The Supremacy of Jesus over Adam
by James Lincoln on May 15, 2005
12Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned - 13for before the law was given, sin was in the world. But sin is not taken into account when there is no law. 14Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who was a pattern of the one to come.
15But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God's grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! 16Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man's sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification. 17For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.
18Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. 19For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.
20The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, 21so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
New Categories of Thinking
Paul introduces us here to categories of thinking that sound very strange to some of us. Well, at least they are strange to me. There are always those who want things kept simple. I'm one of them. However, some texts aren't simple. Why is that? Well, sin has a way of complicating things.
Have you ever lied and then had that lie complicate your life? When I was about six years old our Sunday school teacher gave us a little basket with a candy egg in it for Easter. When I came home I told my sister that we made the baskets in class. I told her that the teacher brought the strips of bamboo and we wove them together in class. Well, her first reaction was something like, "Jim, you're a big fat liar." And of course she was right. But then I went back into my room and to make the story more believable I began to unravel the basket. Of course no one believed me and I eventually gave up on the idea. Now, wouldn't life have been a lot less complicated if I had just told the truth? So sin complicates things and Adam's sin really complicated things.
Adam's Sin plunged the Human race into judgment and death. So Paul's thoughts are a bit complicated. How is it that we share in Adam's sin? How is it that the transgression of one man brought judgment on all mankind? Paul is unequivocal about this.
Verse 15: By the transgression of the one (Adam) the many died.Verse 16: "The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation"
Verse 17: "By the transgression of the one death reigned through the one."
Verse 18: "Through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men."
Verse 19: "Through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners."
The word translated Adam literally means mankind and in some way Adam's sin brought judgment and death to us all. Pannenberg, a theologian, wrote,
"It is impossible for me to be held jointly responsible as though I were a joint cause for an act that another did many generations ago and in a situation radically different from mine."
So, this idea of our corporate solidarity with Adam offends our modern and perhaps western idea of individual culpability. It didn't offend Nehemiah. In his opening prayer he freely confessed the sins of his fathers. He didn't say, "I have no responsibility or connection to what they did." He sensed solidarity in sin between his life and theirs.
But let me ask you this: How do you explain the universal pervasiveness of sin? We don't have to teach our kids to sin. It seems to come to us naturally. Paul's explanation accounts for the facts. Somehow our choices (even to sin) are connected to Adam our first parent. We are somehow bound up with Adam with regard to sin. Now of course this is mysterious. I don't know how it can be. I don't know if Augustine was right in saying that we share the same rebel genes as Adam and that we pass those genes down biologically from generation to generation. I don't know if the connection is primarily representative and legal. Was Adam acting on behalf of the human race when he sinned? It does seem so. And of course if part of the covenant God made with Adam was that his sin would plunge the race into ruin it would be a perfectly just outcome. When Adam sinned were we somehow present with him in some mysterious way that I can't explain? I don't know. That one man's transgression can implicate the race is mysterious to me. However, it seems clear to me that this is just what he is claiming. We'll try to see why in a moment.
Adam's Fault or Ours?
When our kids were little and got caught misbehaving they knew their Bibles so well that they blamed, vilified and cursed Adam and the devil when they got caught. They would say things like, "Why did Adam have to go and ruin it all for all of us?" They would even go a step further and try to escape their own personal responsibility by blaming Adam their behavior. Blaming illustrates what it is like to be dead to God. When Adam and Eve sinned they died to God and blame was one of the first outcomes. Guilty before God Adam blamed God saying, "The woman You gave me" caused all of this. Eve in turn blamed the serpent. Blame casting is evidence that we have moved from life to death. Can you imagine a world without blame? We're so used to it we can't imagine it.
Look, Paul holds together two things that are hard for us to do. We want things to be simpler. But our faith is multi-dimensional not simplistic; it's not flat or one-dimensional. Don't think like a square. Think like a cube. You could never understand what my house is like unless you accept the fact that it's three-dimensional. If you only see it as a square you just won't get it. Instead you have to walk around it and see it from a larger perspective. Paul is stretching us here to see things from categories that are multi-dimensional.
On the one hand he holds Adam accountable for the judgment of the human race and on the other he holds you and me accountable for our sinful actions as well. For us, this isn't perfectly consistent. But God's mind is big enough to manage this.
Did Adam & Eve Die In The Garden?
In verse 12 here Paul says, Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned-
Paul drives us back to Genesis 3. God told Adam and Eve that if they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, "on that day" they would surely die. Those were the terms of the covenant God made with them. On that day Adam and Eve died. Now, they didn't die physically that day, although they began to. So what kind of death could he be referring to? In the original language of the Bible the word for death means 'to separate'. When your body dies your spirit or immaterial part of your body separates from your physical body. On that day their lives became alienated or separated from the life with God in terms of living by His favor and blessing. They died spiritually. Their spirits were unresponsive, hardened and dead to His life giving favor.
Now it's really easy to get lost here in abstractions. So, next Sunday we'll get more specific, but for now, just notice that God's covenant with Adam was that if he rebelled against Him and tried to live independently of God and His word that he would die spiritually and physically and be alienated from God's favor. This separation is called death. It is the condition of mankind east of Eden. Paul says in Ephesians that we are all dead in trespasses and sins. Death then is not just physical it's the circumstance and condition of man outside of Christ.
Through one horrific act of arrogance, defiance and rebellion judgment came to Adam, Eve and their progeny. And that condition of sin, judgment and death passed on to their children.
Now even though we don't know how it is that Adam's sin became ours no one will be able to stand before God and claim that he hasn't sinned on his own merit. Nor could someone say (as is suggested in vss.13-14) that just because he doesn't know the Mosaic Law he is innocent. Paul says, "No." Sin was here before the Mosaic Law. The presence of death proves that. The Mosaic Law simply made sin more recognizable as sin and clarified what was going on in the heart of mankind.
An Enormously Encouraging Comparison & Why
Now Paul wants to be an encouragement here. He makes his point by comparing Adam (the first man and representative of the human race) and Christ who is both like and unlike Adam. In regard to sin, judgment and death we are all connected with Adam but all who believe in Jesus and have a saving connection with Jesus Christ there is righteousness, justification and eternal life
Ok, Look, Why is Paul doing this? Why is he comparing Adam's failure and disobedience with Christ and His faithfulness and obedience?
I think what Paul wants us to know is this:
What Christ has done for all who are in Him is exponentially and extravagantly greater than what Adam did for all who were in him.
Rom 5:12
"Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because (or we know this is true because) all sinned-" NASU
Then after making the comparisons he applies this main point in vs. 17:
"For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.
NASU
He wants you and me to live in the joy, beauty and power of being alive to God in Christ not dead and alienated! So he compares the sin of Adam and its outcome of death to the abundant grace of Christ and its outcome of life. If we want to lay hold of eternal life here and now in very immediate and tangible ways this is what we must know.
In other words, God's grace in Christ is revolutionary and radical. It reverses the dynamic of sin, judgment and death into righteousness, justification and eternal life.
God's grace is therefore sufficient to enable believers to overcome the powers of sin, judgment and death that entered and spread to the human race through Adam. Through hope in God and faith in Christ we can enjoy this reversal. Hope, as he has said, beloved, does not disappoint us.
Now, we still do battle; we still endure hardships; we still fall down. At times we doubt the constancy of God's love for us precisely because we still sin. But the challenge is for us to fix the eyes of our faith on God and the evidences of His love for us, the presence of his Holy Spirit in us and on the supremacy of Jesus over sin, judgment and death rather than on our own weaknesses and sins or even our own performance. Paul calls us to fix our eyes on Christ and His grace that is exceedingly superior to what we were in Adam.
Even though Adam inaugurated and plunged the human race into sin, judgment and spiritual death, in verse 17 he tells us that through faith in Jesus Christ that those who receive Him, "the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life" and overcome all of this. Beloved this is such good news.
Adam: A Type of Christ
Of course we can only do all of this through faith in Jesus Christ, but Paul wants us to consider the comparison. At the end of vs. 14, Notice that Paul calls Adam a type of Christ. What does that mean? He means that in some way Adam is a pattern of Christ who was to come. He is an example or a foreshadowing of Christ.
Sometimes when you want to understand something better you compare it with something like it ... but not totally like it. One way to understand something better is to see it next to something that is both like it and unlike it. If I wanted to show you how superior the stylus is on my Palm PDA to Rich Eggimann's stylus I might hold it up next to his and show you the difference. Mine has a light on the end. And if you turn it ever so slightly the light comes on. It's great for reading things in the dark. All Rich's can do is touch things on his PDA. However, if we were comparing our PDA's...Rich placed his next to mine and show me how superior the brightness of his screen is to mine. And he would be right. I don't make as much money as Rich does or work as hard as he does. Next to mine his Palm is vastly superior and you can see that better if you place them side by side.
This is what Paul is doing here. He is using Adam as a point of comparison to show how vastly superior Jesus is to Adam. We need to know this comparison to prevail over the challenges of life. And here is the comparison that I see.
1. The obedience of Christ is vastly superior to the disobedience of Adam. (18) Rom 5:18-19
"So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men. 19 For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous." NASU
First let me make a clarification: When he says Jesus' obedience resulted in justification of life to all men, we know that he doesn't mean all men without exception. Within his argument he is referring to all of those who are related to Him (Jesus) by faith just as "all in Adam" refers to all those related to Adam by birth. This is the context. He is comparing those in Christ and those in Adam. If you grant justification outside of faith in Christ you would be ignoring everything Paul has said up to this point about justification by faith.
So, Paul contrasts Christ's absolute obedience to God with Adam's arrogant rebellion. Which record of obedience would you rather have, Adam's disobedience and your own or Christ's obedience? Christ's obedience is vastly superior to Adam's disobedience because the glory of His obedience is more lovely, beautiful, noble and wondrous than disobedience. Which one do you want to represent you before God the Father? Christ or Adam? Which do you regularly celebrate? Which one fills up your mind and heart day to day?
Also, Christ's obedience was the obedience unto death ( Phil.2:8). In the gospel Jesus is not only obedient where Adam was disobedient but Jesus takes the punishment of your sins on Himself in His death. He was obedient unto death. Which is better, Adam's record of disobedience or Christ's glorious, perfect and sacrificial and loving obedience? Who is superior?
Notice that our justification came through "one act" of obedience? You can only be cleared by God and forgiven through His one act and not through any series of acts of merit on your part. His one act of extravagant love makes us right before God if we will receive this glorious gift.
2. The second comparison is in vs. 16: The justification that comes to those who receive Christ is vastly superior to the judgment that comes to those who are in Adam. vs. 16:
"The gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned; for on the one hand the judgment arose from one transgression resulting in condemnation, but on the other hand the free gift arose from many transgressions resulting in justification. NASU
The standing and status before God that is available to us in Christ is exponentially and vastly superior to the standing of those who are only in Adam.
In Adam our standing is judgment and condemnation and eternal separation from God. In Christ, it is justification or being considered absolutely righteous and as righteous as Jesus and forgiven. In your mind, which is superior? The contrast could not be starker. He is talking about the difference between Heaven or Hell, the joy of being forgiven and freedom from our true moral guilt or the agony and dissipation of carrying the burden of our guilt forever.
Paul uses the word "gift" five times from 15-21. We deserve our guilt but we can't earn our forgiveness. That can only come to us as a gift. It is a grace. And grace he says that is super abundant and the atmosphere of our new life in Christ. Wow! Which sounds superior to you? True moral guilt in Adam (We are all guilty. Don't kid yourself) or abundant grace and the gift of righteousness In Christ?
3. Finally, the last contrast. The life that comes to us in Christ is vastly superior to the death that comes from Adam.
Rom 5:16-17For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ." NASU
We're back to why Paul wrote this. He doesn't want believers to live under the foot of sin and death nor its rule or tyranny. Instead, He wants us to reign over sin and death and really live through Jesus Christ. Now, I know that is a very abstract idea. And for most people eternal life is something they think of beyond death.
However, in Genesis three when Adam and Eve died the outcomes became very real and tangible. Next Sunday we'll go back and look at what life was like in paradise prior to the fall and then specifically what was lost and what it looks like for death to rule and reign in our relationship with God and others.
For now, just know that Paul is saying that because Jesus Christ and His grace is so superior to Adam and his sin ...and because you are now in Christ, that because God has poured out his love in your hearts through the Holy Sprit, that because He has considered you righteous in His sight, that because He has given you new life in Him through His word and spirit, that because He has given you a hope in hardships and loved you and funded you with power and promise, and because Jesus is so vastly superior to Adam, that indeed you can therefore live the life He has called you to live and rule over all that would bind you to sin and death.
In light of all of this may God help us to take up His promise of abundant goodness and grace, which He has freely given us in Him. May we have more faith and confidence in the supremacy of Christ in our lives than in the weakness of Adam in our lives. May we hope in the supremacy of His obedience, and the gift of life than we do in Adam's disobedience and death. May we with joyful certainty know that even our troubles are working to make us more like Jesus and then proceed to overcome sin and death and reign in the life knowing that Jesus who is great and greatly to be praised, who is vastly superior to any thing else in the universe has turned all that superior power, wisdom, beauty strength and might toward us who believe. May we do these things by faith. Proverbs 24:16 says, "The righteous man falls seven times, and rises again..." May we fix our eyes on Jesus who is the author and finisher of our faith and be those who rise again. Amen.