Romans 5:12-21

12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:

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

14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come.

15 But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many.

16 And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift: for the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification.

17 For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.)

(12.) The "one man" here is Adam. God told Adam not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,(Gen 2:16,17). The day they ate of the tree, (Gen 3:1-10), they died spiritually. Death is a condition of separation, not a ceasing to exist. They became separated from God, and hid from Him. As Adam’s children, we are born sinners like him, spiritually dead and "alienated from the life of God." (Eph 2:1-3 & 4:17,18) A human sin nature can only sin, (Rom 7:18; 8:7,8; Jer 13:23) and "the wages of sin is death"(Rom 6:23). So all men are born spiritually dead, (Col 2:13), die physically (Heb 9:27), and face eternal death in the lake of fire. (Rev 20:14,15).

(13. & 14.) Adam had a direct command from God. Thousands of years later, when God’s law was given to Israel, they had direct commandments too. But what about the people in between? They "had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression", in other words, they did not disobey a direct command. They did the same evil things, but were not charged with them because there was no law against their deeds (Rom 4:15). "Nevertheless death reigned", meaning they all died. Sin corrupts and destroys, and always ends in death. That’s called the "the law of sin and death" in Rom 8:2.

Notice how Paul divides time. "From Adam to Moses" is before the law, and from Moses to Paul is under the law. Now we live while the law is temporarily abolished (Eph 2:15). After our age, the law will be fulfilled in the kingdom on the earth, (Mat 5:17-19; Heb 8:8-13).

(15.) Now Paul begins to compare the effect of what Adam did, with what Christ did. Adam’s one sin brought death to many, but Christ freely gives much more to those who believe in Him than Adam lost.

(16.) It only took one sin for condemnation to pass on all of Adam’s race. But the free gift of Christ justifies the many, many sins of all those who believe in Him.

(17.) Life will reign much more in those who receive Christ’s gift of righteousness, than death reigned because of Adam’s offence. In other words, Christ’s death and resurrection accomplished more than Adam’s sin cost. Through the cross, God will not only rule the earth as He told Adam to do, (Gen 1:28; Zech 14:9,16), but He will reconcile the heavens too, by filling them with us, the body of Christ. (Eph 1:20-23; 2:6; Col 1:20)

Two thoughts come from verse 12. We considered verses 13-17 which are in brackets. Now let’s consider verse 12 with 18 and 19.

12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned: ..............

18 Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.

19 For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.

(18.) All Adam’s decedents inherited his sinful nature and so come under judgment and are condemned. But Jesus is 100% righteous and offers to freely give His righteousness and eternal life to any and all men.

(19.) Whose actions made us sinners? our own or Adam’s? God never expects us to make up for Adam’s disobedience. We can’t. Christ did that for us. He was "obedient unto death, even the death of the cross" (Phil 2:8; Mat 26:39,42)

The issue is not your personal behavior, or mine. The question is; are you in Adam? or are you in Christ? If you are in Adam, you are under sin and condemnation. If you are in Christ, you are in His righteousness and eternal life. Do you get the idea that the human race is made up of two men, Adam and Christ? Everyone who ever lives is in either one or the other. All we need to do is choose which side we want to be on. Adam dies. Christ gives life. We choose.

"For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." (I Cor 15:21-22,45-49)

20 Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound:

21 That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.

(20.) The law was given to show sin and to make people accountable, (Gal 3:19; Rom 3:19,20; Deut 31:26) It made sin abound by making the extent of sin evident. But regardless of how much man sinned, Christ’s gift of justification by grace is more than enough to cover it.

(21.) . "Sin hath reigned unto death" means that sin ruled mankind and leads to death. But now that Christ has died in our stead for those sins, He freely gives believers His righteousness as a gift, by grace. Righteousness brings eternal life. Then we are no longer spiritually dead, (Eph 2:1,5), no longer face the eternal second death, (Rev 21:8), and we will be raised from physical death at the I Thes 4:13-18 event. (Heb 2:14,15) All of this is by God’s kindness that we don’t deserve. That’s called grace! At the cross, God showed more grace than there was sin, so now grace reigns instead of sin.

M. Dent

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