Thank You Lord For Not Ending With Adam!

Realizing that the sinful nature is what is passed down to us starting in Adam all the way through our parents we get a basic understanding of the concept of original sin. I know that some out there would say that original sin is way more intricate than this, but let us keep in mind that were ought not overlook the simplicity of the Gospel. Keeping that concept in mind let us refresh ourselves on the scriptures we are studying. Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and 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. Romans 5:12-14

The Bible gives a grand and glorious definition of what sin is. The King James Version says it like this. Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law. 1 John 3:4 While the English Standard Version, my personal favorite, says it like this. Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. 1 John 3:4 On the surface these translations of the Bible may seem to be saying something different. Yet the truth is that they looking at the truth from a different angle. Sin is transgression, or breaking of the law. Yet sin is also lawlessness, which some would say is also breaking the law, yet it is really being without the law. Now for the really brain hurting part, which is looking at the Greek. The Greek word that John is using in 1 John 3:4 to say what sin is happens to be ἀνομία (anomia). It actually means the condition of without law because of ignorance of it, or because of violating it.

You see sin is breaking God’s law even if we haven’t ever realized that it was His law because we had no knowledge of Him. Paul affirms this basic truth because he says that sin was indeed in the world before the law was given. However it was not counted as sin because there was no law. Yet somehow death reigned from Adam to Moses, whom the Law was given through. Death reigned even for those who broke the law in ignorance of it, even if they were not directly rebelling against a command that God had given them the same way Adam did. The big question on your mind now might be something like this: How can that be, if sin was not counted before the law?

It is essential to remember that Paul said that none are without excuse because God’s Law is written on the conscience. Romans 2:15 The original sin was eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The knowledge of good and evil – wow doesn’t that sound like our conscience. Isn’t our consciences job to tell us good and evil? Our conscience is direct proof of original sin, that is present in each and every person regardless of whether they want it to be or not. Now thanks be to God that He did not let it end with Adam, for Adam was of a type of the one who was to come. As “original sin” entered through Adam, and death with it, we will soon learn that “original righteousness” and life with it entered through one man as well – the man Christ Jesus!

Dear Lord,
Thank you that you did not quit with Adam, but thank you that you sent your Son. God I thank you for helping me to understand original sin, and ask you to make that truth paramount in my life, for by understanding how sin came through one man I might better be able to understand how righteousness also came through one man, namely Jesus.