented from having eternal life)

Jesus’ righteousness saves us from wrath, brings reconciliation with God and offers us eternal life -> the very tree we were cut off from.

The first law was really found in the garden. And even as more laws were added, the outcome produced both people who lived more like the way God wanted, but also it was a greater reminder of our fallen-ness and our sinfulness that came from Adam.

But where sin multiplied, as we become more and more and more aware of our own sinfulness and the brokenness of our society, it makes the gift of God all the more valuable.

God is not surprised by our sinfulness, though I am sure he is shocked that people would so flippantly pass up his amazing, gracious gift.