We have seen that Romans 1 to 8 falls into two sections. In the first, we are shown that the Blood deals with what we have done. In the second, we shall see that the Cross (the entire redemptive work – death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of the Lord Jesus Himself) deals with what we are.
The Blood can wash away our sins, but it cannot wash away our old man. It needs the Cross to crucify us. The Blood deals with the sins, but the Cross must deal with the sinner. We are not sinners because we sin, but we sin because we come from the wrong stock. We sin because we are sinners.
Our sins are dealt with by the Blood, but we ourselves are dealt with by the Cross. The Blood procures our pardon for what we have done; the Cross procures our deliverance from what we are.
At the beginning of the Christian life, we are concerned with our doing, not with our being. We are distressed more by what we have done than by what we are. We think that if only we could rectify certain things, we should be good Christians, and we set out therefore to change our actions. But the result is not what we expected. We discover that it is something more than just a case of trouble on the outside – there is more serious trouble on the inside. We try to please the Lord, but find something within that does not want to please Him. We try to be humble, but there is something in our very being that refuses to be humble. We try to be loving, but inside we feel most unloving. We smile and try to look very gracious, but inwardly we feel decidedly ungracious. The more we try to rectify matters on the outside, the more we realize how deep-seated the trouble is. Then we come to the Lord and say, ‘Lord, I see it now. Not only what I have done is wrong; I am wrong.’
The conclusion of Romans 5:18 is beginning to dawn upon us. We are sinners. The trouble is in our heredity, not in our behavior. Unless we can change our parentage, there is no deliverance for us.
As in Adam, so in Christ.
In Romans 5:12-21, we are not only told something about Adam; we are also told something about the Lord Jesus. ‘As through the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the one shall the many be made righteous.’ In Adam, we receive everything that is of Adam; in Christ, we receive everything that is of Christ. So we are presented with a new possibility. In Adam, all was lost. Through the disobedience of one man, we were all constituted sinners. By him, sin entered and death through sin, and throughout the race, sin has reigned unto death from that day on. But now a ray of light is cast upon the scene. Through the obedience of Another, we may be constituted righteous. Our despair is in Adam; our hope is in Christ.
The Divine Way of Deliverance
God has made adequate provision that we should be set free from sin’s dominion.
The Blood cannot take us out of Adam. There is only one way. Since we came in by birth, we must go out by death. To do away with our sinfulness, we must do away with our life. Bondage to sin came by birth; deliverance from sin comes by death – and it is just this way of escape that God has provided. Death is the secret of emancipation. We…died to sin (Romans 6:2).
But how can we die? Some of us have tried very hard to get rid of this sinful life, but we have found it most tenacious. What is the way out? It is not by trying to kill ourselves, but by recognizing that God has dealt with us in Christ. ‘All we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death’ (Romans 6:3).
But if God has dealt with us in Christ Jesus then we have got to be in Him for this to become effective, and that now seems just as big a problem. How are we to get into Christ? Here again, God comes to our help. We have in fact no way of getting in, but, what is more important, we need not try to get in, for we are in. What we could not do for ourselves, God has done for us. He has put us into Christ. ‘But of Him, you are in Christ’ (1 Corinthians 1:30). Praise God, It is not left to us either to devise a way of entry or to work it out. We are in; therefore we need not try to get in. It is a divine act, and it is accomplished.
The Lord God Himself has put us in Christ, and in his dealing with Christ, God has dealt with the whole race. Our destiny is bound up with His. He was crucified then what about us? Must we ask God to crucify us? Never! When Christ was crucified, we were crucified, and His crucifixion is past, therefore ours cannot be future. Just as no man could ever commit suicide by crucifixion, for it were a physical impossibility to do so, so also, in spiritual terms, God does not require us to crucify ourselves. We were crucified when Christ was crucified, for God put us there in Him. That we have died in Christ is not merely a doctrinal position, it is an eternal and indisputable fact.
His Death and Resurrection representative and inclusive
The Scriptures have never told us that we shed our blood with Christ. In His atoning work before God, He acted alone; no other could have a part. But the Lord did not die only to shed His Blood. He died that we might die. He died as our Representative. In His death, He included us. It is God’s inclusion of us in Christ that matters. It is something God has done.
In 1 Corinthians 15:45,47 two remarkable names or titles are used of the Lord Jesus. He is spoken of these as the last Adam and He is spoken of too as the Second Man. Scripture does not refer to Him as the second Adam but as the last Adam; nor does it refer to Him as the last Man, but as the Second Man. The distinction is to be noted, for it enshrines a truth of great value.
As the last Adam, Christ is the sum total of humanity; as the Second Man, He is the Head of a new race. When the Lord Jesus was crucified on the Cross, He was crucified as the last Adam. All that was in the first Adam was gathered up and done away in Him. We were included there. As the last Adam, He wiped out the old race, as the Second Man, He brings in the new race. It is in His resurrection that He stands forth as the Second Man, and there too we are included. ‘For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, we shall be also by the likeness of His resurrection.’ (Romans 6:5).
We died in Him as the last Adam; we live in Him as the Second Man. The Cross is thus the mighty act of God which translates us from Adam to Christ.