The Abundance of Grace (Romans 5:12-21)

Introduction

This is the time in our service where someone, usually me, gets up here and we open this really old book called the Bible. The reason we do this in our gatherings is because we, as Christians, believe that it is through this book, the Bible, that God has spoken to us. Particularly we believe that God speaks both to reveal himself to us, as well as reveal his plan of redemption for us in the midst of our brokenness.

And so, because we believe that God speaks in these ways to us, we open the Bible, read from it and then labor to expose the text in both understanding it and then trying to rightly apply these ancient, unchanging truths to our present lives.

Particularly this morning, we want to labor to expose our passage this morning of Romans 5:12-21 and tie it to this past week’s Vacation Bible School Theme of Christmas in July, Celebrating God’s promised gift of a Savior.

This year’s theme was chosen with the hopes of taking sometime outside of Christmas to share and talk about the significance of waiting and then celebrating the coming of God’s Savior to rescue us.

But here in lies the problem, many of us fail to see this part of Christmas because we fail to see our need of a Savior. For Christmas is a time of the year where lots of distractions arise. There is the hustle and bustle of events, family traditions, shopping for the perfect present, and streaming all the nostalgic Christmas movies. All of this leaves little room for the dwelling of what comes at Christmas.

Or even when we do pause to dwell on Jesus at Christmas, we think about his birth, his being laid in a manger. Or maybe we think of the Shepherds keeping watch out in the field and the angel chorus ringing out:

Luke 2:14 “14 “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!””

However some may dwell on these words from Matthew’s gospel,

Matthew 1:21 “21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.””

But even in considering this, how often do we dwell on the importance of what it means to be saved from sin or more importantly why we needed saving from sin? It is this that I want to talk about this morning. So, if you have a Bible, I invite you to take it out and turn with me to Romans 5:12-21. Romans 5:12-21. If you do not have your own copy of the Bible, please feel free to take the Red Bible in front of you, and you can find our passage on page #1120.

In case you are newer or unfamiliar with the Bible, that first number, the five, it is what we call the chapter number and is the big number on the page. the second numbers, the 12-21, these are called the verse numbers and are the smaller numbers there on the page. This will help you as you follow along this morning.

Without us having been in Romans, let me set the stage for us. The book of Romans is a letter, often called an epistle, to the Church at Rome. It is written by the Apostle Paul who had not yet made his way to Rome, therefore he writes this letter not as one who planted the church. However, as is made clear at the end of this letter, he knew many in the Church at Rome. Therefore Paul seeks not to write to correct or finish a work he has already been invested in, but he writes it as a letter seeking partnership with the Church at Rome to take the gospel to Spain. However, in seeking partnership, he seeks to ensure they are on the same page as to what the gospel is, that is what the good news of Jesus is.

Therefore, his letter to the Church at Rome is a tightly packed letter with the first 11 chapters laboring to make plain the gospel to make sure they are all on the same page. It is then doctrinally and theologically rich.

It starts in Romans 1 with Paul laying out his desires, as well as his not being ashamed of the gospel, the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes. He does not hold back at the end of chapter 1 all the way through chapter 3 in showing how all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, then in chapter 4 he turns to the example of Abraham and being declared righteous, not by works but by faith. And that brings us to chapter 5, the chapter where we will be this morning.

Now, while we will only labor to unfold Romans 5:12-21, we are going to read the entirety of Romans 5 for the sake of context. Therefore, let us hear the word of the LORD beginning in Romans 5:1.

Main Idea: As bad as the sin of Adam was in bringing the curse of sin and death to all, the grace of God is greater in bringing righteousness and life through Jesus. We are going to unfold this in 2 points: (1) the reign of sin and (2) the reign of grace.

I. The Reign of Sin

How can we celebrate the gift of a Savior without understanding our desperate need for one? It does us no good to talk about the coming of the Savior if we do not first grasp the necessity of the savior. The significance of Christmas will never be fully understood if we do not grasp our need to celebrate the arrival of a deliverer, a Savior.

So here is why we need a Savior, because apart from the coming of a Savior, we continue to live under the reign of death that has entered the world. Romans 5:12.

This one man who sin entered through being that of the one man Adam, the first man created by God in the very good beginning as told in Genesis 1-2.

Sin and Adam

Please hold your place here in Romans 5:12 and turn with me back to the very start of the Bible, the first book Genesis in the first chapter. Genesis 1:26-31.

Man was made in God’s image and given the charge to be fruitful and multiply and subdue the earth, to rule it in its perfect and good harmony. And in this very good beginning, there was but one rule. Genesis 2:15-17.

It would be well with man and woman there in the Garden in Eden if they obeyed. They would continue to walk with God, they would rule with perfect harmony over God’s very good creation as his agents. But this did not happen. Genesis 1-2 shows the very good beginning, but Genesis 3 brings about the fall of man, their rejection of God’s rule. For in Genesis 3, Adam and Eve are deceived by the serpent, they take of the forbidden fruit of the tree and they eat. They rejected their creator, the one who had right authority over them as their maker.

And while Adam and Eve didn’t immediately die, they certainly began to feel death through the consequences of their sin, of their rebellion. And so we don’t miss it, Genesis 5 comes bringing with it the repetitive phrase, and he died to all in the chapter with the exception of 1.

For from Adam to Moses, all die as a result of their sin. Death spread to all people through the one man Adam. Adam being the head, the representative for all of creation. For we all, even here today, are in Adam. That is we are born from Adam, we can all trace our line back to Adam in some shape and form. And because we are all in Adam, that sin is passed on from Adam to us. That sin affects us, it poisons us, it kills us. That is because in Adam, we inherit a sinful nature from him. This is why we do not have to teach our children to be sinful. This is why we see a nature in them to reject authority, to rebel, to raise their fists against any to rule over their hearts. And if this is true in children, how much more in each of us as we grow older?

Sin and the Law

Going back to Adam to Moses, all born after Adam were in Adam. They all sinned, rebelling against the very God who created them. They sinned even prior to the giving of the law. Romans 5:13-14.

Those in Adam may not have had the entirety of God’s law to show them their guilt, but they were certainly guilty. They did not turn to the one who created them. The people quickly rejected God, even after him casting judgment against the world through the coming of the flood. God saved the family of Noah through judgment, judgment that wiped out all but the eight on the ark.

Sodom and Gomorrah and their rebellion shows the spread of sin. The enslavement of God’s people in Egypt, forgetting how Joseph had delivered the Egyptians from death in the famine comes. Sin continued spreading throughout creation. And as sin spread, death continued to come. Sin reigned over the hearts of all men.

But following God’s deliverance of his people out of slavery from Egypt, God gives the law to his people. A law that is to teach them who he is and that to be his people, they are to live distinctly from the world.

And what happens, instead of the law humbling the people, it continues to harden them. It hardens them in thinking they are worthy of God’s blessings and promises, that they are deserving of them. Therefore their hearts begin to grumble and harden in more sin, more sin demanding of things from God and upset when they don’t get it.

The people began to even misunderstand the law in thinking that the law could save them if they lived rightly. But here is the thing friends, the law of God was not given to show how well we live; it was given to show us just how bad we really are.

And so, before the law was given, we see the reign of sin and death from Adam to Moses. We see that though they did not all have the direct disobedience as Adam did, they all sinned and died. And now that the law has come, how much more do we see our sin in light of the law? The law exposing the evil within our hearts?

Sin and its consequences

So, here in Romans 5:12-21, we see that sin has entered through Adam, how it is exposed by the law, but now we must consider the reality of our sin and the fullness of its consequences.

Romans 5:15 tells us that many died through the one man’s trespass. We see that sin still is at present reigning, because death still comes. It has come for those before us, it is at work now, and it will continue to be at work until death itself is finally defeated. Now, here it says many died. There is hope, which we will get to momentarily, but here we have to feel the weight of our sin and its consequences.

But death isn’t the only consequence of sin. Judgment is also a consequence of sin. Romans 5:16 teaches us that following the one man’s sin brought judgment and condemnation because of the one trespass. That pointing back to Adam taking the forbidden fruit of the forbidden tree. This showing that sin leaves us guilty and condemned before God. Leaving us deserving of punishment for our guilt.

And to show us our guilt of being those who have trespassed against God’s commands, all we need to do is look at the law. Look and see how in our lies, in our wrong worship, in our coveting, that is desiring what others have with envy all leave us guilty. Let alone our murderous hearts, that both physically and from the heart murder others through our hate. The failing of us in not honoring our father and mother. The worshiping of idols. All of these prove our guilt and trespass against the God who created us.

The reign of sin leads to death and judgment. And friends some of you here this morning need to be awakened to the weight of your sin. In particular that you continue to stay in your sin as you reject Jesus, leaving you remaining in Adam where death still reigns over you. For you remain a child of disobedience, a seed of the serpent, and as with your father, you will be condemned in eternal judgment.

Friend, if that is you this morning, I urge you, I plead with you to let the law humble you as it exposes your sin. See how sin has been reigning over your life and repent, that is turn from Sin’s reign as you hear the grace of God this morning in our second point.

Before we turn to that second point though, beloved brothers and sisters in Christ. This truth is not here to just humble the non-Christian. It is here to humble our hearts too. It is here to humble us to see just how undeserving we are. How broken we are. It is to bring us trembling before a Holy God as we hear of his amazing grace and the coming reign of it in the person of Jesus.

II. The Reign of Grace

We see that while sin has serious consequences, the free gift, God’s grace, is more abundant, that is it is greater. Romans 5:15.

The trespass of Adam brought death to many showing just how serious sin is. This is restated in verse 15 from what was already said, but then consider how the verse starts, “But the free gift is not like the trespass.” This is followed by an implied if then statement. For if many died through the 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. To make that plain, if the one is true of the trespass, then greater is what comes in grace. To quote John Calvin here:

“Christ is much more powerful to save, than Adam was to destroy,” to quote John Calvin. [1]

Grace Justifies the Trespass

First notice the comparison that comes in V.16. A comparison comparing the judgment of condemnation that comes through Adam’s sin and the free gift bringing justification.

As we have already heard this morning, because we have all sinned, we all are condemned, we all are counted guilty for that sin in Adam. And rightly so. But, in the coming reign of grace in Jesus, instead of condemnation coming, justification comes.

Justification being a legal term in which is used to describe the standing of those who are under the rule of grace before a Holy God. For instead of standing condemned before God because of Adam’s trespass, because of our own sins, when we come under the reign of grace in Christ, we stand as those declared right with God as if we never had committed any trespass. For grace justifies us by making us stand in the righteousness of Christ. This is God’s free gift of grace to us. And it is here how grace abounds in triumph over judgment. For though God is a just God who judges rightly, his grace is more.

Or to put this in more memorable terms, we can learn question 33 of the Westminster Shorter Catechism:

WSC Q33: What is justification?

WSC A33: Justification is an act of God’s free grace, wherein he pardoneth all our sins, and accepteth us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone.

The abundance of God’s free gift to us of grace that takes us from being condemned to being justified is amazing, and it is all because of the work of Christ Jesus, of his one righteous act. Romans 5:17-19.

Our justification comes through Jesus’ one righteous act, that of laying down his life for us while we were still sinners (v.8), the shedding of his blood for us (v.9), all of this to reconcile us to God (v.10), moving us from being condemned to being justified. O what grace has won for us in Christ.

Grace Overturns Death

Sin brought death and death for many. But the grace of Jesus Christ abounded for many to overturn death and bring eternal life.

Hopefully we have been seeing this as we have gone, but we saw a glimpse of this in V.15. But then we saw this more in V.17 where it says those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ. Death reigns in Adam, life in Jesus. This is the free gift of God in the coming of his grace to us in Jesus! The hope of life.

And even as the law has come bringing the increase of the trespass, exposing more sin, more rejection of God, grace has abounded more! V.20-21.

Let us make no mistake, Sin is serious, but the grace of God abundantly surpasses it . Jesus has come to overturn the curse of sin and death by justifying us before a Holy God and leading us to eternal life if we will but place our faith in him. It is faith and faith alone that he has required of us. There is no works to earn this favor, it is a free gift. We are not justified by our works, by our deeds, by our religiosity. We are justified by the righteousness of Jesus and our trust in it.

Friend, you here this morning who are trying to clean yourself up before coming to Christ, stop your toiling and see the free gift God has extended to you in the grace of Christ. Turn from your sin in repentance today and believe!

You who think you have sinned too much, hear how God’s grace abounds, that all he requires of you is to see your need for his grace and to receive that grace in Jesus! God’s grace can overcome our greatest evil if we will but come.

Christian, this should stir us to regularly be confessing our sin before the LORD and coming to him knowing that he is a gracious God whose mercy is new every morning.

Conclusion

Sin is serious, death entered the world because of one man’s disobedience. And that death spread throughout. It spread from Adam to Moses without the law, and then following the giving of the law that trespass only increased as the law exposed the great evil of our hearts. And yet, God did not leave us where we were under the reign of death. He sent his beloved Son Jesus into the world at Christmas in order to save us from such a fate. He sent his son to be born of a virgin, laid in a manger. A child who would grow, live a sinless life and yet die the death of one guilty of the trespass so that by his death we could be reconciled to God and declared just to stand before a Holy God. And all of this by the abundance of God’s grace! A grace that pardons and cleanses, a grace that is greater than all our sin. A grace that we can rest in, knowing death has been defeated, because of the fact that Christ did not remain dead, but rose on the third day.

It is because of these things we celebrate Christmas and the coming of the Savior into the world. A Savior who has come to save us from the curse of sin and death! And so, this is why we as Christians gather to worship week in and week out, declaring our worship to the God of grace who has come to save us! And this is why we go and declare the message of this good news so that all may hear!

Let’s pray!

Endnote:

[1] John Calvin and John Owen, Commentary on the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2010), 206.