In Rom 3:23 and Rom 5:12 Paul
declared, “all sinned.” It was seen as not only a completed act with the Greek
past tense employed by Paul, but "all" indicates that Adam did not act alone though
the federal headship view might argue that Adam acted on his own by Paul using the
prime number “one” in reference to Adam 8 times in Rom 5:12-19, causing all of humanity to be spiritually at war with God.
It appears Paul doesn’t offer a resolution on
whether Adam was the sole culprit in sinning against knowledge (federal view),
or that somehow we were all responsible
“in Adam,” as the father of mankind (seminal). Again, federal headship will see
representation; seminal headship will see participation, and the independents will
often remain undecided, striding the fence as long as possible. Actually, I can
simply agree to disagree as long as we don’t deny the reality of sin, its
negative impact on humanity and all of creation, and the dire need for
redemption through Jesus Christ.
The headship views are not involved
in everything Adam did; for instance, we did not receive a covering for sin being
“in Adam” (Gn 3:21); his peace with God at that juncture wasn't our peace with God. Actually, the views orbit around the original
sin, and look at the predicted consequences, “For as in Adam, all die” (1
Cor 15:22a). In contrast is the remaining part of Paul's verse, “even so in
Christ all shall be made alive” (1
Cor 15:22b, emphasis mine). The first “all” applies to Adam’s posterity or
descendants (mankind); the second “all” only refers to believers. With the original sin, there is universal involvement and universal results even though unborn; in salvation, there is only
individual involvement and individual consequences after birth.
The Bible doesn’t teach a
universal eventualism concerning salvation – all will eventually be saved. It
would be wonderful if all the peoples of the earth placed their faith in Christ
who died for all (Jn 3:16; 2 Cor 5:14), but this is nothing more than a pipe
dream and unrealistic (cf. Mt 7:13, 21). We must do the best we can to reach those
who are perishing for all related to Adam by natural birth are dying (1 Cor
15:22a), whereas all related to Christ by spiritual birth will be made alive (1
Cor 15:22b). A fisherman catches live fish that will ultimately die; we are to
be fishers of men who catch dead fish to be made alive.
Though there is a division of
thought on who is responsible for the original sin, it will not alter the
outcome one bit. Three deaths came forth upon transgressing the prohibition in
the Garden regardless of the headship view: physical, spiritual, and eternal. Immediately
upon partaking of the forbidden fruit, Adam, Eve, and their posterity would now
have an appointment with physical death, a general rule of mankind (cf. Rom
5:12; Gn 5:5; cf. Heb 9:27, Lazarus is an exception having died twice, Jn
11:43-44). I say generally because Enoch (Gn 5:24) and Elijah (2 Kgs 2:11) did
not die, and a large host will not die during the rapture or translation of the
Church, which is imminent by the way (1 Thes 4:17)!
Spiritual death or separation
from God was also spontaneous (Eph 2:1-2; 4:18). Adam and Eve were spiritually
separated from the Creator God until He graciously provided skins as a covering
for them both (Gn 3:21; Heb 9:22). This shedding of blood as a suitable
covering for the guilt of sin became necessary as determined by God alone. It
foreshadowed the truth that one day God would provide another Substitute to
redeem sinners from the penalty of sin, eternal death or separation.
So this matter of “in Adam, all die,” barring the rapture, all
will physically die because all sinned (Rom 3:23; 5:12). We sin because we are
born sinners. The moment we are conceived in the womb, we begin our trip to the
grave (cheery thought). Theologically speaking, once a person reaches the
mysterious “age of accountability,” (God making that determination, not man),
he or she is spiritually separated from God and in need of salvation.
Christ’s death on the cross
addressed the penalty of man’s sin against God. If a soul dies in a state of
spiritual separation from God, he or she will forever be separated from God in
hell and ultimately consigned to the lake of fire at the end of the ages. When
Christ died on the cross for us, He propitiated or satisfied the just demands
of God Almighty for sin (Rom 3:25; 1 Jn 2:2; 4:10); He bore our sins on the
cross (1 Pet 2:24). If a person rejects God’s gracious offer of salvation, he
or she will pay the penalty for sin forever in the lake of fire, experiencing
the wrath of God for sin eternally (Jn 3:36; 8:24; Rom 1:18); this is the
second death (Rev 20:11-15; 21:8). Listen to these sobering words, “How shall
we escape if we neglect so great a salvation.…” (Heb 2:3a)?
Let’s take a peek at seminal
headship. Lot, Abraham’s backslidden nephew, found himself in a serious pinch
while living in the city of Sodom. Sodom, like Gomorrah, was a vassal of the
King of Elam by the name of Chedorlaomer for approximately 12 years. On the
lucky 13th year the powers that be in the plains (Gn 14:2, five
kings in all) decided to rebel against their suzerain by refusing to pay
tribute (Gn 14:4); a military response came in the 14th year (Gn
14:5-10), and all the goods and provisions of Sodom and Gomorrah were taken.
Lot was among the captives (Gn 14:12) of the Chedorlaomer-led coalition.
Abraham took 318 trained men (Gn
14:14) and pursued Chedorlaomer. Before attacking, Abraham divided his men and
attacked the coalition on two fronts. Gn 14:16 implies that Abraham defeated
his enemies by bringing back all the people, including his nephew, and all the
goods were taken by Chedorlaomer. This had to have been an incredibly brave military
undertaking by Abraham and his servants for going up against a superior force;
this is a God thing of attacking His enemies when they are at their greatest
point.
Notice that the King of Salem
[Jerusalem, cf. Psa 76:2] attributed Abraham’s victory to “God Most High”
according to Gn 14:20,
“Blessed be Abram of God
Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, Who has
delivered your enemies into your hand” (emphasis mine, cf. Zech 4:6).
Abraham was doing the right
thing, and God blessed him with a victory. If it were not for God, the
expeditionary response would have been disastrous. Chedorlaomer unwittingly
made a critical error in his strategy; his booty included Abraham’s nephew. There
was no reason for Abraham to engage the enemy otherwise. The sad thing about
all of this was that Lot would return to Sodom (cf. Gn 19:1a).
Lot never connected the dots to
realize that God wanted him out of Sodom when He used Chedorlaomer to haul his
butt out of there! How many dots have we failed to connect? Abraham’s nephew
could have spared himself a lot of grief and nearly the loss of everything,
except for his life and that of his two daughters. The devastation of the
cities of the plain (Gn 19:29) was thorough. Lot’s failure due to greediness,
drunkenness, and incest marred his testimony though he was described as righteous (2 Pet 2:7, 8)! It only gets
better; the Moabites (Gn 19:37) and the Ammonites (Gn 19:38) were of the incestuous
lineage of Lot and sworn enemies of Israel! The positive thing was the option
to return to Sodom was forever gone for Lot…. If we didn’t have Apostle
Peter’s statement concerning Lot being “righteous,” who would have thought?
After Melchizedek blesses
Abraham, notice Abraham’s response, “And he [Abram] gave him [Melchizedek] a
tithe of all” (Gn 14:20b).
This is the first mention of
giving 10%, but the giving was from the plunder. It was strictly voluntary on
Abraham’s part in contrast to the future expectations under the Law of Moses. Under
the Mosaic economy, the Levites’ source of income and compensation for tabernacle
service was the tithe (Num 18:21-24; Deut 14:22; 26:12). The spiritual
significance of this tithe paid to Melchizedek is not revealed in the Genesis narrative,
but around 67-68 A.D., the writer of Hebrews (Paul died under Nero who died in 68
A.D.) used it as one of the reasons for the superiority of the priesthood of
Jesus Christ over the Law of Moses in chapter 7, represented by Melchizedek,
“king of Salem, priest of the Most High God” (Heb 7:1).
The writer of Hebrews asked us
to “consider how great this man was,
to whom the patriarch Abraham gave a tenth of the spoils” (Heb 7:4; also cf.
Heb 7:1-3). The greater doesn’t tithe to the lesser but the other way around
(Heb 7:7). By Abraham, the patriarch of the faith, giving freely a tenth of the
spoils of war to Melchizedek, Abraham by his actions recognized and acknowledged
that God gave the victory and that Melchizedek was greater than Abraham. Oh, if
we could only grasp that victory is only in Jesus and give back to Him
willingly a Spirit-led portion of what had been given to us (cf. 2 Cor 9:6-8)!
The Sons of Levi who are from
the loins of Abraham are to receive tithes from the people (Heb 7:5), and Melchizedek
who is without genealogy (Heb 7:3, having no connection with the Levitical
order) received tithes from Abraham and blessed Abraham (Heb 7:6). Let me say
that the primary point of this passage is not to substantiate the seminal
participation theory but to illustrate and declare the superiority of the
Melchizedek over the Aaronic priesthood. Nonetheless, an argument can be made
from Heb 7:9-10 of the metaphysical possibility for the seminal headship of Levi paying tithes through Abraham to Melchizedek.
Heb
7:9 Even Levi, who receives tithes, paid
tithes through Abraham, so to speak,
Heb 7:10 for he was still in the loins of
his father when Melchizedek met him.
Keep in mind that Abraham and
Sarah had no children at this time. The miraculous birth of Isaac would come later.
Isaac and Rebekah would have two sons, Jacob and Esau. The third son of Jacob
and Leah was Levi (Gn 29:34). Levi never knew his great-grandfather, Abraham. God
would choose the tribe of Levi to minister in the tabernacle and the sons of
Aaron [Moses’ older brother] to be priests. So when Abraham gave a tenth of the
plunder to Melchizedek this was spiritually significant in at least two ways.
One, it illustrates Melchizedek’s priesthood was vastly superior to the
Levitical priesthood that was in the loins of Abraham. Two, it offers an
alternative possibility that rather than Adam shouldering the blame, we were
involved in sinning against the Creator God because we were in the loins of
Adam when he violated the prohibition.
Though Abraham actually paid the
tithes to the King of Salem, the writer of Hebrews indicates that Levi as head
of the priestly tribe or the Aaronic priesthood paid tithes through Abraham to
Melchizedek, not literally but involving the unborn generations in his loins
because they were his descendants. When Abraham paid tithes to Melchizedek,
Aaron and Levi paid tithes to Him. Since the lesser pay tithes to the better
(cf. Heb 7:7), this tribute revealed that Melchizedek was better than Aaron and
Levi; though unborn, they were in the loins of Abraham.
In a similar argument, Paul demonstrated when Adam sinned we all
sinned. All mankind sinned because they existed in the loins of Adam. The sinful
nature would be passed seminally to Adam’s posterity. Because of an inherent
sinful nature, we sin because we are born sinners (Psa 51:5). So, I am inclined to
believe that when Adam sinned, I was involved in some way in violating God’s
prohibition of being his descendant.
Thus my physical death was not because of
Adam acting alone, but I was making that choice while being in the loins of
Adam. Rather than dying because of what Adam did; I will die by my actions through
Adam. You may reject the notion, but it throws us into a state of helplessness to
do anything about repairing the collateral damage as in the case of Adam and
Eve. Covering our guilt with fig leaves and hiding from God is not going to
help our helpless spiritual condition.
This is where “grace,” to
me one of the most beautiful words in all of Scripture, made its entrance into
the world (Gn 3:21). God took the initiative to help the helpless. It
foreshadowed the sending of grace through His Son (Eph 2:8-9). Beloved, His
blood doesn’t cover, it removes the penalty of sin, and we find ourselves a new
creation (2 Cor 5:17). Though the presence of sin remains within us (cf. Rom
7), the penalty of sin is gone forever! As long as Jesus is barred from the
heart, there is nothing but helplessness, condemnation, wrath, darkness, and
death.
Perhaps the reason Paul
does not offer a resolution between “all sinned” (Rom 3:23; 5:12) and “by one
man sin entered the world” (Rom 5:12), along with the eight occurrences of “one,”
referring to Adam (Rom 5:12-19) is because it falls under the category of my most
convenient term to explain the unexplainable, a paradox. Adam literally
rebelled, and we were involved while in his loins as Levi was in paying tithes
to Melchizedek, not literally but involved as a descendant unborn, “so to speak.”
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| To Part 8 |
