Romans 5
Please take your copy of God’s
word, remain standing and turn to Romans chapter five, verses
one to 21. We’re gonna take up a handful
of scripture lessons over the coming weeks to observe the coming
of Christ. Today, we want to look at the
new Adam. Next week, we’ll look at the
new man, what it means to be a new creation in Christ. The
week after that, we’ll look at the new life, how a Christian
ought to live in light of being a new creation. And then we’ll
look at the new world when God makes all things new. So today
we take up our study of the new Adam from Romans chapter five. So let’s give our attention to
God’s word. We’ll begin reading at verse
one. The Apostle Paul, God inspired, wrote these words through the
Holy Spirit, said these things. Therefore, since we have been
justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus
Christ. Through him, we have also obtained
access by faith into this grace in which we stand. And we rejoice
in hope of the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in
our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance
and endurance produces character and character produces hope. And hope does not put us to shame
because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy
Spirit who has been given to us. For while we were still weak,
at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. For one will
scarcely die for a righteous person, though perhaps for a
good person, one would dare even to die. But God shows his love
for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for
us. Since therefore we have now been
justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him
from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies
and we were reconciled to God by the death of his son, much
more now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.
More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus
Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. Therefore, just as sin came into
the world through one man and death through sin, so death spread
to all men because all sinned. For sin indeed was in the world
before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there
is no law. Yet death reigned from Adam to
Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression
of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come. But the
free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one
man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free
gift by the grace of that one man, Jesus Christ, abounded for
many. And the free gift is not like
the result of that one man’s sin, for the judgment following
one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many
trespasses brought justification. If because of one man’s trespass,
death reign through that one man, much more will those who
receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness
reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. Therefore,
as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness
leads to justification and life for all men. For as by the one
man’s disobedience, the many were made sinners, so by the
one man’s obedience, the many will be made righteous. Now the
law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace
abounded all the more so that as sin reigned in death, grace
also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through
Jesus Christ our Lord. Pray with me. Our God, give us
eyes that see, ears that hear, hearts that will receive your
word, your truth, and give us lives, give us Christian living,
give us faith to go and do according to your holy will. We pray this
in the name of Christ. Amen. You may be seated. I wonder if any of you today have
lost a job before. Maybe it was your doing, maybe
not your doing, but you’ve experienced the humiliation. You’ve experienced
the hardship. You’ve experienced maybe the
embarrassment. You’ve wondered, what is there
for my hands to do? Maybe particularly you who are
the providers for your household have felt the pain a good bit
worse. Um, maybe you’ve had a demotion. Uh, you, you had a position you
held and you were, you were demoted, but you had to work at the same
place with the same people, but in a lesser role for lesser pay. Uh, you can imagine what Adam
felt like in the garden. Uh, you can imagine what he felt
like when he sinned against God and the, the grand job that he
had, he, he lost. The grand task that he had was
was well, it wasn’t taken from him. It was it was harder to
do. It was more painful to do. It
was more difficult to do. You know the story. The Bible
begins in the beginning. God made the heavens and the
earth in the beginning. There was there was there was
nothing. And God made something. It was
formless and void. And God formed it and he filled
it. The crown of God’s creation at the last. was his making man. He put Adam on the earth. He
put him in the garden to work, to keep. He put Adam in the garden
to make it fruitful. And he put Adam in the garden
to spread the order and the beauty of Eden across the entire globe. Now, remember, God made a negative
statement. It is not good for man to live alone. And so God
put Adam into a deep sleep. took a rib from Adam, he formed
out of that rib a woman. And when Adam awoke from that
sleep, he said, at last, bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh,
a helper suitable for me. And so God ordained marriage,
man and woman. God told them to be fruitful
and multiply, to have children. And as the garden of Eden spread
across the whole earth, They were to raise children and to
have generations after them who would fill the entire earth with
the glory of almighty God. We think of some Bible stories,
some passages of scripture that help us see this. King David in Psalm 8 says, O
Lord, O Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. We
see the glory of God is supposed to cover the face of the earth. But we know the backstory. While Adam and Eve were tilling
the garden, while they were having children, while they were working
out all the creation mandates, they were living in bliss and
in fellowship with almighty God. We understand that sometime in
eternity past, Satan despised God and his plan of glory covering
the entire earth. And Satan and his companions
fell from their state of grace. And from that time, they continued
in every way possible to disrupt the glory of God, to disrupt
his plan of letting his glory spread through all creation across
the entire planet until the whole earth was filled with his glory.
And the best way for Satan to disrupt that was to come in the
garden. and to attack Eve, to tempt Eve with the fruit that
God had forbidden. Remember God had said positively
to Adam and Eve, of all the fruit of the garden you may eat, except
of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not
eat of it. In the day you eat of it, you will surely die. You
know, we tell our kids, don’t look. We tell them don’t touch. And they act like that’s all
we ever tell them. And that’s how Eve treated God.
Of all the trees of the garden you may eat, but of the one you
may not eat in the day of it, you will surely die. And how
does our child psychology go? You won’t let me do anything. God had given them the whole
earth. God had given them everything for their rich pleasure and enjoyment. And he just said of one tree,
do not eat. We call this in theology, the
probation. We call it the covenant of works.
And you understand from your Bible stories, you understand
from your theology that Adam, representing the entire human
race, had a choice. He could choose to obey God and
not eat the forbidden fruit. And in due time, Adam’s fidelity
to Yahweh, in due time, Adam’s keeping the garden, And in due
time, Adam’s faithfulness in marriage to be fruitful and multiply,
you understand, in due time, the whole earth would have expanded.
Eden would have covered the entire earth. The glory of God would
have covered the face of the earth as the seas and the land
do now. But Satan knew that and he entered
and he tempted Eve. He tempted Adam. God’s holding
back from you. God doesn’t want you to have
any fun. And they believed the lies. Eve
took the fruit. It was a delight to her eyes.
She took it and ate it. And Adam also, who was with her. And we say in theology, in our
understanding of the Bible, that Adam, by sinning against God,
fell. And that all mankind after him
fell with him in this first transgression. My brother and his family just
moved from D.C. to Virginia, but when they lived
in the District of Columbia, their license plate on the back
of the car said taxation without representation. They had no say
in the government, but they were taxed. Well, you and theology,
you and the scriptures, you get damnation, but it’s with representation. It’s Adam. In Adam, all die. all have sinned and fallen short
of the glory of God. We speak of it as original sin. It’s why Jesus was conceived
by the Holy Ghost in the womb of the Virgin Mary. It’s why
Joseph was not his father. It’s why the Holy Spirit had
to powerfully create life in the womb of the Virgin Mary.
If Joseph had been his earthly father, guess what? Jesus would
have been a son of Adam, born with sin. Well, we look back
at the duties of the priest in the Old Testament. We look back
at the duties of the patriarchs. We look back at the duties of
those called by God to lead. And we say with great longing
in our heart, oh, Adam, why did you disobey? Oh, Adam, why did
you believe the lies of Satan? You know, every gardener has
a hoe. And a hoe is not for digging
potatoes. It’s for killing snakes. And can’t you imagine that that
that Adam is the priest of the garden. Adam is the keeper of
the garden. Adam is the the underservant
of God, the vice regent of the whole earth. He had a duty. He had a It was more than a duty. It was
everything to, to keep that garden pure, to, to protect it from
enemies. And the first thing he should
have done when he saw that snake slithering in is what we do.
It doesn’t matter if it’s a good snake or bad snake, they’re all
bad snakes, right? You take that gardening implement
and you make sure that’s a dead snake. And we understand the
theology of it. It may be humorous to us in our
garden analogies. We’ve, we’ve all done it. But
think of where we’d be now if Adam had been faithful. We would
have been born without sin. We would have been born into
a earth full of the glory of God. We would have been born
into a earth full of righteousness. But look quickly over the span
of human history after Adam and Eve. What’s the first thing that
happened after they left the garden? Cain killed his brother
Abel. And you go just a few verses
in the scripture. There’s Lamech who says if revenge
on Cain is seven fold than whoever messes with Lamech. It’s 70 fold. And then we, we see the tower
of Babel and then we see the flood. We see that Noah is the
only righteous man on the face of the whole earth. Can you imagine
that saying there’s only one man with one family who are righteous
and all the earth. That’s what the case was with
Noah. And so where Adam failed, it plunged mankind into sin and
futility and darkness. And you only have to see, well,
there’s hope. Noah, he comes out of the ark. What does God say? Be fruitful,
multiply, fill the earth. And he’s laying there drunk.
And then we have his sons cursed because they looked on his nakedness.
And then we go on from there and say, well, Abraham will do
it. Well, Abraham’s faith was weak. And then we say, David
will do it. Remember David, remember, uh,
Jesse, line up your boys, not him, not him, not him, not him,
not him. And then finally they get to the, well, he’s not here.
He’s out in the field. We’ll bring him in. It’s him.
We anoint him with oil and David’s after a man of God’s own. He’s
a man after God’s own heart. And we think this is it. This
is God’s man, but he fails miserably. And then we have Solomon who
pops up. The whole world is coming to see his wisdom. but he’s got
his failures and on and on we go. And maybe some of you have
read through the Bible this year. You’ve read through all the,
the, this King and that King and what he did. And very few
of them do what’s right in God’s sight. And then there’s this
little bitty story about a little bitty baby and this little bitty
baby is born. And if you understand your Bible
and you understand your theology and you read Romans chapter five,
you, you say, when the Christ child is born and he’s laying
there in the manger, you say, this is the second act. This
is the child who will obey. And you compare his life to Adam. Adam lived in paradise. Jesus
went in the Judean wilderness. Adam lived among tame animals
who wouldn’t bite him or kill him or eat him or scratch him.
Jesus went into the desert where all the wild animals are, the
snakes and the vipers and the scorpions and all the beast of
the wilderness. And he laid there at night, not
having eaten for days, he slept on the ground and he had nothing. So you have Adam tempted in paradise
and he fails. Jesus is tempted in the Judean
wilderness. And every time without fail,
He says, the scripture says, the scripture says, the scripture
says. And so what the first Adam failed to do, the second Adam
is able to do by God’s grace, is able to do because he is our
better representative. And so we think of this passage
today, we think of particularly, Verse 12 in chapter 5, therefore,
just as sin came into the world through one man and death through
sin, so death spread to all men because all sinned. And then you look down at verse
15, the free gift is not like the trespass. If many died through
one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the
free gift by the grace of that one man, Jesus Christ, which
abounded for many. And then you skip down again
to verse 18. Therefore, as one trespass led
to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads
to justification and life. for all men. Can you imagine
Adam living as he did? He lost the great and grand job
that was his. He lost the work, the dignity
that was his. It was bent and bruised and broken
by the fall, but he continued to have to live. And there were
the thorns and the thistles and the curses. And one of the great
blessings we have this side of Christ, this side of the cross,
We still have the futility and the sin and the hardship, but
we see the dawn of a better day. We see the glimpse of the new
heavens and the new earth. But as we come to the Lord’s
table today, we also can say in our minds, we can also feel
with great joy in our hearts that we who have come to faith
in Jesus no longer live in Adam, in sin and in death, but we live
in Christ. And just as we inherited Adam’s
disobedience, we now inherit Christ obedience. We have that
little saying, justification. It’s just as if I’ve never sinned
and it’s just as if I’ve always obeyed. And so when we come to
faith in Jesus, when we come to the table, when we come to
the Lord’s supper, we are recognizing All that we have is provided
to us in Christ Jesus. And what a great joy, what a
great blessing it is to understand this Advent season that there
is a new Adam, a second Adam, a faithful Adam, an obedient
Adam. and that through faith, when
we have faith in him, his obedience is ours. We leave behind that
disobedience of our first parent and we pick up by faith the obedience
of our great big brother. Pray with me if you will. Our
father, we pray now that as we come to your table, that we would
rejoice that we would take great joy in seeing and tasting and
experiencing all that has been done for us in Christ Jesus. Lord, we would be lost without
Christ, dead in our sins and trespasses, but we thank you
for Jesus, the great lamb of God. And we pray your blessings
on us now as we approach your table. Amen.