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Romans 5:12-21Belgic Confession Articles 14-15January 16, 2005

Understanding Sin

Text

Theme: Jesus, as second Adam, is the solution to the problem of sin.Goal: To demonstrate that Jesus is the solution to the problem of sin. Need: Understanding Jesus in light of original sin.

Sermon

Theme: Jesus, as second Adam, is the solution to the problem of sin.Goal: To demonstrate that Jesus is the solution to the problem of sin. Need: Understanding Jesus in light of original sin.Form: DidacticSermon OutlineI. The Source of Sin in AdamII. The Supremacy of Sin in our LivesIII. The Solution to Sin in Jesus Christ.Brothers and Sisters in Christ,As I was preparing to teach my church history class I came across this section of a prayer from JohnCalvin.

“O Lord God, eternal and almighty Father, we acknowledge and sincerely confess before your holy majesty that we are miserable sinners, conceived and born in iniquity and sin, prone to evil,and incapable of any good work, and that in our depravity we make no end of breaking your holycommandments. We thus call down destruction on ourselves from your just judgments. Nevertheless, O Lord, we lament that we have offended you, and we condemn ourselves and our faults with true repentance, asking you to help us from wretchedness by your grace.”

It’s very negative isn’t it. These days as we hear these words – we might be inclined to think that JohnCalvin had issues with self-esteem. That he’s not focussing on the good. He’s not looking on the bright sideof life. He’s not in tune with the Power of Possibility Thinking.I mean, come on, we don’t talk about things like sin anymore. We’re taught to see the good and value in people. We take pride in the things that make us human beings. Our curiosity, our technology, our civilization, our ability to face overcome challenge and adversity.Even in the Christian church the language has changed. We don’t talk about depravity and inability. We talk more about being in touch with our spiritual side and how things are going in our walk with Jesus.And the church that talks about sin. About personal responsibility. About ethics and morality. That church isno longer relevant to this world. That church is filled with right-wing fascist conservatives. Legalists tellingme what to do.My friends, we’ve lost our ability to talk about sin. Few of us understand it as a part of our identity. Maybewe understand it in a theoretical kind of way – but tell me this – Sunday morning – when we get to the partof the service that deals with confession and assurance – how many of us take it seriously.

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How many of us examine our lives in those few moments and as an expression of our worship truly confess before God how much we’ve fallen short? And how many of us just follow along until we get to the nextsong?Our goal tonight is to reclaim an understanding of sin and we turn to Paul and a very familiar section of hisletter to the Romans. As we do so we also continue our journey through the Belgic Confession to see whatour church has to say about this very difficult topic of sin and why we need to pay attention to it – why wemust never lose it from our vocabulary.I think that it’s important in any discussion of sin to go right back to the beginning. We need to talk about…

I. The source of sin – Adam

Paul writes this in verse 12:

“sin entered the world through one person, and death through sin, and in this way deathcame to all people, because all sinned”

Paul’s interest for us is to remember. To remember how the whole thing started. To think about this worldthat God created. To remember to the blame game that went on in the garden of Eden as we find it inGenesis chapter 3.If we want to understand sin Paul is telling us that we need to start there. Back in the garden. Back whereall our troubles began. We need to look at what we call the Fall and what we mean when we say OriginalSin.Many of us here tonight know what I mean when I say the Fall – there may also be some who don’t have aclue what I’m talking about – there may also be some of us who want to make sure that I do and so I wantto take just a moment and be clear about this so we can build on it.We use the term Fall in order to put a picture in the mind. When we say that something falls we understandthat through the workings of gravity something goes from a place that is higher to a place that is lower.In the same way when we say Adam fell, or man fell, or humanity is fallen we are meant to think that thereis a place or state where he was or we should be that is better or higher than the place in which he is or weare now.De Bres and the Reformers recognized this and included this pre-fallen state in Article 14 of theConfession.

We believe that God created man from the dust of the earth and made and formed him in his imageand likeness—good, just, and holy; able by his own will to conform in all things to the will of God.(14)

This is our picture of Adam and Eve as we find them in Genesis chapter 2. Human beings created to begood and just and holy created in God’s image. These were good people. They didn’t need to be asked to dowhat was right – they just did it. And they were free – the confession says “able by his own will” – to dowhat was right.Two things that we can take from this – they were good, and they weren’t robots. They made gooddecisions and they made them because they wanted to – not because they were coerced.Life was good in the garden. They had what they needed. They had perfect relationship with one another and fellowship with their God and creator. Genesis 2:25 tells us that “the Man and his wife were bothnaked, and they felt no shame.”

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What happens next we know about. Scripture doesn’t tell us about the passage of time between Genesis 2and Genesis 3. Perhaps Adam and Eve lived as they did for many years going about and interacting withthe garden. Getting acquainted with the beauty that God had made for them. Perhaps it was much less.The immediacy that we find going from chapter 2 to chapter 3 is not meant to tell us about time but insteadtells us that what was about to happen was something contrary to what went on before.Again we know the story – the serpent, the apple – all of a sudden Adam and Eve realized that they werenaked – they were exposed – and they felt shame. The rest of chapter three talks about their punishment for disobeying God.This whole story from Genesis 2 to Genesis 3 gives us this picture of a sudden fall. From a place of gloryand honour hiding among the bushes in a place of shame. What happens to Adam and also to Eve isdescribed as we continue in Article 14…

But when he was in honor he did not understand it and did not recognize his excellence. But he subjected himself willingly to sin and consequently to death and the curse, lending his ear to theword of the devil. For he transgressed the commandment of life, which he had received, and by his sin he separated himself from God, who was his true life, having corrupted his entire nature. So hemade himself guilty and subject to physical and spiritual death, having become wicked, perverse,and corrupt in all his ways. He lost all his excellent gifts which he had received from God, and heretained none of them except for small traces which are enough to make him inexcusable. (14)

As the story goes Adam and Eve fell from the highest place of honour in fellowship with God and with allthe gifts and privilege that comes with it down to a place of shame and death.They were living with everything that they needed in the garden and the next thing they knew they wereoutside the gates with nothing besides some garments of skin that God had made them – a gift of compassion for their shame.It is this story that Paul wants us to remember when he writes

“sin entered the world through one person,and death through sin”

So now we know what we mean when we talk about the Fall. But what we are left thinking is this…wellPastor…That’s great for them but what does that have to do with us?That’s why we also need to understand what we mean by original sin. When Adam and Eve fell in thegarden we need to understand that as our parents their actions affected us as well. If we look at the curse inGenesis 3 closely we see that in verses 15 and 16 what has gone on also has consequences for their offspring.If we use the analogy of divorce we see that no matter what the parents intentions are – their children arealways dragged into the middle. What parents do affects their children. What Adam and Eve did affectedus. Our confession from article 15 is this…

We believe that by the disobedience of Adam original sin has been spread through the wholehuman race. (15)

This is what Paul means when he says

in this way death came to all people, because all sinned.

This iswhat he means in chapter 3 of this letter to the Romans when he says “all have sinned and fall short of theglory of God.”We human beings – wherever we are, whomever we are – bear this stain right from the beginning. If wewant to talk about sin then we have to understand it’s source as we find it in the Genesis account.

And as we investigate the source of sin we must also look to…

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