But I don’t need to tell you that despite the fact that this is scripture – this is what the Holy Spirit, through the Apostle Paul, was saying – I don’t need to tell you that despite the fact that this is scripture, this is highly offensive language to those billions of people who believe themselves better than they really are. No one likes being blamed for the sins or crimes of others; it is offensive to our innate sense of justice. I know some elderly people who immigrated from Germany, but they are not, and never were, Nazis. I know some Russians, but they are neither Communists nor Russian Orthodox idolaters. None of those people like being attached to some of their neighbors back home. We don’t like being thrown into generalities, and more particularly, we don’t enjoy being found guilty by association. But this is exactly what this scripture declares. Because we are the children of Adam, we are condemned with Adam as sinners. And since the ultimate penalty of sin is death, the fact that all human beings eventually die, is proof that we are sinners.
To get around this problem of guilt by association, some people don’t mind admitting that when Adam sinned all his children became potential sinners and capable of their own sins. They say that when Adam sinned, all his children became weak and vulnerable. They say that because we are all children of weakened Adam we all sin against God ourselves. While this is absolutely true, this is not what Paul is teaching us right here. The apostolic declaration is that when Adam sinned, you and I sinned along with him.
And here is the proof: Several months ago, I used the following illustration. What if I went out for my morning walk tomorrow, and I was arrested? I said, what if a city by-law had been passed which made it illegal to walk the city streets on Mondays. Any other day of the week walking is perfectly legal, but not on Mondays. And yet, I have been taking that walk for over 50 consecutive Mondays. It wasn’t illegal the first forty times, but now there was a law which declared that it was illegal. Where there is no law, there is no crime, and there can be no punishment. We are told that Adam was given a divine law which forbade his eating of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. When he ate that fruit he sinned and spiritually died. That makes perfect sense, because he had been given the law and told of the penalty ahead of time. But what about Adam’s children and grandchildren, who never saw the Tree of Knowledge? They could not commit the same sin as Adam – they didn’t have the same opportunity. If you think about it, there were relatively few laws directly given to man until the time of Moses. And yet there was still death from Adam to Moses – and death is the punishment of sin. Verse 14 – “Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression.” Adam’s transgression was that he had been given a specific law, and he deliberately broke that law. But it’s impossible to prove that Cain, for example, had ever been given any other laws. Where do we learn that he had been commanded, “Thou shalt not kill.” Verse 13 teaches that where there is no law, there is no sin or crime, and therefore there should be no death.
Okay then, beyond that, can anyone tell us what sin against God Abel committed which required his death? Why did that man die? Of course he died because his brother was filled with murderous hate, but an additional reason was that Abel died because he too was a sinner. He was born a sinner, because his father chose to sin against God. I’m not sure that Abel could have been killed, if he wasn’t already sinner and susceptible to death. By his birth, as one of the sons of Adam, the father and progenitor of all sinners, Abel was a sinner.
When someone says that he hates this doctrine, he is a hair’s breath away of several serious things. First, he is attacking the rather clear and unmistakable Word of God. He is telling the Apostle Paul that he doesn’t like what he is talking about. He is also saying that the Moses’ account of the fall of man is either not true or not important. But, more than these, he is on the cusp of attacking and accusing God Himself. He is virtually saying that he doesn’t like the government of God and the degrees of God. Why doesn’t God make every man responsible for his own sin and nothing else but his own sin? Doesn’t God have authority to create sin-limits like that if He chose to do so? Furthermore, if Adam did pollute everyone of his descendants with a sin-nature, then why didn’t God destroy Adam and Eve before their first child was ever born? Why didn’t God start over with a new created person and keep that person from sinning?
This last question takes us into philosophy and theology where perhaps we are incapable of going. But if you’d like a quick answer to that last question, here might be a reasonable one – If Satan had made man to sin, forcing God to destroy Adam in order to start over, it would have meant a Satanic victory over Jehovah. It would mean that God failed on his first attempt at humanity, forcing Him try again. But if God rather chose to redeem, forgive and cleanse even just one of the sinful children of Adam, it would magnify and glorify the Lord more than anything that God ever did in the original creation. In saving lost souls, Jehovah drives the knife of defeat into the Devil’s very heart. Furthermore, the Lord knew and ordained each one of these events prior to creation. And the sin of Adam and the poisoning of his children is nothing compared to the gift of God’s saving grace. Verse 15 – “For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many.”
All of this has only been the introduction to my message for the morning. And since it has been pretty long and complex, I’ll try to keep the rest of this message fairly short and simple. Despite this very gloomy picture, by the grace of God, there are some distinct blessings in the sin of Adam.
With Adam’s sin came something called “the curse.” Genesis 3:17 – “And unto Adam (God) said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” You may think that this is a bit silly, but consider it for a moment …. Have you ever pulled a tomato off your own backyard vine and thought how wonderful it tasted? Did those beautiful tomatoes or potatoes or strawberries, spring up of themselves to feed you? Didn’t you have to plant, weed, fertilize, prune, pick, wash and nurture that fruit of the ground? But didn’t it taste all the better because YOU contributed to its growth? You fought with the curse, and to a small degree, by the grace of God, you were victorious. Similarly have you ever solved a really difficult problem and felt a kind of satisfaction about it? Have you ever dried the tears of a child or neighbor, or comforted someone in their grief? Have you ever settled an argument between friends and restored the love between two people? Have you ever helped someone recover from an injury or nursed someone through a serious disease? What you have done in each case is to battle the curse and the effects of sin and you have had a small victory.
If Adam had not sinned, do you think that he would have ever done any of those things that I’ve just described, except perhaps to eat a really good tomato? Do you know the difference between turmoil and peace? The difference between stress and calm? Isn’t it a wonderful thing to work extremely hard, and then to come home to completely relax? Each of these things mark the difference between effects of the curse and relieving those effects. What is the source of patience? Verse 3 – “We glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope.” If there were no tribulations in life, we would know nothing about patience or hope. And tribulations come as a result of sin and the curse of sin. What about faith? Do you suppose that Adam knew what it was to trust God for something that he could receive in no other way? Before sin came along how much faith was necessary for that man? And even though he could and should have praised God for a great many things, Adam knew nothing about lack. There may have been nothing that God miraculously provided or especially supplied. Adam’s ability to worship the Lord was in some ways enhanced as he learned to deal with his sin and the curse that his sin brought upon him.
So some of the most blessed aspects of our faith, religion and worship are connect to results of the fall. Again, this is not to praise or glorify sin, but rather to praise and glorify God. The Lord is able to bring honey out of the carcass of the dead lion.
If Adam had not sinned and God had not taken steps to redeem sinners, there could be no absolute assurance that you would be privileged to remain in the garden – or to enter Heaven. Everyone of us would still be at risk of eternal death. Fortunately for us, however, Adam did sin, but God has graciously made a way of escape through Christ. The Lord Jesus has paid the penalty for sin, and with His death, purchased redemption for a great number of people – a number which only the Lord knows. And because I have repented of my sin, and believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, and because I have the witness of the Holy Spirit within me, because His spirit testifies with my spirit, and because there are dozens of other evidences, I am confident that what the Lord has begun in me he will perform until the day of Jesus Christ. The Bible teaches me that I am kept by the power of God, and that no matter what temptation Satan might throw at me today, and even if I submit to his wicked impulses, and I sin against God, I cannot loose my eternal hope or the Lord’s eternal life.
In this, every saint today has much, much more than Adam had while he was still in the Garden of Eden. That man was in constant spiritual danger, even though he didn’t know it, but we are absolutely secure. A sinner redeemed by the grace of God is far better off than any innocent, untested creature. IN other words, you and I, as Christians today are better off than Adam in the Garden of Eden. And we have not yet begun to really enjoy all that the Lord has planned for His saints.
The Bible does speak of the love of God in a great many places in both Testaments. And as far as I can discern every one of those scriptures puts that love into a context of either God’s election or salvation of the sinner. Ephesians 2 – “God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved😉 And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.” I John 3 – “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God.“ Then there is a verse right here in our context of Romans 5 – “God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” There is no greater example of Divine love, than what we see in the death of the Son of God. In fact it might be reasonably argued that there is no Divine love outside the death of Christ.
And remember that Jesus died for the specific purpose of rectifying the problem of our sin. If Adam had not sinned, God would never have displayed His love. In fact, if Adam had not sinned there would have been no need or purpose for the love of God.
Furthermore, if Adam had not sinned, there would have been no such thing as “death” for Jesus to have died. Death is the result of sin – all, any and every death – is the result of sin. And the death of Christ is not an exception. But, praise God, the sin for which Jesus died was only imputed or reckoned unto Him – He had no sin of His own. The sin of those He intended to save was applied to Christ, and He died because of, and for, that sinner. He “gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us form this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father” – Galatians 1:4. He “gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity” – Titus 2:14. If Adam hadn’t sinned, Christ would have had no reason to die, and we would know nothing of divine love.
Has there ever been a time when you lost the love of someone who had been a friend? You did something that offended him, and he no longer trusted you or enjoyed your company? But then, perhaps, a mutual friend intervened and mediated a settlement of the problem. Somehow, the broken friendship was restored and you could enjoy one another once again. At least for a while wasn’t that friendship even sweeter than it was before it had been broken? I think that might begin to illustrate our relationship to the Lord for all eternity, because of the reconciliation which the Lord Jesus has accomplished for each of His saints.
But of course, this assumes that you are no longer in that state of unforgiven sinfulness. Adam sinned and you became a sinful sinner. But Christ died for sin so that repenting, trusting sinners might be saved by His sovereign grace.
Can you say before God that you are fully repentant of your sins and that your only hope for Heaven is in the Person of the dying Son of God? Adam’s sin can be a great blessing to you, but only if it is made a blessing through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Is Jesus your personal Lord and Saviour?