Have you ever looked at the world - what’s going on in places like Syria or Washington or Merced - or stuff - drama - going on at school or work or at home - in your marriage or with the kids.  Have you ever looked at things and asked, “How did we get here?”  “How could things have gotten this bad?”  Ever ask that?

Or this:  “Is there any way out of this mess?”  “Any hope?”

As we’ve been Roaming Through Romans we’ve been exploring Paul’s theme:  The relevancy of the gospel to our lives.  Where it is that the saving transforming power of the gospel touches our lives and what that means for each one of us.

John Stott made the following statement:

“What keeps people away from Christ more than anything else is their inability to see their own need for him or their unwillingness to admit it.  Jesus himself put it this way:  ‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.  I have not come to call the righteous, but the sinners’ (Mark 2:17).  We only go to a doctor when we admit that we are ill and we can’t cure ourselves.  In the same way, we only go to Christ when we admit we are guilty sinners and we realize that we can’t save ourselves.” (1) 

Someone has said someplace saying...  “A man’s greatest need is to know what is his greatest need.”

Some people may say that the gospel is out-dated - with all that talk about sin and repentance and Jesus.  Some in the church may get distracted from the gospel - maybe because we’re focused on political or social issues or just distracted by busyness and doing the stuff of life.  But the bottom line reality is that the gospel is crucial for our lives.  Essential.  Relevant.  Because our bottom line need that transcends all of life - in all that we search for - long for - are desperate for - at the heart level - the essential deepest need of our lives can only be met by God.

The way out - the remedy - God’s answer to our dilemma - is the message of the gospel.  The way to get right with God and live in that rightness. 

5:12-21 - the passage we’re focused on this morning - is Paul giving us the bottom line behind why the gospel is essential - totally relevant - crucial for us to respond to.  What’s here in these verses is the very basis of everything else Paul writes.

Let’s jump into Paul.  Please join with me - let’s read verses 12 to 14 together:  Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because of 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.

There’s a lot here for us to unpack.

Compressing what Paul writes verses 12 to 14 focus on The Reign of Death.

Paul gives us four truths for us to grab on to.

First truth - in verse 12:  “Sin came into the world through one man” - Adam.

The account of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden is familiar to us.  Yes?  Man was created to enjoy an intimate relationship with God - an abundant  life of opportunity - a deep communion with others - and the freedom to glorify God with our lives.  Adam was placed in a beautiful garden that supplied all of his physical needs.

In that garden God gave one restriction that Adam was to obey.  We’ve memorized this.  “Adam, don’t eat the - what?  fruit.”  Stay away from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Painfully - we know how this goes.  Adam rebelled against God with his eyes wide open - knowing exactly what he was doing - a deliberate act of disobedience.

The result is that sin enters the world of men.  Humanity becomes a race that has fallen - turned away - from God.  We live in sin.

Second truth - verse 12:  “And death through sin”  Death comes into the world through sin.  Let’s make sure we’re clear on what death is.

Scripture speaks of two deaths.  Death number one is physical.  Meaning all of us have a reservation in the Marble Orchard.  Death and taxes.  Death number two is what Scripture calls the “second death” - which comes after our physical death - meaning forever death.

Jesus said, “Don’t be afraid of those who want to kill your body; they cannot touch your soul.  Fear only God, who can destroy both soul and body in hell.”  (Matthew 10:28 TNLT)

Flipping forward to Revelation 20 - and what’s there is a description of a lake not made of water but eternal fire - sulfuric gas - acrid steam - foul odor - a place of eternal burning and choking.  Torment without relief.  That’s where Satan ends up.  (Revelation 20:10-15) 

The Bible tells us that when judgment comes there isn’t going to be any place to hide from judgment.  We’re going to be judged by what we’ve done before our physical death - before we leave this life - death #1.  And if we’re standing there trusting in our own righteousness - trusting in our own whit, wisdom, and works - our own wile and guile - to get us into heaven - into eternal life with God - we’re gonna be burnt toast.   

Those who die without Jesus as their Savior end up where Satan ends up - unending weeping - sorrow - gnashing of teeth - burning forever.  That’s the death that Paul warns is the consequence of sin.  Death #2 is infinitely worse that death #1.

A significant amount of Paul’s teaching up to this point in Romans has been Paul describing what our sin earns for us.  Paul writing about God’s coming judgment and condemnation and wrath - all associated with physical death and what comes after that.  Showing us in gruesome detail our need for God. 

Truth number three - verse 12:  “So death spread to all men” - all of us.

Have you ever asked yourself, “If Adam hadn’t sinned would he have died?” - death number one - physical.  Maybe you’ve never asked yourself that question.  Now you’ve got something to lose sleep over tonight.

There are people who endlessly debate that.  But it’s kind of not the point here. 

Paul’s point is really about the second death - spiritual.  That everyone of us here - when were born - we’re born with a spiritual death #2 sentence ready to be applied to our lives.  Because we all are descendants of Adam.  Adam representing us when he sinned.  We all live in the consequences of that sin.

Some people will say, “Well, that’s just unfair.”  Or, “I don’t chose to believe that.”  Which is understandable.  Adam was dweeb when he sinned.  Why should I have to pay the penalty for that?

There’s a story of a lumberjack named Sam.  Every day Sam went out and chopped down trees.  Every time the foreman came by he would hear Sam saying, “Ohh, Adam!  Ohh, Adam!  Ohh, Adam!”

One day the foreman asked, “Why do you moan ‘Ohh, Adam!’ every time you’re out here chopping trees?”

Sam answered, “Because if Adam hadn’t sinned, I wouldn’t have to do this backbreaking work, which is part of the curse.”

So the foreman said to Sam, “Come with me.”  He took Sam to his palatial home with a tennis court, swimming pool, maid, and butler.  He told Sam,  “All this is yours.  You never have to complain again.  I give all of it to you, a perfect environment.”  Sam couldn’t believe it.

The foreman said, “Now you can have everything you’ve ever wanted, all the time.  The only thing you mustn’t do is touch a little box sitting on the dining room table. Whatever you do don’t touch it!”

From then on Sam played tennis every day, he swam, he had his friends over, but after a while he got a little bored.  There was only one thing in the house he didn’t know about - that little box on the dining room table.

For days he would walk by, checking out the box, but then he would remind himself, “You can’t touch it.  Don’t touch it.”

Day after day he was tempted to look.  One day he finally gave in. “I’ve got to find out what’s in that box!”  He went over and opened the box and out flew a little moth.  He tried to catch it, but he couldn’t.

When the foreman came home he found the moth had escaped.  He immediately sent Sam back to the forest to chop trees.  The next day the foreman heard Sam groaning, “Ohh, Sam!  Ohh, Sam!  Ohhh, Sam!”  (2)

Point being that every day of our lives - whether we think Adam was a dweeb or not - every day of our lives we confirm that Adam as our representative did what we would have done.  We don’t always like what our elected representatives do either.  But in Adam’s case we confirm that he represented us well. 

We’re sinners because of the choice made by Adam for all of us and by the choices each one of us - every  man, women, and child - by the choice each one of us makes individually to sin we prove that Adam made the right choice as our representative.  We all live with this death sentence hanging over our heads.  Sin and death flow in our race - in us.

Grab Paul’s point:  Because sin is universal - death is universal - death reigns.  Every one of us is born into the reign of death.

Truth number four - verse 13:  Death reigns over all of us.  “for sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law.” 

“Counted” is a word that can be easily confusing.  What does Paul mean by “counted”?

Let’s say we have a credit card.  All month long we’re out shopping.  Having a good old time.  Works great.  We go into a store.  Choose something to buy.  Swipe the card and its ours.  Shoes.  T.V.  Computer.  IPad.  Ferrari.  Whatever.  It’s the best thing since sliced bread.  Swipe it and its ours.

We have no clue what all this costs.  We don’t care.  As long as we can go on swiping and doing what we want - who cares?

At some point down the road the credit card company sends us a bill.  Instant sticker shock.  Suddenly we’re brought face to face with the reality of how we’ve been living. 

Before we got the bill we were still racking up debt.  But now all that is “counted” - as Paul uses the word- we’re shown the reality of our debt.

That’s the law.  The law is like getting the bill.  It’s the written down reality check - the description - of what we owe for how we’ve been living our lives in sin.

Which is the reality behind what Paul writes in verse 14:  Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses,

Humanity looks at our situation and concludes that the answer is for us to work harder at trying to be good - more humane towards each other.  We can do this.  Which is a conclusion that prompts the question:  “How’s that going?”

There are occasional bright spots.  But let’s be honest - way too often we’ve messed up pretty bad.  Thousands of years of human history and we’d think we’d have gotten somewhere.  Pick just about any place in the world and something bad is going on.  When has there ever been a time when people haven’t been abusing or killing each other?

Charles Spurgeon - the great preacher - shared in one of his sermons - about spending some time down in a hut in Italy.  When he went into the hut he noticed that the floor was very dirty - dirtier than any floor he’d ever seen in his life.

After he had lived there a day or two he couldn’t stand it any longer so he hired a cleaning lady to clean the floor.  This woman scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed.  But, the more she scrubbed the floor the dirtier it got.

Finally Spurgeon got down on his own at floor level and investigated what was going on.  He discovered that there wasn’t any floor.  There was nothing but dirt. (3)

With all of our philosophies and peace treaties and self-help programs and religious ideals and politically correct intentions and laws and everything else man - and each one of us has tried - when we get down to the bottom of things - conclude what we want - bottom line:  we cannot get past our own sin and death.

When God’s word says, “death reigns” - we understand that because of the world we live in. 

These are the core issues of our hearts today - what drives people to suicide - to children killing children - to wars - to all of the horrible things we think about ourselves and the terrible things we do to each other. 

Death drives us to fear and uncertainty.  Death tempts us to think of our lives as futile and meaningless.  Death leads the wealthiest and greatest of mankind to look upon their lives with despair.

Death reigns in disease and poverty and failure and divorce and broken homes and addictions and defeat and on and on and on.

Beyond the grave is judgment - condemnation - wrath.

The account of Adam and Eve in Genesis holds our attention because every day we relive it in our lives - the failure - the casting out - separation from God - the longing to return to paradise.  We despair because there’s nothing we - in and of ourselves - nothing we can do to return.  We’re bound by death - physical - eternal.

At the core of it all is our sin - Adam’s - ours.  It is the bottom line of how we have gotten ourselves into this mess.

Let’s go on.  Verses 15 to 17 - thankfully focus on The Reign of Life. 

Let’s read these together:  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.  For if, because of one man’s trespass, death reigned 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.

Three truths.  First  truth:  Life in Christ is much more than death.

Paul writes in verse 15:  “For if many died through one man’s trespass - meaning because of Adam’s sin we are all under the reign of death - much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many.”

In contrast to Adam’s sin which leads the many - us - to death - is the death of Jesus Christ - which opens up the possibility for the many - us - to life.

Jesus takes the sins of the world - by a choice to obey the will of God not a choice of disobedience like Adam's - Jesus takes the sins of the world  - our sins - pays the penalty for them - death in our place - endures the ridicule of mankind and the hatred of Satan and his minions on the cross - is put to death - and forever buried - dispatched by the people - the religious and political leadership of that day - as we would have if we would have been there.  And yet - innocently enduring the worst of this world - Jesus didn’t stay dead. 

Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15:  “The sting of death is sin…  Then Paul goes on:  But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Corinthians 15:56,57)

Jesus has triumphed over death - obliterated its authority and power forever.  The life He offers us is greater than the reign of death.  It is victorious over death.

Paul writes - comparing death and life - Paul uses the words “much more.”  Whatever death is, the life Jesus offers to us is “much more.”

The phrase in Greek has the idea of much more in value - much more in time - much more in content - exceedingly more - whatever way we slice it - with whatever perspective we may view it - with whatever needs we may come to it - as disastrous and terminal as death is - life in Christ is to the extreme the opposite.

Jesus said that He came to give us life in abundance - superlative life - life above and beyond anything we can process today.  (John 10:10)

Which one of us really “gets” Hell?  Who here really understands the depth of it?  Which of us “gets” Heaven?  The heights of it?  What it means to live abundantly with God?  I don’t.  Not until we get there - to Heaven.  And even then - it’ll take eternity and we still probably won’t get it.

Whatever death is  - the life God offers us in Jesus is “much more.”

Second truth about life in Christ:  Life in Christ comes by God’s grace.  Grace is huge.  God's love is given through grace - the basis of our life in Christ.  The life God offers us is totally undeserved.

Remember Hosea?  We know how this goes.  Right?  God comes to the prophet Hosea and commands Hosea to marry a prostitute and have children by her.  Hosea marries Gomer - has 3 children by her - and then she abandons him and the family for another man.  Harsh reality. 

In the midst of all this - God - shockingly - tells Hosea - Hosea 3:1 - “Go again, love her again, even as the Lord loves the sons of Israel, though they turn to other gods.”  And so, Hosea goes and pays money - 15 shekels of silver and a homer and a half of barley - to buy back his wife who’s now working as a prostitute.  (Hosea 3:1,2)

When you think about Hosea doing that doesn’t it rock your boat just a tad?  Gomer must have broken Hosea’s heart.  Humiliated him.  Shamed him.  The one that he’s trusted with the deepest intimacies of his heart has made him the public joke of the town.  And yet, he loves her.  Goes and buys his beloved wife back from the bondage of her sin.  

All that is picture of what?  God’s love for the people of Israel that have prostituted themselves with other gods.  Such is God’s grace towards us who are dead in our sins.  We who have lived in disobedience.  We who have been unfaithful - even living in spiritual adultery - living captive to the reign of death..

That’s God’s grace - the expression of His love.  We deserve death.  We’re born into it.  We’re victims of it.  It reigns over us regardless of if we choose to acknowledge it or not.  But God gives to us what we do not deserve - what we could never earn - His love - His grace - His Son who dies horribly rejected on a cross in our place - paying our penalty for our sins - taking our death sentence upon Himself - to offer us life - a restored relationship with God.  

Regardless of the greatness of our sin - the frequency of our sin - the depth of the disaster that we’ve made of our lives - or the arrogance we feel in our own self-righteousness - God offers to us by His undeserved abundant grace - His loving acceptance and forgiveness and restoration - now - and again and again and again - to live in the “much more” abundance of life in the resurrected Jesus Christ.

Third truth:  Life in Christ is a gift given freely by God.

There’s perhaps familiar story about a wealthy business man who wanted to get his mother something special for her birthday.  So he thought and researched and shopped and shopped and thought found a very special bird - extremely rare - very beautiful - very intelligent.  This bird could sing.  It could dance.  It could even talk.

So what if the bird cost $10,000.  He could just imagine the companionship the bird would provide for his mother.  He was so excited - overjoyed - to give his mother this great gift.  So he had the bird delivered to his mother on her birthday.

Later, he called her and asked her what she thought of the bird.  Mom told him, the bird was great.

“Mom.  You didn't eat the bird?  That was a very special bird.  It could sing.  It could dance.  It could talk.”

“Well,” she said, “Then it should have said something.”  Heard that?

It’s not the gift, it’s the - what?  thought that counts.” 

That’s what Paul means that God’s gift is freely given.  God gives without reservation.  Lavishly - without holding anything back.  The giving is not because of what God gets from us.  But God - by His undeserved love and grace giving what is incredible - beyond comprehension - the gift of life in Jesus.  His gift wrapped in the body and blood of Jesus offered joyously - freely - to each one of us.

Paul writes - in verse 17 - that the gift is “the free gift of righteousness.” 

Righteousness means being made right with God.  God restoring our relationship with Him.  Making it new so there’s nothing between us.  No issues where we have an unresolved conflict between us and God.

We need to think about the hugeness of that - and stay focused on that.  God freely supplying everything we need to be made right with Him.

God doesn’t have some kind of spiritual bucket list that He goes down checking off what we’ve accomplished in getting right with Him.  The gift is not up to us.  We don’t deserve it.  Never could.  We can’t earn it.  We can’t work for it.  Cleaning ourselves up before God will accept us.  We’re the one’s making lists.  Not God.

The gift contains everything we need to be made right with God.  We don’t need to look farther.  To the Koran or the Vedas or some other religion or philosophy or teaching.

Everything we need to know about salvation and being set free from the power of sin and the bondage to our sins and the consequences of our sin - the end point of eternal separation from God and eternal conscious punishment.  Everything we need in order to be removed from under the authority of Satan and his kingdom of sin and death and to be placed into God’s kingdom under God’s authority.  Its all there in the gift.

The gift comes with the power of the Holy Spirit - with everything we need to do life - to live out the life that God has created us and called us to.  Life with meaning and purpose that counts for today and eternity - even sharing the Gospel with others.  Life together in the Church.  God working in us and through us to restore our homes - our marriages - our relationships with others.

The gift comes with God supplying what we need - whatever that is - comfort - forgiveness - wisdom - joy - strength - physical - spiritual - God supplying what we need in the midst of life’s crud.  God Himself going through the drama of life with us.  God even blessing us so that we can encourage others as point them to Jesus as they go through their own drama.

Verses 18 to 21 focus on The Reign of Righteousness.  What it means to live right with God.

Let’s read these together:  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.

For 5 chapters Paul has been pounding away at the contrast between death and life.  The “therefore” in verse 18 is there because these verses are all of that in a nutshell. 

Let’s be clear.  There are only two opposing kingdoms at work in this world.  Satan’s reign of sin and death.  God’s reign of grace and life.  Everything else in life finds its source in either of these two kingdoms.  Everyone of us is in one or the other of these two kingdoms.  There is no in between.

Whatever philosophy we may espouse.  Whatever morality.  Whatever wisdom or knowledge.  Whatever our world view.  How we treat issues like abortion and euthanasia and poverty and wealth and sexuality and who we vote for and every element of life - marriage - parenting - how we approach education and work - even how we approach church and God is all grounded in one reign or the other.

Each of us is on one of two trajectories through life.

One trajectory leads away from God.  A trajectory of foolishness and lies - deception - delusion - all in opposition to God’s truth.  A trajectory that binds us in sin and self-destructive behavior that is degrading today and ultimately leads to eternal death.

The other trajectory is offered to us by the one true God of creation - infinite - all powerful - loving - who by His grace freely offers to us a righteous - made right - relationship with Him through Jesus that is abundant life today and leads to eternal life with Him forever.

That choice is what God - through Paul - is showing us here in Romans.  How we got here.  How we got into this hopeless misery apart from what God has created us for and called us to.  How we got into our bondage to the self-destruction of sin that tears at us and everything in our lives that sin touches. 

Adam - our representative chooses disobedience - sins.  The result is condemnation - death reigns - over every aspect of human life now and forever.  A reign that we are born into.  A trajectory that apart from Jesus we follow every day of our lives.  We are sinners - condemned.

Paul writes in verse 15 that “the free gift is not like the trespass.”  Adam’s epic failure that got us into all this.  Unlike the trespass - sin and so death - we’re not born into the gift - the reign of life.  We’re not victims of it.  It doesn’t impose itself on us - forcing us to accept its power over our lives. 

In verse 17 Paul writes that “those who receive” the gift “will reign in life through...Jesus Christ.”  Receiving means accepting - literally - seizing it - reaching out and grabbing the gift. 

God puts the gift on the table.  Its given.  Freely by grace.  With all that God offers to us.  It sits there whether we pick it up or not. 

If the gift if going to be of any value to us we need to receive it to ourselves.  To accept God’s gracious offer of life through Jesus.  The gift requires choice - to live within the reign of life instead of death. 

That is astounding to think about.  Isn’t it?  Based on what we see going on the world around us.  Maybe even in our own lives.  Maybe even a little hard to believe.  That God would offer us so much - something so radically different - so freely.  No fine print.  No strings attached.  Just receive the gift.

How do we live in the reign of God’s grace - His life and righteousness?

In Jesus - as recipients of God’s grace - we’re all recovering from bondage to the reign of sin and death.  We’re all recovering alcoholics and substance abusers.  Recovering prostitutes and addicts of porn.  Gluttons and gossips.  Haters and hypocrites.  Arrogant and proud.  Adulterers and…  well we are all self-focused sinners in need of grace.

To live in God’s reign of grace we need to stop trying to earn God’s grace and by faith accept what God by His grace has done for us.  None of us deserves to be here.  None of us is worthy.  All of us have messed up at least once in our lives.  Some of us are really good at messing up.  We’re here because of grace.

Maybe that means choosing to believe that God really does forgive you and choosing to let go of guilt and shame that’s not coming from God.  Maybe it means choosing to listen to what God says about you and not the people who try dump their crud on you.  Maybe it’s a choice to learn a new way of dealing with life - seeking God in prayer and study and fellowship and accountability and worship rather than in some addiction or behavior.  Ask God.  He’ll show you.

How do we live in the reign of God’s grace - His life and righteousness. 

If we get grace we’ll be gracious.  Those who know God’s grace extend God's grace to others.  We’re not end users of the gift. 

There are others around us who need grace.  Some are our siblings in Christ who need to be pointed at God Who is gracious.  Who need us to act with grace towards them.  Not condemnation.  Not judgment.  But grace. 

Some are outside these walls.  People God will bring us to this week.  How many people do we know who are living under the reign of death?  Whether they choose to acknowledge it or not.

Death reigns.  Jesus reigns.  Both are true whether we acknowledge them or not.  But, God is honest with us.  They do exist.  God’s offer is on the table.  Each of us has a choice.  Death or life?

Which reigns over you?

_________________________

1. John Stott, Romans - Intervarsity Press, 1994 - cited by Gary Vanderet, Man’s Descent and God’s Wrath, 03.14.1999

2. Shared in “A Tale of Two Heads” - a teaching on Romans 5:12-21 by Keith R. Krell - https://bible.org/seriespage/12-tale-two-heads-romans-512-21

3. Stedman, Ray, “To Reign in Life” - sermon on Romans 5:12-21

Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®  (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.  Used by permission.  All rights reserved.