Romans 5:12-17 ‘Death in Adam, Life in Christ’ Pt.1 (AKA The Big Parenthesis)

TEXT
Rom 5:12
Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned--

• Sin came into the world because Adam sinned – notice he doesn’t say Eve here for some reason! And death only came because of sin.
• Note that this supports a literal view of Genesis…if sin came into the world by one man, then Adam was indeed one man, not a whole race of men.
• Note also that it says death spread to all men because all sinned. It doesn’t say because ‘all were born of Adam’. Again, this reminds us we are judged based on the sin we do.
• However, since he is setting Adam up as a type of Jesus, we need to realise that the reason he can say ‘all sinned’ is because we were born of Adam. That is, we sin because we are sinners. We inherit our sinful nature, and therefore we sin.

Rom 5:13
(For until the law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law.

• And here starts the big parenthesis, which ends at the end of verse 17! The parenthesis obviously deals with the immediately previous statement, which is that death spread to all men, because all sinned!
• When it says that sin is not imputed when there is no law (which there wasn’t until Moses), it does not mean that people did not sin before the law. It just means that there was no specific accounting of sin. You couldn’t break the law because there wasn’t one. But you could still fall short of the glory of God!

Rom 5:14
Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come.

• Even without the law, death reigned (ie. people died) because of sin. Even people who didn’t do exactly what Adam did sinned in different ways and fell short of God’s perfect standard.
• Paul introduces the idea that Adam was a type of Christ. We start to see that they were very similar but completely opposite.

Rom 5:15
But the free gift is not like the offense. For if by the one man's offense many died, much more the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abounded to many.

• The ‘free gift’ is God’s righteousness, as explained in previous chapters.
• Adam’s offense caused many (read ‘everyone’) to die, because the wages of sin is death. This sets up a ‘lineage’ of sorts, where everyone who is born of Adam (ie. everyone) is born into a lineage where death reigns. The opposite is Jesus, who started a lineage of life. All who are born into Jesus become heirs of this life.

Rom 5:16
And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned. For the judgment which came from one offense resulted in condemnation, but the free gift which came from many offenses resulted in justification.

• So we have two sides – one side that everyone is born into at physical birth which offers judgment and condemnation, and the other is a gift which results in us being right with God.
• Note that the free gift came from many offenses. Indeed, there were many sins that led to the crucifixion of Christ. But good intended them all for our infinite good!

Rom 5:17
For if by the one man's offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.)

• Ah! The end of the parenthesis. Here we see one of Paul’s favourite types of arguments – if such and such, then so much more Such and Such! In this case, we have that we recieved death from Adam, a mere man, and then so much more we have life through Jesus Christ, who was so much more than a mere man! If we think of how completely death reigns in us before Christ – it is fairly dominant. No-one can escape it, we all experience it in our relationships and pretty much daily we are reminded of it. Furthermore, it affects everything, causing decay and suffering. Then, life through Christ is much more dominant than this, because we receive it from One who is much more powerful! This will of course be ultimately true in heaven, where life will be eternal and blissful, but the firstfruits of this life we have now, and we should be living it!

SUMMARY
Paul sets up the binary opposition of Adam and Christ. In Adam we receive death through sin. We become heirs of Adam at birth and with that we are lumped with these unwanted ‘gifts’. However, Jesus came and we can be born into His line, where the gift is the righteousness of God – and this gift is so much more powerful than sin and death, because Jesus is much more powerful than Adam!

WHAT DO I LEARN?
Is my life a testimony to the fact that Jesus is more powerful than Adam? Do I reign in life through Jesus Christ? Or do I turn back to the ‘gifts’ of my old ‘father’? I want to live life as if Jesus has given me infinite grace and righteousness. Why? Because He has!