War In Your Heart # 54

Christ Our Provision (continued)

In Adam - the Ruin of the Race (continued)

Adam sinned, the sin of disobedience. Adam willfully transgressed God's law. His sin constituted spiritual anarchy. The essence of it was self-will as opposed to God's will, which brought immediate, terrible consequences upon himself. Sin entered into the sinless being and became the very root of his nature, and so he became a sinner. Sin abounded (Romans 5:20), permeated his whole being, spirit, soul and body, polluting every part. Sin reigned (Romans 5:21), taking possession and control of his whole being, thus establishing a ruthless dictatorship, which made Adam sin's bondslave. Sin became the governing, dominating principle in Adam's life. Sin dispossessed, displaced, and dethroned God in the life of His first man.

Death was the immediate consequence of sin, as God had said it would be (Romans 5:12).

Sin entered into the human spirit, the seat of God-consciousness, and death ensued. Sin had shut off access to and fellowship with God. "Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God" because of fear inwrought by the sense of guilt and shame. Being alive to sin, they became dead to God. Sin had put their whole self in reverse.

Genesis 5 is the first cemetery in human history, naming the family lot of Adam's immediate descendants down to Noah. There is a tragic similarity in the epitaphs on the tombstones, for which Adam set the pattern (Genesis 5:5).

Eight times the sad refrain "he died" is reiterated. In the midst of this darkness of death there is one glorious sunburst: "And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him," sweetly symbolic of those who will escape death by translation at the Lord's coming for His own. If spiritual death goes beyond the time of physical death it terminates in the second death, which means eternal separation from God in hell (Revelation 20:14).

Condemnation was the inevitable consequences of sin. (Roman 5:16).

God must pass sentence upon Adam in respect to his lawlessness. He must declare him guilty and treat him accordingly. So God condemns him as a guilty sinner and casts him out of His presence. The judgment of God's wrath is the finality of Adam's sin (Romans 5:18).

God hates sin and can manifest nothing but wrath against it. Adam's sin was resistance to God's authority; rebellion against God's government; outright lawlessness. As such it affected God's personal relationship to man; His government relationship to the universe; even His own personal character.

What would God's attitude be toward Adam's sin? Would it be one of leniency or severity? Would He pass over or punish it? If He failed to deal adequately with this flagrant disobedience, how would He be able to maintain order through obedience to law? As the moral Governor of the universe, He must judge and punish sin. Otherwise His holy, sin-hating nature would deny itself.

~Ruth Paxson~

(continued with # 55)