Great Doctrines of Salvation
Mike Doyle · Oct 3, 2010
Great Doctrines of Salvation, No. 40
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926216166040

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

OK. We're streaking on talking about trying to put together over the next couple of months, hopefully a fairly comprehensive understanding of what we call the identification truth and the identification truth. with the doctrine of the two men. We've referred to it quite a bit. But there are only two men that matter in the human race. The first one is Adam. Who's the second one? It's the Lord Jesus Christ.

And why? We're on lesson four, right? And when you read Romans 5.12, and actually I'm going to read part of it to maybe just set this up.

Up until Romans 5.12, up until Romans 5.11, the focus of all of Paul's epistles to this point justification has been salvation. All men were deemed lost and he proves every kind of man all under sin. And then the doctrine of salvation is presented in 3 and 4 and expanding on it in 5. In 5, 1 through 11 talk about the But when you get to 12, a couple of things change.

He starts to talk about two men and things that are consequent on these two men. And the other big change I want you to notice is that the word sins, S-I-N-S, changes to the word sin, S-I-N. which are the actions of a sinner, right? They're all of those things that we do as sinners. Now, when he brings in the idea of sin, S-I-N, we're talking about something different. What are we talking about? Talking about nature. Every human being from Adam has a sin nature that we got from him. And a sin nature is a very interesting entity. If you have a nature, you know what a nature is? What's a nature? Your being, your nature, your personality, your character.

Okay. My black Labrador has the nature of a black Labrador. What does that tell you about it? He's black, but he's a dog and he does in a certain way. Do you have a dog? You don't have a dog? Yet. You do? Not yet. So the nature of a dog is different than the nature of a cat because you can tell by a dog's behavior that they're dogs. You can tell by a cat's behavior that they're a cat.

So does that switch in verse 12 or chapter 5? Verse 12. Human beings are born with this thing called sin, S-I-N, and in the Greek language, if you look closely, you will see that starting in 512, there is a definite article in front of the word sin. So you could translate it, the sin, the sin, the sin. And it refers to the nature, not to the acts. So this is my favorite question.

When did you become a sinner? When we were born. Before you were born. When you were conceived. In Adam. Sure. You became a sinner when Adam sinned. Now the hard thing to understand is that the way we look at sin is that we start from the premise that we're all doing okay, and then we mess up once in a while, but we're still okay, right? I don't think we realize what a dramatic change in creation happened on Adam's end.

So can you use that same analogy, say, with a dog, or does that not work? It works in the sense that your dog isn't going to meow. He's not going to fly. He's a four-footed creature like a cat, but he's different and you can tell by his behavior pattern.

When Adam sinned and his nature changed, obviously that affected the whole place. When Adam sinned, it totally changed who Adam was. He became this thing called sin. He had now the nature of sin and so he could conduct his life only by sinning. Because that's what his nature was. Wouldn't he then always have had that nature if he did sin? Say that again? Yeah, since he did sin, Didn't that mean that he had that nature to begin with? No. He got it the moment that he sinned.

He was created innocent. He was perfect. He had a body, soul, and spirit. He had an innocent nature that was dependent on God. When he sinned, he became self-centered. totally self-centered. And the only thing he could produce, now that he was a sinner, were sins. So it seems like Satan needs to work his way in here. Because it wouldn't have happened without Satan, right?

Okay. And it's interesting when after Adam sinned and God came looking for him in the garden and he was hiding, part of the nature to hide when you sin. Who did Adam blame? Me? No. He blamed God. No. You know that woman you gave me? No. It's not her fault, it's your fault because you gave me the woman. Well, if that doesn't describe the sin nature, I don't know what does. He blamed God? Sure he did. He said, that woman you gave me, you know that woman you gave me? It's not her fault, it's your fault for giving her to me.

Well, that exposes what the sin nature is. So, with that in mind, Therefore, in verse 12, therefore just as through one man the sin, the sin nature, entered the world, came in through Adam, and death through sin, thus death spread to all men because of all sin. For until the law sin was in the world, But sin was not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned, according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam, who is the type of him to come." Now, let's deal with those verses. How did sin come into the world? By one man. By one man. That one dirty dog, Adam. So through one man sin entered the world.

You cannot go about counting ourselves justified in the sense of merely having to deal with our own trespasses. Those we have committed that are forgiven. For this would amount to counting ourselves as innocent before we personally sin. Now all of you that have kids, I know you all think that they were conceived and born without sin natures, but they proved you wrong, didn't they?

Why? Why? They're in Adam. Because they're in Adam. I mean, Donna thought that John didn't have a sin nature, but man did he prove her wrong. So why did my son John sin? There's all of sin. Why do they do that? Because we're not good parents, that's why. We're born into it. You have it. It comes with the package. You have this thing called sin nature that came with Adam and every human being is born with it and it's going to demonstrate and produce its own fruit, which are sins. And it all came through one man. Now, so can I go to God and reasonably say, look, it's Adam's fault.

I wasn't there in the garden. I didn't do this thing. It was him. How can you blame me? What would God's response be? Do you want to do the same thing? Yeah, read the last part of the verse. What's it say? All sins? Yeah, so you sinned, I mean I know some of you are younger and some are older, but you all sinned in Adam, in the garden, every one of you. Why?

You're so identified with Adam, because you come from him, that when he acted, you acted. Now if Courtney would have been Adam, if you had gone to God and said, Adam screwed up, why don't you let me take over? And I won't screw up. Yes he would because he's from Adam. He would have done the exact same thing. We are begotten of Adam and we are like him. We are exactly like him. Like a dog is a dog and a cat is a cat.

So you can't go to God and say it wasn't my fault. Yes it was your fault because you sinned in Adam. You can go to God with X, you can go to God with anything right? Well you go to God with X, you get it as far. Now that's a really interesting principle because it's other places in the word of God. God bless you. Can you give me another example of when someone's father did something in which the person, his son or grandson was in him doing it even though he wasn't alive yet? David. David? Not David. Abraham when he did. Abraham.

We haven't studied Hebrews in a while. In Hebrews there's a discussion about the Lord Jesus Christ as a high priest after the order of Melchizedek. And what's the other priesthood group? Levitical priesthood, right? Of which the head guy was Levi. And in Hebrews it says that Abraham, or Levi, paid tithes in the loins of Abraham to Melchizedek. Which means Melchizedek is a higher priesthood than Levi.

That make sense? Abraham was coming back from winning a bunch of battles and he meets this guy Melchizedek who is the king of Salem and he recognizes that Melchizedek is a very special man and so he gives 10% of his spoils to Melchizedek. Now understand something, this is Abraham doing that. Abraham is the guy that was called to God to start the nation of Israel.

But he is paying ties to this man Melchizedek who is a priest. So when Hebrews says that the Lord Jesus is not a priest according to the Levitical priesthood but according to the Melchizedek priesthood, it puts the Melchizedek priesthood on a higher plane than the Levitical priesthood. And to prove that it was, in Hebrews it says that Levi, in the loins of Abraham, paid tithes to Melchizedek. Which meant that the priesthood that Christ is of and from and you're from, is higher than the Levitical priesthood.

See that? Same principle. Was Levi alive then? No, he wasn't. But when his father acted, he acted. See that? That's a Biblical principle. As we get a little farther in identification, you're going to see it really benefits us by being in Christ. So it's like the sins of the father? The sins of the father, Adam. Even though you're not born yet? Well, this verse says that you sinned in Adam. You sinned when he sinned. Essentially, sin just means you missed the mark. You fell short of the mark. What was Adam's sin?

What did he do? What was so bad about what he did? He didn't listen. He listened? Well, he didn't do it. He didn't believe. Well, he didn't believe. God gave him a specific command. Right, don't eat the apple, but you did. Don't eat this fruit. Right? What did he do? He ate it. Did you take a bite too?

Yes, you did. You were there in Adam. Because it's our nature, I would have done it if I were in his place. It's the same principle as you were on the cross with Christ. Yes, it's the same principle. So when Adam sinned against God, he was condemned to death. Dead to God, Adam being your unsaved head in life, does the same whole true for you and why? When Adam sinned against God he was condemned to death, dead to God. Does the same hold true for you? Sure. Why? Adam being the head of the human race he takes the entire human race into death with him. What's death? So Adam is separated from God and so are you.

1 Corinthians 15.22 says in Adam all die. In Adam all die. This N word is getting to be an important word. All in Adam have his life and are therefore by nature the children of wrath.

Ephesians 2.3. Now when you look at non-safe people. We classify them whether they are good guys or bad guys, whether they are culture educated or not. We never look at them like this, that in Adam all die. Every single human being on the planet today who is alive, who is not a Christian, is in Adam and he is dead to God. Not a little bit dead, totally dead.

Every single one of them, including our kids. Pretty big pill to swallow. We're trying to make them nice. We're going to send them to college and educate them and they're going to be better. They're still dead, even though they're better. See that? So what does it matter if you're educated or not if you're not in Christ? It doesn't matter. You'll just be one of the smarter guys in hell. Now, verse 13-17 is a parenthesis.

For until the law was in the world, sin was in the world, but sin was not imputed to them when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam who is the type of him to come. But the free gift is not like the offense, for if by the one man's offense many died or all died, much more by the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one man Jesus Christ abounded unto the many. And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned, for the judgment which came from one offense resulted in condemnation. But the free gift which came from many offenses resulted in justification. For if by one man's offense death reigned through the one, much more those who received the abundance of grace of the gift of righteousness will reign in the life through the one Jesus Christ.

Now, question three is, in those verses, that's a parenthesis in the Greek language. Why do you think God didn't impute sin before there was law? There's no definite article before law, so we're not talking about the mosaic law, we're just talking about the law. We're talking about the principle of law. How many laws were there from Adam to Moses?

There wasn't any. There wasn't any. Can you think of any? Don't leave the street. That's one law. There was one law and it was given to one guy. Right? But that law could not continue because they were kicked out of the Garden of Eden. Right. So when the verse says that death reigns from Adam to Moses, even though nobody sinned like Adam sinned, in other words, they weren't looking for the garden to eat as much of that food as they could. Only Adam and Eve got their hands on that fruit. So if nobody else was able to eat that fruit, how come they were still dying? So murder wasn't serious?

Yeah. How about Cain killing Abel? Was murder a violation of the law? What do you think? I don't find anything that says thou shalt not kill Adam. I don't find anything that says you can't kill. You should kill. Was there a lock? Did God say to Adam when he gave him the skins, he said here I'm giving you a list of stuff I want you to, if you follow these rules you get along pretty good? It also says he places in every man the ability to know right from wrong. Yeah, conscience. Is that a lock? No it's not. So when Cain kills Abel, notice that God doesn't snuff old Cain out of existence. didn't break a law. So how come all these people are still dying? Because of our sinful nature. Because of Adam. That's right.

So if we all lived in the time between Adam and Moses, we could be sinning like crazy and God would not put it to our account. He would not have a list of, he wouldn't open up the book for anybody in this room and say here's all the violations that you've committed. Because there wasn't anything to violate. Do you see that? Because they didn't know any better? No, they didn't have any instructions. They had no law.

But the word says that they're still dying. And I was interested to read something that Newell wrote. This goes to the next question and I'll wait for that. The issue with this is that every human being is dying even though they're not breaking laws. How come? Because we're sinners. We're in Adam. Because by one man sin entered the world. And what came along with sin? Death. Now when we talk about death we're talking about separation. How many kinds of separation did Adam suffer? One. Two. Two. Two? Sure.

He died spiritually and positionally the moment that he ate the fruit, and he died physically 900 plus years later. So everybody from Adam is going to die physically, physically now, because they're descendants of Adam. That's why we're going to die. Because we're descendants of Adam. Our bodies are going to die. Except for Courtney, he's going to make it to the rapture. Paul is about to prove that death passed upon all men, not because they sinned, but because Adam sinned.

Sin was in the world between Adam and Moses and then according to chapter 1, the race had rejected the light and were without excuse, they were without law. Or God's definition of sin is not transgression of law, what's God's definition of sin? Anomia is the Greek word. What's God's definition of sin?

Following children of Mark, which is Amartya. But when you read like here, he uses the word anomia. Refusal to be controlled. That's right. We refuse to be controlled. So independence. Yeah. We're Americans, it's okay for us, right? Are we free and independent? Nobody controls us, right? We get to decide who's going to control us.

And this is what Bruce is talking about, there was a work written in our hearts to which our conscience bore witness, either accusing us or excusing our behavior. and corresponds to what we would call moral law. I remember in college we had to study moral law. What was the first code? Hammurabi? Did I get the name right? Came up with a code of laws and it all came out of your conscience. But still, even if you violated something in your conscience, God did not put it to your account. So on number three we're going to say we were under conscience. I think so.

Now listen to this. Here, look what happens between Adam and Moses. There's this little event called the flood. Why the flood? Wasn't God sick and tired of all the sinning that was going on? Yeah. He was. He was sick and tired of it. How about Sodom and Gomorrah? He was sick.

What laws were they breaking? Well, when Sodom and Gomorrah is Abraham and Lot, Moses hasn't shown up yet, so we don't have a code. How about the flood? If there isn't any law, there aren't any specific statues that were breaking, how come God destroys the world with the flood?

Because they didn't recognize God as God. He still has to judge sin. That sin nature you have, Genesis 6, God looked over the world and he saw that the deeds of man were only sin continually. So every single human being, because they came from Adam, were rejecting God continually. That's all they did. So they were missing the mark, but they didn't know what the mark was. But they didn't care. But I guess you can't.

Is this going back to Romans 2, 14, explaining about the Gentiles, basically, for when the Gentiles do not have the law, do instinctively the things of the law. These, not having the law, are law unto themselves, and that they show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness, and their thoughts alternately accusing. or else defending them on the day when according to my gospel God will judge the secrets of men through Christ Jesus? That's pretty close. It's not law, it's just conscience. I mean, without the law, you know it's wrong. You know, when Cain killed Abel, You know God punished King, sent him off to his own land or whatever and he put a mark on him and actually made it a principle that nobody could touch him. Isn't that interesting? Is that a law?

When the flood was over and Noah and his family get off and he begins to organize the earth in terms of government. See the issue here is that God gave Adam a specific command about the tree. He never up until the time of Moses gave man any specific commands. And so the point that he is making here is that death is passed upon all men even though they have not specifically broken a law.

What's the difference between a principle and a law? Good question. A law, let's pick the Mosaic Law. God gave Moses and the Jewish nation the Mosaic Law. He gave them 600 and however many there are, specific things to do or not to do. And of which doing them or not doing them was a violation of a statute.

Do this and I will bless you. Don't do it and I'll curse you. 35 miles an hour, that's it. Can't go any faster than that. A principle, like sin is a principle, a principle is a way a thing acts or functions every time. Principle of gravity. but you don't break a statute by dropping the knife. Do you see that? That's not in violation of a statute. God didn't say don't drop the knife. A principle works the same way every time. Your sin nature is under the principle of sin. It operates the same way every time. It sins every single time.

The point being here is that men are dying even though they didn't break a specific command from God. The cemeteries are full of dead people, dead bodies. And none of the gravestones back then had said, well he broke commandment 6, 39. They're still gone.

And the reason he's saying that is to show that there's a principle of sin in every man and that's why you die. You do not die because you broke a specific law. You are separated from God because you function and live and are identified with the principle of sin. Okay? Most of Christendom doesn't teach that. They tell people that they're going to go to hell because of their sins. It's all based on sin. Nobody talks about sin nature.

Yeah, and the word does say that you're that a non-believer dies in his sins, because the sins are attached to the nature, and if you're attached to the nature, you're also attached to the sins, even though they've been paid for. But if you get rid of the sins and you're still attached to the nature... Yeah, see, that's the philosophy that you see in most denominations.

I get rid of the sins. We never discuss the sin nature. I'm clear. I'm good. It's all good if I get rid of my sins. But if you have a sin nature, it isn't all good. Because you can get rid of the actions and still have the nature and you're still in trouble and you're still going to die. That's right. But the focus is still on yourself. You got rid of them. That's right. That's right.

So now the next thing I want to talk about is the little phrase that says death reigned. What's the word reign mean? You Americans have trouble with that word. What does it mean? It means that death reigned. No one escaped. Death was the king. Death was king. Everybody's under it and nobody gets to escape.

We're under it. We're still under it physically. Yeah, that's still true. We're still under it. You know, we've got these guys called doctors who are making a fortune off of this principle. The guys at the funeral home, they're all living off of this one principle. So you have to understand that death is a reigning principle and you are not going to escape it. Now those in the world think that maybe they are.

The human race is under the sentence of death and Adam. And they didn't bring it upon themselves other than the fact that they sinned in Adam. But Adam, when he sinned, brought death to the whole creation. which includes other things other than human beings, animals, plants, everything's in a state of dying. Tell me something that's lived longer than Adam. They say some of those trees in California might have.

Let me ask you, did actually Eve take a bite also? She took the first bite. So then actually, how come we don't say because Adam was first born, Yeah, that's a good question. Does everybody understand that thought that came to mind? Let's say Eve took a bite out of him and Adam didn't. What happens? Adam had a direct connection. Okay, but if she did also, how come we don't ever hear about that? Well, you do.

It says that there's that whole scenario about where Satan tempted her and she saw that the tree was good for food and good to make one wise and so she got persuaded And she took it and then she just handed it to Adam and he ate it. If Eve had eaten it and Adam hadn't eaten it, the whole creation doesn't fall because she's not the head.

She came from him. The direct command given to Adam. Not to her. Right, not to her. And she misunderstood the command because if you read there carefully, God told Adam, don't eat it. Eve told Satan, we're not to touch it or eat it. God said nothing about touching.

Maybe he was acting like the Israelites. Like the Jews. They've got a law to keep them from committing a real law. I don't know what happens to Eve. God's got to go find somebody else I guess. The whole race only falls in Adam. Two men. Really important. Question four. Why does the word say that death reigned from Adam to Moses? And here's a quote from Newell, I thought this was great.

He said, I traveled around this world from west to east, beginning from Chicago. That was the west in those days, beginning with Chicago. As we went eastward to the older parts of the states, we saw the stones thicker and thicker in the cemeteries. Then in England and Scotland, still more cemeteries with still more monuments to the reign of death. But when we got out to the old China, I was literally appalled at the number of tombs in the coffin. Surely death has reigned through Adam." It's a great quote. When we say that death reigns as king, we say that death has absolute authority. Nobody escapes it. Can you name any human beings that escaped death? I only know of one. Elijah? Elijah? Elijah. Which one? Is that the only one?

I don't remember. Oh, Enoch. Enoch escaped death at Enoch. Oh, that's right, he did. Gotta keep all those E words straight. I think that Lazarus is coming out of that grave and if he's thinking that he's thinking, man I've got to go do this again. The word for reign is Basilio is used denoting sovereignty and not mere lordship. That's question four. Alright question five.

The phrase is a figure of him to come tells us what about Adam and Christ. What does that tell us about two natures? Adam was a type. And the word type is interesting here. You will see in the Old Testament men and women that are referred to as types. Adam was a type of him to come. What sort of type? In other words he was an example of him to come. is a type of Christ. Right? You see that? Why? Why is Isaac a type of Christ? He was going to be sacrificed. No. Think about it. He's a human? No. Who's the other guy?

What promise did God make to Abraham? That you're going to have a son. And oh by the way, you're going to have a year from today. And that's after that promise had been made several decades before that to Abraham and he and Sarah are hanging around and they decide they are going to help God out. They are too old to have children but Adam obviously isn't so Sarah has got this girl working for her named Hagar and she says I know what God wants us to do you need that go have relations with the Hagar and will produce a son and that's what God means.

But God said, no that's not what I had in mind. So what makes Isaac the type of Christ? Number one, he's a miracle child. How old was Abraham and Sarah when Isaac was born? 90 and 100. He is the son of promise that makes him a type. He's not born of the flesh. He's born of promise.

Abraham when they went to do the sacrifice also believed that he would be resurrected because he'd been promised that his seed would be great as the sand of the sea or whatever. At a point when Isaac was probably in his thirties. God told him to Abraham to take Isaac up on a hill and sacrifice him and so he did, took him up there, raised his hand that was going to kill him and in his mind he was willing to do it because he knew God could give life. He trusted God enough at that point to allow to do whatever God told him to do and God stayed his hand obviously. But that's again, Isaac is the son of promise. It's really important, he's a type. Adam is the type of what? Of who? What's the verse say? He's the type of the one who was to come. What are we talking about here? So what makes Adam a type of Christ? He's a head of a race. He's the federal head of a race. Now, can you say, well who's the prototype man? When God created Adam, who did he copy? Himself. No. He copied Christ. Christ is the prototype man.

When Christ shows up on the scene, can you say about Christ that by one man grace entered the world and life by grace so grace passed upon all men and all men are alive? No. But you can say, which is about to say, that by one man grace entered the world, didn't it? Yes. Who's that man? Christ. Christ.

So what does Adam bring to the table? sin and everybody from him is under death. Christ brings grace and life so everybody under him gets grace and life. The problem is how do you get from Adam to Christ? That is what identification answers. How does God take somebody who is from Adam and get them lined up under Christ.

So when we talk about the fact that Adam has declared a type of him to come, we're talking about Christ and Christ is termed the last Adam. Isn't that interesting? He's known as the last Adam. There's not going to be another man show up who's ahead of anything. Christ is it. So we get condemnation by one man, we get justification by the other.

Again I refer to 1st Corinthians 15.23, as in Adam all die, So also in Christ shall all be made alive. Now think about that in terms of separation. All men are separated from God in Adam. Does that mean that now that Christ has come everybody gets saved?

No. We have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. everyone could. Yeah that's a good way to put it. Everybody could in the sense that the opportunity, grace has been presented to every man. See that? Now that's true of every single human being on the earth. Federal heads or representative men represent their race. See that? Federal heads or representative men represent their race. and the race that comes from them will be identical to them.

So when we talk about, when we use the word federal head, the word federal here really means that the actions of the one is representative of the actions of all of them. Like we have a representative form of government. Our leaders are supposed to reflect our actions, what we want. But they don't. Under this circumstance, all of those that come from the federal head should act like the federal head.

You see that? And as a representative, that man is willing to take the consequences of his behavior. In some cases in Adam it's negative, in Christ it's all good. So why is the offense of one unlike the gift of the other? That's a hard question. Let's read the verse. Verse 15. But the free gift is not like the offense. For if by the one man's offense many died, much more the grace of God and the gift by grace of the one man Jesus Christ abounded to many. What makes them different? One is automatic and the other must be accepted.

Well, the first one says, it doesn't say all died. It says many, which seems perplexing to me. First means all. All died and haven't. That's what it means. I have written down condemnation by one and justification by the other. Okay, that's good. You're not going to get the answer until next week. Christ's gift brings grace to all who believe. Wouldn't Christ's gift bring grace to all? Isn't grace there?

For the taking you have to cash the check. You have to leave one. I'm not going to answer it. You can talk all you want. You're not prepared, right? He doesn't know the answer. It's a rather long answer. We'll pick up at question six next week. Let's close. Dear Father, how we thank you for your word and your son. how wonderful it is to begin to understand that we really are from your son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And we pray in his name. Amen.