So history starts with the first Adam, and Jesus is called the last Adam in places like 1 Corinthians 15:45 and Romans 5:12–21. The first Adam sinned and this last Adam atoned for sin. Through the first Adam, the human race fell; through the last Adam, members of that race can be saved. Through the first Adam, there was condemnation; through the last Adam, there can salvation. Through the first Adam, we inherit a sin nature; through the last Adam, we receive a new nature. Through the first Adam, we’re born sinners; through the last Adam, we’re born again, saints. The first Adam turned from God in a garden; and the last Adam turned to God in a garden, the Garden of Gethsemane. The first Adam was a sinner; and the last Adam is a Savior of sinners. The first Adam yielded to Satan; and the last Adam defeated Satan. The first Adam sinned at a tree; and the last Adam atoned for sin on a tree. The first Adam brought thorns; the last Adam wore a crown of thorns. The first Adam was naked and unashamed; the last Adam was stripped naked and bore our shame. Everybody is born in Adam. My hope is that you would be born again in the last Adam, Jesus Christ. See, Jesus is the better, greater Adam.
Mark Driscoll – How Jesus Taught the Bible
Jesus paid it all,
All to him I owe;
Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow.
Oh praise the One who paid my debt
And raised this life up from the dead.
One of the things that I am not known as is a ball of emotion, but this song wrecks me every time; and, honestly, I’m not sure why.
I don’t mean “I’m not sure why” because I disagree with it or because I don’t “get” the theological implications of the truth of this hymn/song. What I mean is that the truth of the stain of my sin and the costliness and effectiveness of Jesus’ payment doesn’t often hit me consciously. Why is it that this song brings it up? Why does that three-tone quarter-note progression consistently bring me to the point of real tears and help me really, really get it and own those things?
Despite it not being often conscious, I think I really do know the depth of my own sin. I know that it is all-encompassing. I know that I am constantly under its sway to abandon what I want to do and to pursue those things that bring rot to my heart. I also have experienced my inability to change myself. I struggle just to change my actions, to throw off the lies that I believe that hold me down, to press forward to own the strength that God has given to overpower my own faults – and I fail to do those things. And those things stain. They stain in a way that leaves a blot on my life – and my life is under a debt. The stain is like blood on a wedding dress, the debt is deeper and more life-destroying than a foreclosure on a dream house.
Yet, there is Someone who can clean it!
There is Someone who has paid it!
I was quite literally damned without it. I am quite literally helpless without His cleansing.
For this I am thankful – and that is why the tears come. Not out of the fear of what could have been – but out of gratitude of what has been done to save me from it.
