All of Grace-Why?

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: 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.  For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.  (Romans 5:12, 18-19)

In the preceding verses Paul made one of his strongest arguments that our eternal salvation is all of God to be found in the New Testament.  In making this argument he asserted precisely the truth that caused his critics to misrepresent his teachings as appears in the first eight verses of the third chapter of Romans.  Although he dealt with the ethical issues of the doctrines of grace in the fourth chapter-and will do so emphatically in the sixth chapter-Paul here refuses to allow the critics and their straw man exaggerated misrepresentations of his teachings to drive him away from the truth of the gospel that he taught.  What is the necessity of holding so rigidly to the idea of grace alone for both the power and the agency or instrument of eternal salvation?  From Romans 5:12 to the end of the fifth chapter Paul will deal with this question quite specifically.  Can't man have just a little role to play in his salvation?  Even if God orchestrates his response so that God gets all the credit, can't man do something in the process of causing or bringing about his new birth?  Paul emphatically says no.  Our question is why.  In the lesson before us he gives the reasons.

Verses thirteen through seventeen in this chapter are set off by parenthesis.  A parenthetical expression is added in literary works to clarify or to provide added details or explanations to what has been said.  In this parenthesis Paul reasons with incredible emphasis and logical argumentation.  I intentionally quoted the lesson without the parenthesis.  As quoted, the lesson states the point that Paul intended.

Theologians sometimes refer to the features of this lesson under the term "federal headship."  What does this mean?  What is the theological significance of this idea?  Let's examine the lesson and see what Paul has in mind.

1.  …by one man sin entered into the world….  No great mystery here; the first three chapters of Genesis cover this historical event quite clearly.  I emphasize that these chapters cover historical events, not symbolic or figurative events.  Did God really create the material universe, or is the first chapter of Genesis a mere myth not to be taken either literally or seriously?  Hebrews 11:3 affirms that true Biblical faith embraces that God created the material universe.  This simple verse categorically rejects the ancient Gnostic and contemporary New Age philosophies that God despises all things material.  How could He despise them?  He created them with the repeated moral and aesthetic conclusion, "It was good." Periodically well meaning Bible students will attempt to compromise the Bible account of origins in a futile effort to evade the criticism of atheistic evolutionary claims by asserting that human beings existed for untold centuries before the first chapter of Genesis.  In this failed effort to satisfy unbelievers they deny-if not factually at least by implication and by a loose allegorical interpretation-the whole Bible account of origins.  In this allegorical view Adam and Eve were not real human beings at all, but merely mythical representations of human history.  Others will acknowledge them as real human beings, but never offer rational and reasonable explanations of the impact of Adam's and Eve's sin on humans prior to their existence. In this lesson Paul builds his whole theological lesson on the fact that Adam was as truly a real historical being as Jesus was.  He further makes the case that it was Adam's sin that introduced sin into the human race and, with it, the dreadful consequences of sin. Adam becomes the true representative of all humanity in this lesson.

2.  …and death by sin….  One wonders; in the case of the view that humans existed prior to Adam and Eve-were they sinless?  The inevitable consequence of sin is death.  In the parenthetical portion of this lesson Paul will expand this point to indicate that death reigned in the human race from Adam to Moses and the giving of the Law.  We normally associate death with the penalty for breaking God's Law, so how could death reign for centuries prior to the giving of the Law to Moses?  Paul here associates death with Adam and his sin, not with Mosaic law.  Around the fourth century an English monk, Pelagius, advocated that there was no inherent or "federal headship" impact from Adam's sin on subsequent humanity.  Logically he argued that the only impact of Adam's sin in the Garden of Eden was that he set a bad example for his offspring.  Are we then to conclude that the only impact of Jesus' Incarnation is that He set a good example for us?  Some of Pelagius' followers seem to have embraced this idea; perhaps Pelagius himself embraced it.  Paul's reasoning in this chapter categorically rejects such an idea.  The ratio of deaths to births universally from Adam's creation to our time has been a solid and uncompromising one hundred percent, a true one-to-one ratio.  Not a single human has evaded the logical implications of Adam's sin, death.  Death may come late as with many of the patriarchs in Genesis.  It may come early as with infants who die in infancy or-God forbid-who are killed by their parents prior to birth by abortion.  (If you doubt that abortion kills a real human being, I urge you to read Psalm 139 carefully.)  Why is death universal to the human family?  Paul asserts that it is so because sin is universal; we inherited it from Adam.  Adam's basic nature was altered by his decision to sin and walk away from God, and that corrupted DNA/moral nature was passed along to every single one of his offspring.

3.  …so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.  Paul emphasizes the universality of sin by the observable fact of universal death.  I do not believe in childhood innocence in terms of the nature possessed by infants.  If childhood innocence were true, based on Paul's reasoning in this lesson, infant death would be impossible.  Scripture clearly affirms a degree of behavioral innocence in infants, but it never affirms innocence of the nature possessed.  We are born with the same nature that we manifest in adulthood, including our moral fallenness and our inherent proclivity toward sin. …all have sinned likely refers to the inherited quality of sin that we derive from Adam, an inherent trait that eventually manifests itself in actual sinful conduct.
 
4.  Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation….  "Therefore" indicates that Paul is here reviewing and further explaining what he has already stated.  One man's sin, Adam's, brought judgment and the sentence of "Guilty as charged," the equivalent in the New Testament to the word "condemnation."  All subsequent humanity to Adam were specifically and directly impacted by what Adam did.  How could we read this lesson and reach any other conclusion?

5.  …even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.  So far Paul has focused tightly on Adam and the consequences of his sin.  Now he shifts from the implications of Adam's sin to Jesus and the implications of His Incarnation and righteousness.  And here we see the clear implications of this term "federal headship."  It is actually two distinct "federal headships," one in Adam and the other in Jesus.  The implications of Adam's headship bring the consequences of Adam's sin upon all of his offspring, all humanity.  There is no option.  There is no choice to be made.  It occurs in every single instance.  Every child born into "Adam's family" inherits the moral and spiritual state that Adam brought upon himself in his sin.  Not a single child born into the human family was given a choice as to whether or not he/she wished to embrace the Adam-condition.  They inherited it.  Adam's federal headship made it as certain as the child's human nature itself.  It became an integral part of our human nature when Adam chose to eat the forbidden fruit in the third chapter of Genesis.

But now let's shift our focus from Adam to Jesus.  Paul introduces Jesus and the implications of His "federal headship" with the simple "even so" comparison.  The rules by which we become members of Jesus' family and children of God who shall spend eternity with Him in heaven have an "even so" corollary with the implications of Adam's sin.

We become members of God's family in the Lord Jesus Christ by a "genetic" event no less than we became members of Adam's family by a similar natural genetic event.  We didn't volunteer to become a member of Adam's family.  Neither do we "volunteer" to become members of Jesus' family!  This point goes to the heart of Paul's teaching in Romans 5:6-11.

6.  For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.    "For as by…so by…."  Paul's comparison between Adam and Jesus are so emphatic as to defy misunderstanding.  This teaching confronts the whole paradigm of "decisional" salvation that prevails in contemporary Christianity.  Unless advocates of this view can make a compelling case that Scripture teaches that every human being at some time personally chooses to become a member of the human race, of Adam's family, they cannot harmonize their salvation teaching with their idea that the new birth, the beginning of eternal life in an individual, occurs because of a decision that they make.  The Greek word translated "made" in this verse (both instances) means to "constitute."  It refers to the essential constitution of a being, not to a mere peripheral feature.  What Adam did altered the essential "constitution," the essential nature of his offspring, of those whom he represented in federal headship.  Likewise, according to Paul, what Jesus did alters the essential constitution, the essential nature of those for whom He died.  It is not their decision or works that saves them; it is what Jesus did as their Savior, their new and spiritual "federal head."

So why must our salvation in Christ be all of grace and not in some degree by anything that we do?  Paul's reasoning concludes that our fallen and sinful standing in Adam renders any action on our part wholly impossible.  If we are ever to be moved from our identity in Adam's family to a new identity in Jesus' family, it must be by an act of God that bestows that familial relationship on us no less than our birth into the human family.

This truth gives powerful logical significance to the analogy of spiritual life that Jesus introduced in the third chapter of John's gospel during His conversation with Nicodemus, an analogy repeated several times throughout the New Testament by other inspired writers.

Two major deviations from this bedrock spiritual truth are rather common in theological circles in our time.  The first deviation openly advocates salvation by works, by some form of human effort or another.  You either perform these works, or you will not be saved.

The second deviation is more subtle, but also more insidious because it presents itself as advocating that salvation is all of God.  It asserts that salvation is all of God, but it then asserts that unless a person clearly exhibits a certain degree of behavioral change in his conduct he isn't really saved at all.  Although advocates of this view are reluctant to assign a specific degree of behavioral change to reach their conclusion that a person is saved (I find it absurdly egotistical that they consider themselves judges of a person's eternal state with God, a point that Scripture will not permit.), they tend to assign the same behavioral characteristics to their conclusion regarding a person's being saved or not that advocates of salvation by works assign to their theological system.  The rather ironic result is that both errant systems of salvation end up with exactly the same number of folks being saved!  Perhaps, despite a convincing amount of window dressing, both systems are far more similar than advocates of either system care to acknowledge.

Advocates of this second errant system typically obsess about "assurance of salvation."  Followers of this theological error are constantly reminded that they must seek perpetual assurances of their salvation, or perhaps they are not really saved at all.  Christianity degenerates into a monstrous and self-serving "It is all about me and my assurance of my salvation" humanistic philosophy.  Biblical assurance of salvation builds on self-denial, not self-obsession!  The more we deny self and make our Christian life about serving God by serving others the more spiritual blessings we realize, including assurance of our salvation.  The more we are willing to make our faith all about ourselves and our self-assurance the less assured we are.  Thus advocates of this error constantly doubt both their own salvation as well as the salvation of everyone else!  Dreadful!

We have barely introduced this vital theme.  We must linger with these verses and with their spiritual implications.