For a week now, I have been telling myself I would not bring up the subject of last Sunday’s football game. I told myself that if someone brought up the game to me, I would respond, but I wouldn’t initiate things. After all, no matter which team won or lost, it really was only a game. And despite what some people thought a week ago, it has no lasting importance or value. So I have been true to myself for nearly a week, not bringing up the matter to anyone. But we have visitors here today from the great State of Colorado, so, in honor of our guests, I am going to break the promise made only to myself, reminding everyone that the Denver Broncos are the champions of football. That is in spite the fact that most of the world said they would be crushed by the Carolina Panthers. And in spite of the fact that most of the football world was saying that Denver’s quarterback was an over-the-hill old man with nothing left in the tank. The humiliation of two years ago has been reversed, because Denver soundly defeated the team which humiliated the Seattle Sea Hawks a couple weeks before that. So the game has been played, and the only team for whom I ever root has won. Now we can move on.
But before doing so, I’d like to mention that for two weeks preceding last Sunday and again for the past week, I have heard Denver players repeated thank people for helping them to become world champions. Some have mentioned parents; some have mentioned coaches; some have named other players. “I would not be here today, holding this Lombardy trophy if it were not for so-and-so.” “The most influential man in my career has been my high school coach,” or “my dad,” or “my pastor.” (Well, maybe I didn’t actually hear that last one.)
What if YOU were asked, by a rabid fan or some reporter, about the most influential person in your life, how would you answer? Do you have any people in your life towards whom you can point and say, “That person helped to make me the person that I am today?” An honest answer should include the names of our parents. There might be some teachers named or perhaps some spiritual leaders. Then you might reach back into the past and pick some important historical people – people like Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, or Joseph Stalin, perhaps. What about an author from days gone by, whose pen has helped to shape your thinking and your life?
We are “the people that we are” because of many different factors. Things such as where and how we were raised, and the people who have been our friends. And then there is heredity — the tightness of your genes. Perhaps the most important person in your life may still be IN your life. Maybe ultimately the most important person in your life has yet to enter your life?
Among those on your personal list, be sure to include one or both of the men described in our scripture. These two are very special, and have had an inestimable influence on every single one of us. We can – we should – call these men – the two most important men in history. There are no two men who even come close to these two in their influence over others.
By one of these men, we were all made sinners.
Have you ever wondered why, when confronted with a tempting situation, you have chosen the wrong course? I am currently reading a book where the bad guy blames his uncle for all his crimes. “The most influential man in my life was a wicked man, and now I am not responsible for my actions.” Perhaps there was a situation when you were a child when you made a small theft of absolutely inviting. You took that object, even though you knew what you were doing was wrong. I had one of those experiences when I was six or seven; I was caught; I was punished. But then three or four years later, I did it again, and again I was caught, and again I was punished. Why didn’t I learn my lesson the first time? Why is it so easy to tell a lie, even though our mothers taught us that it is a bad thing to lie? Isn’t it because there is something in us pushing us towards those sins and bad decisions?
Why do we call lying a “sin,” but theft and murder are “crimes?” There is such a confusion about “sin” in our modern society. Why is “crime” a bad thing, but “sin” is often tolerable depending on the circumstances? What sin is great enough to make a normal person worthy of being called a “SINNER?” When a teenager starts to use marijuana, does he become a sinner? Or is meth essential first? Is he a sinner after he learns to use profanity? We probably would all agree that a murderer is both a criminal and a sinner, but what about a gambler, or a liar? Armed robbery is a crime and sin, but does shop-lifting a candy-bar in the jiffy stop make us a sinner? Why don’t your evil thoughts make you a sinner, when publishing those thoughts with pictures would? “What sin is great enough to make someone a sinner?”
Actually there aren’t any! None! That may surprise some people, especially coming from a Baptist preacher, but it is true. Just as there is nothing you can do to become an angel, there is not one thing in the world you can do to make yourself either a devil or a sinner. Adultery doesn’t make people sinners; lying doesn’t, and not even spitting on the Bible. The subject of our sinfulness was taken out of our hands centuries ago. You and I were already sinners by the nature of our human blood before we ever committed a sin. Not everyone has “A negative” or “O positive” blood, but all have red cells, white cells and protein. And every, one long before their births, have had sin in their blood. “By one man’s disobedience many, many, many were made sinners – all were made sinners.”
If you found a stray kitten, crying its heart our and tearing yours out in the process. If you brought it home, set it down on your floor and said, “I now pronounce you a ‘kitten’” we might have to wonder about your sanity. That kitten was a kitten before you brought it home – it was born a kitten. We don’t have to teach our children to be naughty – all children are born naughty. Thomas Beecher told the story about an old clock which was high up on a wall in his church. Despite all that could be done to it, the clock never gave the right time. Instead of removing the guilty time-piece, the preacher put a sign under it. It read – “Don’t blame my hands. The trouble lies much deeper.” Sin isn’t a matter of actions, thoughts and hands – sin is the condition of every human heart. Some people become open criminals because they were born sinners. And some people never become criminals – yet in the sight of God, they are all still sinners. That includes me, and it includes you.
So the first and perhaps greatest influence in your life was a man whom you never met – “Adam.” The evolutionist may snicker all he likes, but it is true never-the-less, because the Bible says so. The historical fact of the fall of Adam into sin has never been disproved, and it never can be. While on the other hand, the upward progress of evolution can’t be proven either. What can be proved is the presence of some degree of wickedness in every person we meet Adam – the “one man” who disobeyed in verse 19 is one of the foundational individuals in the Bible. Adam, as the father of us all, is one of the foundation individuals in all of us.
God tells us that Adam sinned, and as a result all his future children were made sinners at that moment. It is not necessary that we do anything to active this sinfulness. A blind person doesn’t have to tear out his eyes to be blind. And a dead person doesn’t have to have his heart and brain removed in order to be dead. The Bible says “there is not a just person upon the earth that doeth good and sinneth not.” “The LORD looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one.”
But what does it mean to be born a sinner? Ultimately, it means death. Verse 17 says that our sinful nature means that we will all die. In fact, every death points a finger to the presence of sin. There would be no death if there was no sin. And that includes the two day old baby, who has never had the opportunity to lie, cheat or steal.
If someone asked me to prove that the sun contains energy, I’d ask him to sit in it for a while. Without using the Bible, can I prove that all men are sinners? I can prove it by taking you to the cemeteries scattered around Spokane and Kootenai counties. Despite all the vaunted imaginary accomplishments of evolution, it has never even come close to solving the problem of death. In verse 12 Paul said, “Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin and so death passed upon all men, for all have sinned.” In another book, Paul’s words sound very much like the ones we have here – “As in Adam all die…” By that man “came death.” Death was not originally the natural way of things. Death was superimposed over a life which should never have ended. The Lord said to Adam, “The tree which is in the midst of the garden, thou shalt not eat of it. For in the day that eatest therefore thou shalt surely die.” Death is the result of sin.
But the death of these bodies of ours, is not the end of things. That physical death is but the foreshadowing of another death which is even worse. As verse 18 says that because of one man’s sin, comes judgment and condemnation for all. Beyond death, there is eternal judgment upon us all because of the sin within us. This condemnation is what the Bible calls “the second death” – spiritual death. By our very natures we are headed for death and eventually hell and something called “the lake of fire.”
I know from experience that some people hear this and think, “That is so totally unfair that it’s incredible.” “Why should I be punished for the sins of someone else?” Well, I’m not going to argue with you about the fairness of this law. I believe that it is perfectly fair. If it is fair that a child inherit his father’s estate – his goods – why not his evils too? Forget about Adam if you like, but remember that your father and grandfather are or were sinners too. It may have begun with Adam, but you received your nature from your father, I inherited my father’s rare blood type – and my father’s sin nature. This is a tremendously important Biblical principle, but it is not what I’d like you to remember most. The verse goes on to another man. Who is the most influential person in your life? Is it the first man or this second man?
By a greater man than Adam, many sinful souls have been made righteous.
People may think that God’s condemnation of humanity through Adam is unjust. I say, lift up your eyes upon the solution which the Lord has provided. Look upon the Saviour, the Son of God. All arguments for unjustness dissolve away in the light of the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus.
There is a way, but only one way that a sinful son of Adam can be made righteous – through Jesus Christ. You will find no room in this verse for any other man or organization. And certainly we have no ability to help ourselves in this area, undoing who we are. There is no niche here for any work, any prayer, any activity of ours. He, Christ alone, can make the sinful man righteous, and He has done this over and over again.
But how? By his obedience. What obedience this was? Long before the creation of the world, there was a covenant made within the Trinity – the Godhead. The Second Person of the Trinity – the Son of God agreed to offer His death as a substitute for the deaths of a multitude – “many” — sinners. He agreed to take the place of death-worthy people like me, so that I and many others might have eternal life. The cross of Calvary was the place of that substitutionary exchange. Upon the cross, Christ took upon Himself my sin. If I am righteous today, it is only because I have been wrapped in the righteousness of the Son of God. In speaking of a great many, Paul said, Christ “bare our sins in his own body on the tree.” “He was made sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made righteousness in God’s sight. Christ only can redeem us from the curse of the law because he was made a curse for us.”
Verse 18 says that He provided something called “justification.” “Justification” is the divine operation whereby God to declares individual sinners – “righteous.” I was racing down the highway of my sinful life, but found that God’s highway patrol had thrown across the pavement one of those tire-piercing spike strips. There was no way to reach what I foolishly thought was home. But Christ Jesus lay His body and soul over the judgment which I faced. He changed the direction of my life, by graciously changing the fallen, decrepit nature within me.
This is one reason why no man can shake his fist in the face of God for condemning him in Adam. A way of deliverance has been provided; escape is provided as well. Verse 21 adds the finishing touches to this equation by speaking of “eternal life.” Adam lost peace and eternal life for every one of his descendants. And God has deemed to let physical death run its full course in most of our lives. Oh, but the second death has been more than met by the second Adam – Christ Jesus. Everything of real importance that Adam lost can be restored in Jesus Christ the Saviour
Who is the most influential person in your life – Adam or Christ Jesus? Do nothing and the ultimate answer will be “Adam.” But if you will repent before God and put your trust in Jesus Christ and His substitutionary death on the Cross, then the grace of God will make Christ to become the most important person in your life. Are you clinging to Christ today?