Sunday – October 3, 2021
Word On Worship – Sunday – October 3, 2021
Romans 5:15
But 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!
Over the centuries of mankind’s history, many men and women have significantly impacted the destiny of those who followed after them. None, however, has had greater impact than Adam, the first man. In our text, Paul shows just how great the impact of Adam’s “fall” has been upon mankind. Paul stresses this impact to demonstrate that in spite of the curse, which Adam’s sin brought upon the human race, God has provided a cure in the person and work of Jesus Christ.
Adam is regarded as the source of sin’s entrance into the world. With his act of disobedience, sin first entered human history. No believer would disagree with this. But Adam’s sin did much more than this—it brought guilt upon all mankind. Adam’s sin and resulting guilt was imputed to all his descendants. Adam sinned, and because of this he died. Adam sinned, and because of this, all men die. All men die because they sinned, in Adam. Paul explains this more fully in verse 12. “The wages of sin is death,” both for Adam (Genesis 2:16-17) and for all others (Romans 6:23).
Men are not guilty sinners only because Adam sinned, corrupting and implicating the rest of the human race. Paul has already taught in chapters 1-3 that all men, without exception, are guilty sinners, because each of us is guilty of unbelief and disobedience toward God. All men have received some revelation about God from His creation. Some men have the added revelation of God’s Law. But regardless of how much men have had revealed to them about God, they have rejected Him and refused to worship or to obey Him.
Does the curse of sin on the entire human race, due to the act of one man, trouble us? Then we must press on to the second link Paul makes. Not only is there a link between Adam’s sin and mankind’s universal guilt, there is a link between Adam and Christ. In verse 14, Paul informs us that Adam “is a type of Him who was to come.” Adam is a type of Christ. What seems to be bad news becomes very good news. There is a similarity between Adam and Christ in just this respect: that as his one sin brought death to all, even when there was no personal sin, so Christ’s one act of obedience brings unfailing righteousness to those who are in Him, even when they have no personal righteousness. It is this likeness, this link, which enabled our Lord Jesus Christ to die on Calvary, and to rise from the dead, and in so doing to free men from the curse brought upon them by Adam. Adam’s curse has its cure, in Christ.