Romans 5:14, commentary and pictures

Death reigned from Adam to Moses even over those whose wrongdoing was not a direct breaking of an express command like Adam's deliberate disobedience. Through his fall guilt and the sentence of death passed upon the whole race, so that every child inherits disobedience, defect, and a fallen, condemned condition. Adam is the figure of Him that was to come, Jesus Christ the second Adam standing at the head of humanity as representative and Redeemer. Where Adam, though favorably placed in a sinless nature in Eden, yielded to appetite and doubt and brought loss and death, Christ in fallen humanity resisted every temptation and by His sinless life and substitutionary bearing of guilt secured life, restoration, and another probation.

Death Reigned from Adam

Death ruled from Adam to Moses, even over those whose wrongdoing was not like Adam's direct, deliberate breaking of an express command. Adam stands as the figure of Him who was to come, Christ the second Adam, who stood in Adam's place and endured the test Adam failed in order to overcome on behalf of fallen humanity. By the time Christ came the race had been weakened and degraded through generations of sin, and He bore its infirmities as He faced temptation.

Death was pronounced upon all because of Adam's sin, and through relation to Adam humanity receives guilt and the sentence of death. The fall of Adam brought misery and death upon all, and death's reign is seen even in Moses, who died while beholding the promised land of Canaan. The figure stands in opposite outcome, for as death came through Adam so life is imparted through Christ's righteousness. That life is possessed because of Christ's righteousness and is lived by faith in the Son of God, Christ having been made sin for men that they might be made the righteousness of God in Him, becoming partakers of the divine nature with promise of eternal life that never becomes extinct, while Christ by His humiliation and death brings life and immortality to light. Through accepting Christ as Saviour people may be connected with God and become partakers of the divine nature, and the contrast calls for entire consecration to God in sanctification of soul, body and spirit.

What makes an act sin is not the greatness of the act but being at variance with God's expressed will in the least particular, and such variance shows sin reigns in the heart. Adam was required to render perfect obedience to God not only in his own behalf but in behalf of his posterity. If he had stood the test of temptation and preserved allegiance to the Creator, his obedience would have insured his acceptance and favor with God, establishing him forever in holiness and happiness, with these blessings extending to all his posterity. Because Adam failed to bear the test and revolted against God's law, all his descendants have become sinners. God's law had once been written in the hearts of men and women, but cherished sins dimmed and nearly effaced that writing as the impressions made by sin wore away the impressions of the law.

Adam's history includes his fall and repentance, and his resurrection and return to Eden. The first Adam and Christ the second Adam will meet when Eden blooms on earth again.

Adam's Fall and Inheritance

Adam was a free moral agent held responsible for his conduct, and he misused his freedom by allowing appetite to overcome him. He transgressed the Father's express commands and His law, lost his innocence and the divine favor and happiness, and by his own choice became a sinner separated from God. In falling he disobeyed the expressed law, and after that disobedience the claim was made that no man could keep God's law and that the whole race was under hostile control.

The first Adam was in every way more favorably situated than Christ, furnished with a holy, sinless, pure and undefiled nature and abundantly supplied with all he and Eve required in an undefiled Eden of pure nature, fruits, flowers and beautiful lofty trees. Yet he fell under the smallest test that could prove obedience, concerning the tree of knowledge, when doubts of God's wisdom were insinuated and the heavenly Father and Sovereign was accused of selfishness for prohibiting its fruit to test loyalty. Eve yielded to temptation and Adam accepted the forbidden fruit from her hand because he listened to the enemy, and in yielding to a small temptation he fell from integrity and opened the floodgates of woe upon the world. By one man's disobedience many were made sinners and his posterity became depraved, perpetuating his sin while finding fault with their first parents. The depth of that fall justified great means to procure a ransom, since man could never rescue and restore himself, and only by immeasurable sacrifice of the guiltless suffering for the guilty could redemption come.

Through that disobedience humanity lost the divine image and the estate received, with dominion forfeited, Eden lost, all right to heaven forfeited, and God's favor lost. Guilt, sorrow, wretchedness, misery and death were brought upon the world, while Adam's transgression brought wretchedness and death in contrast to the life and immortality brought by sacrifice. Man became separated from God and the world was separated from heaven, and the whole human family came under Satan's claim, with calamity and disease charged against God as without mercy. The race was put under bondage to the law under sentence of death, for the disobedience brought God's law under violation, dishonored His government, and justice required the penalty to be paid.

Every child receives from Adam an inheritance of disobedience, guilt and death, and his sin and fall brought guilt, death and natural defects and tendencies upon the race. God's law had once been written in human hearts, but cherished sins dimmed and nearly effaced that writing as the impressions of sin wore away the impressions of the law. Because Adam failed to bear the test and revolted against God's law, all his descendants have become sinners, and the whole race from Adam onward stands fallen under sentence of the transgressed law, helpless, degraded, ignorant, hopeless, condemned by a holy God and ready to perish. That fallen and condemned condition calls for true conversion, and where it is lacking methods must be examined to see whether they are after the gospel order.

Adam's transgression did not cause God to give human beings a new order of energies and passions, nor did God interfere to implant sinful propensities in the race. Its real consequences never give an excuse for breaking God's law, and having inherited tendencies does not leave a person guiltless or not responsible when acting them out. To plead Adam's sin to excuse failure and claim no blame casts reproach upon God and denies the sufficiency of the perfect and complete Calvary provision, which gives sufficient grace and power to work away from natural defects and tendencies and to advance in the divine life. The bias to evil may be overcome through cultivation of righteous principles, so that through obedience to God's law and faith the senses are no longer warped and twisted, the faculties no longer perverted and wasted on objects leading away from God, and words, thoughts and energies may be purified until a new character is formed and the debasement of sin is overcome and the lost image regained.

Adam Foreshadows Christ to Come

Adam is the figure, type and foreshadowing of Him that was to come, Jesus Christ the second Adam, the world's Redeemer and only begotten Son. Death reigning from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sin was not like Adam's direct disobedience, is the result of sin that this figure explains. Adam's transgression brought loss, wretchedness and death to the human race, while Christ is its only hope of restoration to God's favor. When humanity was lost with no hope, sinners with no righteousness or virtue acceptable to God, Jesus consented to take human transgression upon His own soul. Provision was made from the foundation of the world that if transgression came a substitute and surety was ready that moment to take the penalty of the whole human family, with the sin of the whole world upon Him, offering eternal life to every sinner who forsakes sin and takes salvation by faith.

Both stood as free moral agents placed on probation and held responsible for their conduct. Temptation is no temptation unless yielding is possible, so both stood with a real possibility of failing. The first Adam misused his freedom, allowed appetite to overcome him, disobeyed the Father's express commands and law, lost innocence, divine favor and happiness, and by his own free choice became a sinner separated from God. The second Adam was surrounded by intensely subtle and misleading influences and placed in a much less favorable position for living a sinless life, yet in the midst of sinners He resisted every temptation, maintained His innocence, and was ever sinless. Christ passed through that ordeal resisting by faith with firm hold on divine power when powerfully influenced to do wrong, and on the cross experienced to the fullest what man experiences striving against sin.

Christ came to stand at the head of the fallen race as the second head, representative, Advocate, mediator and Redeemer. After the Fall He acted for God toward humanity and saved the race from immediate death, with Adam and Eve and their posterity given a period of probation to return to allegiance. In due time He clothed His divinity with humanity and came in human form, taking human nature but not its sinfulness, to become humanity's head and associate with the fallen race. He laid aside His royal robe that humanity might touch humanity and divinity might lay hold upon divinity, coming as a babe in Bethlehem with Satan upon His track because Satan had things as he pleased. The transgression of Adam had separated the world from heaven, and Christ came to throw the world back into favor with God, standing between the sinner and God so that the Father accepts the sacrifice and meets the transgressed law at the cross of Calvary.

His trial as the second Adam had everything pending on Him, leaving an example and giving probation, and at His baptism and prayer through the hellish shadow Satan cast, heaven opened with the Holy Spirit descending as a dove of burnished gold and the declaration of beloved Sonship meaning God accepted Him as representative and head. Through His own merits He elevates man to be a partaker of the divine nature, since man can accomplish nothing without God, and through accepting Him as Savior people may be connected with God. The figure stands in opposite outcome: as death came through Adam and was pronounced upon all because of his sin, so life and immortality are imparted through Christ's righteousness, possessed because of His righteousness and lived by faith as partakers of the divine nature with promise of eternal life that never becomes extinct. The guilt of Adam's descendants in every age was laid upon Christ as substitute and surety, bearing the curse of the law and enduring judgment for sin to redeem humanity, defeat death's dominion, and open Paradise and immortal life. That rescue came at immense cost, for through the Son of God's sacrifice alone, who as Creator and sinless Son could make acceptable atonement where even an angel's life could not be accepted, people received another opportunity for redemption.

Substitutionary Atonement for Sin

From the foundation of the world provision was made that if transgression came a substitute and surety was ready that very moment to take the penalty of the whole human family, even the whole world. When through Adam's fall the race was lost with no hope, cut off from God as sinners with no righteousness or virtue that God could accept, Christ consented to take human transgression upon His own soul and to take upon Himself the work of restoration. As soon as man sinned He took man's guilt upon Himself as substitute and surety to save the race from eternal ruin, bearing human guilt and the Father's wrath that disobedience would otherwise bring upon humanity, and offering Himself that the race might be brought back into the Father's favor. In Him is offered vast happiness and advantage and eternal life to every sinner who will forsake sin and take salvation by faith, with another trial and another probation in which Adam's sons and daughters now live to prove whether they will return to allegiance to God.

The guilt of Adam's descendants in every age was laid upon Christ, who stood as their substitute and surety. He bore as sin-bearer the sin of the whole world, with its iniquity upon Him, feeling keenly its sinfulness and shame. He bore the curse of the law and endured judgment and punishment for sin, even the wrath of God against transgression, to redeem humanity, defeat death's dominion, and open the way to Paradise and immortal life. On the cross He experienced to the fullest what man experiences striving against sin, tortured by horror of great darkness and the fierce temptation that He was forsaken by God lest He swerve from uprightness, and realizing how bad man becomes by yielding to sin and the terrible consequence of breaking God's law.

Only Christ could make this acceptable atonement, for He is sinless and fully able to understand the gravity of human sin. He could make it because He is the Son of God who created man, where even the life of an angel could not be accepted as a sacrifice for transgression of the law. No angel could remove sin or restore humanity, but Christ bore the punishment so that people could be restored and escape eternal death, and Adam's transgression which brought loss, wretchedness and death is met by Christ as the only hope of restoration to God's favor, whose sacrifice brings life and immortality.

In wonderful pitying love God did not leave men to perish in fallen condition after Adam transgressed the Father's express commands and His law, lost the divine favor, destroyed his own happiness, forfeited all right to heaven, put the whole family under Satan's claim, and plunged the race into hopeless misery and despair separated from God. He gave His well-beloved Son for their salvation, who laid aside His royal robe and crown, left the royal courts, clothed His divinity with humanity and was born as a babe in Bethlehem to bring human beings under His sway so they would not follow Adam's example. He took humanity's sinful, fallen nature while remaining pure and undefiled without taint of sin, as the express image of the Father's person become man's Advocate and Redeemer, and with divinity and humanity combined He reaches the race with His human arm while His divine arm grasps the Infinite, His name the link uniting man to God and God to man. He came not to destroy the law but to honor it and give dignity to it, opening His bosom to suffer for the transgression and paying the debt for past transgressions as man's accepted sacrifice, reconciling man to the Father and bringing him back to His law, so that it is through doing the commandments that man comes to God through Christ. Because transgression had spread the belief that keeping God's law is impossible, He took human nature and joined the human and the divine in Himself, giving men probation and placing them on trial to teach obedience in His own nature and to elevate humanity in moral value with God, revealing God's character through selfless goodness.

Adam's fall dishonored God's government and brought the law under violation so that the penalty of transgression was due, and justice required the penalty to be paid. The Son of God stepped in and pledged His own life as the penalty for that transgression to give man another trial, and He clothed His divinity with humanity and died because God's law was so sacred and immutable that not one jot or tittle of it could be changed to meet man in his fallen condition. That provision did not abolish God's law to give man an unconditional pardon, for the Father does not set forth benevolence at the expense of justice or set aside the principles of righteousness, which would exalt the sinner in impenitence and sin and encourage transgression instead of abating it. By His death He made it possible for man to be restored to the favor that Adam lost and to Eden lost for Adam and Eve, revealing the justice of God.

He gave Himself as a ransom for the world, a sinless offering who was both priest and victim, able to lay down His life and take it up again, and His atonement secured the covenant of grace and opened its mercy and love to sinners. As representative of the fallen race He passed over the same ground on which Adam stumbled and fell, and by a life of perfect obedience to God's law He redeemed man from the penalty of Adam's disgraceful fall. When Adam sinned men sold themselves to the enemy of all righteousness and became unable to redeem themselves or do any good thing of themselves, so Christ at that fall offered to stand as man's substitute and surety to provide a way for the guilty race to return to loyalty, taking humanity and living the example humanity must live to secure the heavenly reward. By bearing the penalty of the law He gives the sinner another chance and a second trial and opens a way to be reinstated in God's favor, bearing the penalty of past transgressions and by imparting His own righteousness making it possible for man to keep God's holy law. Without swerving from allegiance He met the temptations that beset man and overcame every temptation, making His righteousness distinctly apparent, and He will never become a party to sin, for His blood avails only for those who return to allegiance to God and obey the law they have violated, refusing any hope that sinners can be saved in their sins.

Christ Overcame Where Adam Failed

Christ stood in Adam's place and took the place of fallen Adam, entering the conflict with Satan and passing over the same ground on which Adam stumbled and fell. By a life of perfect obedience He redeemed Adam's disgraceful failure and fall and regained what was lost through transgression. As the figure foreshadowed, He bore the test in Eden that Adam failed to endure and overcame on behalf of fallen humanity, coming off conqueror against Satan approaching as an angel of light. With divinity and humanity combined He could reach the race with a human arm while His divine arm grasped the Infinite, becoming the link uniting man to God and God to man. He saw humanity under Satan's claim and gave His life so that men would not follow Adam's example but be placed on probation and taught obedience.

The conditions were unequal, for the first Adam was in every way more favorably situated than Christ. Adam was tempted in the strength and perfection of unfallen humanity, furnished with a holy, sinless, pure, undefiled nature and abundantly supplied in Eden where everything was pure with fruits, flowers, and beautiful lofty trees, yet he fell under the smallest test of loyalty over the tree of knowledge when Satan insinuated doubts of God's wisdom and accused the heavenly Father and Sovereign of selfishness. Christ was placed in a much less favorable position in the midst of sinners under intensely subtle and misleading influences, taking the infirmities of degenerate humanity after four thousand years of declining physical, mental, and moral strength from generations of sin and decline. He took human nature with the race's infirmities and degeneracy yet knew no sin, in order to rescue men from degradation.

He began the work of redemption where Adam's ruin began, at the point of appetite, facing temptation there and overcoming Satan. He met the wily foe who caused Adam and Eve's fall, passed over the three leading temptations whereby man is beset, and was tempted in all points as man is tempted and as man will be tempted. His long fast in the wilderness in single-handed contention with the prince of the powers of darkness, watched with intense interest by angels, was the contest on which man's salvation hung to decide whether Satan or the Redeemer would conquer, and He endured the cross to the fullest as well. He came in human nature over the same ground where Adam fell and met a most powerful series of temptations, standing firm where Adam failed to save all who would receive Him.

Unlike Adam who believed Satan's lie, yielded to a small temptation, fell from integrity, opened the floodgates of woe, and became Satan's bondslave, Christ did not yield to the tempter or become his bondslave. Though both were free moral agents held responsible for conduct, the first Adam misused freedom, allowed appetite to overcome him, disobeyed, lost innocence and God's favor, and by his own choice became a sinner separated from God, while the second Adam resisted every temptation to sin, maintained His innocence, and was ever sinless. He had no evil propensity and did not yield on a single point, but held fast to God and His word under trial and gave no response to Satan's temptations. Satan overcame the first Adam by deception, but he did not overcome Christ on any point.

His victory was by the divine nature combined with the human, and every step was taken in full, entire dependence upon God. He endured every test that man will ever be called to endure and met all the temptations of human life-experience, Himself traveling the path in which He calls followers to walk in self-denial and daily cross-bearing. Had He transgressed the law of God in one particular He would have been a sinner and His offering would have been a failure, but the enemy did not overcome Him on a single point. He overcame the world and grants him that overcomes to sit with Him in His throne even as He overcame and sits with His Father in His throne, so that by that same power every son and daughter of Adam taking hold of the crucified and risen Saviour can be safe, need not go into iniquity, and can come off more than conquerors.

Restoration and Life of Obedience

By bearing the penalty of the law Christ gives the sinner another chance, a second trial and probation, bearing past transgression and imparting His own righteousness so that keeping God's holy law becomes possible and reinstatement in favor is opened. After Adam and Eve came under bondage to the law under sentence of death, He stood in Adam's place as propitiation, taking the penalty upon Himself and thereby securing for Adam another trial with the privileges and opportunities of a free man to exercise God-given power of choice, postponing arraignment to the bar of God in the judgment. The race was saved from immediate death, Adam and Eve received a period of probation to return to allegiance, and their posterity were included in the plan, Christ acting for God toward humanity and taking human nature without its sinfulness to become its head and mediator. His doing all does not remove man's part, for His blood avails only for those who return to allegiance and obey the violated law, and it is through doing the commandments that man comes to God through Him, Christ never becoming a party to sin. On the banks of Jordan, when the Father declared Him beloved Son in whom He was well pleased and sent the Spirit as a dove to enshroud Him, heaven was opened to man and heaven and earth were united again, God accepting Him as representative and head.

He passed over the same ground where Adam fell, was tested as all are tested, withstood every temptation of the wily foe, and by victory placed the human family on vantage ground with God where through the merits of the crucified and risen Saviour people can overcome. He came to give the principles of truth and teach how to obey them, to provide the way of escape for a race ruined, sold to the enemy, unable to redeem itself and able of itself to do no good, meeting without swerving the temptations that beset man after offering at the fall to stand as substitute and surety for return to loyalty. Those redeemed are bought with a price by humiliation and suffering from the power of the enemy, and on that vantage ground through obedience they may win back what Adam lost through disobedience, glorifying God in body and spirit which are His with His peace dwelling in hearts and thankfulness for blessing. By following His example every father and mother would leave children an example of steadfast purity and righteousness, so the race would improve rather than deteriorate and the earth now a desert of sin would become as Eden.

He came to recover for humanity what Adam lost, and as death came through Adam so life is imparted through His righteousness, possessed because of His righteousness and lived by faith in the Son of God, who was made sin that men may be made the righteousness of God in Him. God gave Jesus to reverse the inheritance of disobedience, guilt and death received from Adam by restoring the moral image of God in man and reshaping character, redeeming humanity from the suffering resulting from the fall and making eternal life possible through His strength. That life makes men partakers with Christ of the divine nature, with promise of eternal life that never becomes extinct, bringing life and immortality to light and recovering forfeited dominion. Regaining what was lost requires thorough transformation of soul, body and spirit through Christ, and even as Adam had to accept Him as substitute to be elevated, so man is elevated through Him.

The fall called for the grace of God to appear in behalf of sinners, and without the fall its meaning would never have been learned. Grace is God's favor shown to undeserving, utterly unworthy sinful human beings who did not seek it but were sought by it, given not because they are worthy but because they are utterly unworthy, so that human need itself is the qualification for receiving it. Sinless angels who obey all God's commands and have never sinned are loved by God but are not given grace and know nothing of it, because they have never needed it.

By overcoming where Adam failed He answered Satan's declaration after Adam's disobedience that no man could keep God's law and his claim of the whole race under his control, revealing to the world that men could keep it. He began redemption where ruin began at appetite, passed over the three leading temptations whereby man is beset, met Satan approaching as an angel of light, stood against him and came off conqueror, His victory by the divine nature combined with the human. As Elder Brother with intense interest in human beings, bearing the sin of the whole world and feeling keenly its sinfulness and shame, He proved that human beings can live sinless lives through the power of God. By that same power every son and daughter of Adam can be safe, need not go into iniquity, and can come off more than conquerors by taking hold of the crucified and risen Saviour, relying on Him and cooperating with divine influence to overcome temptation and making His righteousness distinctly apparent, refusing any hope of being saved in sins.

The contrast calls for entire consecration to God in sanctification of soul, body and spirit, for the disobedience that brought guilt and sorrow and led the Son to leave the royal courts for insult, rejection and crucifixion reveals infinite expense and warns against any disobedience. He endured every test man will ever be called to endure and met all the temptations of human life-experience, traveling the path in which He calls followers to walk in self-denial and daily cross-bearing, and he who is at last crowned conqueror must depend upon Deity at every step as Christ did in full, entire dependence upon God. Looking to Him lifted up, believing, keeping eyes fixed on Him and moving steadily forward in the path He marked out, the redeemed glorify God in body and spirit, love every human being, and leave children an example of purity so the race improves and the desert becomes as Eden. To excuse failure by pleading Adam's sin and claiming no blame casts reproach upon God and denies the sufficiency of the perfect and complete Calvary provision with its whole Saviour and sufficient grace to work away natural defects and advance in the divine life, while partial observance such as of the Sabbath contradicts profession and causes sinners to lose faith.