Proper 7: Two Sources, Two Humanities: Grace Abounding
Romans 5:15b-19 NRSV
Many years ago, bottled water companies began emphasizing not the bottle, but the source.
Their message was simple:
if the source is pure, the water will be pure.
If the source is contaminated, everything downstream is affected.
We understand this instinctively.
In fact, modern history gives us sobering examples of it.
In 1993, the city of Milwaukee experienced a major water crisis when a single microscopic contaminant entered the municipal water supply. The result was catastrophic: over 400,000 people became ill, and dozens of deaths were linked to the outbreak. Ordinary households across an entire city were affected—not because of what they did at their taps, but because something had gone wrong upstream at the source.
Whether it is river, a reservoir, or an entire distribution system, the principle holds: when the source is compromised, everything downstream is affected.
Paul says the same thing about humanity in Romans 5.
Our problem is not merely that we make bad choices downstream. Something has gone wrong at the source.
One man's trespass (deliberate and conscious decision) unleashed sin and death into the human race. Adam is the source from which the river of fallen humanity flows.
But Paul immediately introduces another source. Through one man, Jesus Christ, grace has overflowed to many.
If Adam is the polluted river that carries death,
Christ is the living river that carries righteousness and life.
Romans 5 is the story of two sources, two rivers, and two humanities. EVERYONE IS A PART OF ONE OR OTHER. THERE’S NOT A 3RD OPTION
BTW. The question is: From which source are you drinking?
ARE YOU IN ADAM OR IN CHRIST?
And what Paul wants us to see is that while no one is unaffected:
What Jesus accomplished was far superior to what Adam started.
Adam’s sin affected all of us. He’s not merely a moral example. He is the headwaters of a fallen humanity. His act of rebellion does not stay contained. It spreads. It defines the condition of those who come after him.
Romans 5:12 says: “just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned
Paul wants us to see that we are not merely people who commit sins (we do). Rather: We are people born into a broken stream.
Article IX of the Thirty-Nine Articles describes original sin as:
“The fault and corruption of the nature of every man naturally engendered of the offspring of Adam.”
This confronts modern assumptions of self-invention. Scripture says we are not morally neutral. We are born into a humanity already facing death.
It’s By God’s grace, along the way, that we see the truth of this lived out in our own everyday lives - as we honestly see ourselves in light of the holy holy holiness of God. In light of our inability. Our lack of desire to live his way.
That’s the effect of Adam - our inheritance expressing itself through us.
As Genesis tells us God gave incredible freedom and abundance in the Garden of Eden. And drew only one line don’t eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil for in the day in which you eat of it you will surely die.
And Adam deliberately crossed it.
I remember seeing this in one of my kids. We lived on “cut through” street. People used our street to quickly cut through from one busy road to another to save time on their commute and we didn’t have speed bumps to slow them down.
Our children were little - we gave them the abundance of the whole yard to play in - with only 1 condition - don’t go in the street . Don’t cross the curb. I watched one of kids repeatedly find her way to edge of the street. Looking at the curb. Observing the curb. Occasionally glancing over her shoulder to see if anyone was watching her looking at the curb. And then one day - you guessed it — she did it - she deliberately put her toe in the street.
It’s cute and funny - but there’s nothing unique about it.
That’s what ADAM - and Eve did. That’s what we all do because that’s now who we are. Like Adam we do what we want to do - thinking about ourselves.
But the Good news is that Jesus Christ, the Son God, came into the world of his creation. He’s called the second Adam. But as the Nicene creed and our Eucharist liturgy make clear:
For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven, was incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary and was made man.
He doesn’t have Adam’s seed. Or Adams corruption in him.
He didn’t have to come into the world. He didn’t have to come incarnate. He did so because was thinking not thinking of himself. He was thinking of others?
He was thinking of you.
He lived from the delight of the heavenly Father’s love and for the heavenly Father’s glory. He had no sin of his own. He did not trespass. When he died on the cross it wasn’t for himself. It was for others. It was for you. And me. In our place. To undo what Adam did.
I love how CS Lewis captures this in the Lion the Witch and the wardrobe:
Aslan has died on the stone table and he has been raised from the dead. The Great Lion explains to the young girls Lucy and Susan who are marveling at his resurrection what he has done:
“When a willing victim who has committed no treachery was killed in a traitor’s place, the Table would crack and death itself would start working backward.”
Adam brought death and condemnation for all. Christ’s obedience has the power to overcome what Adam did. To bring justification and life
Romans 5:18 says: “just as one man’s (Adams) trespass led to condemnation for all, so one man’s (Jesus) act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all. 19 For just as through the one man’s (Adams’s) disobedience the many were made sinners, so through the one man’s (Jesus) obedience the many will be made righteous.”
They both consciously acted in ways that had huge ramifications/huge results.
But they are vastly different results.
Paul wants us to marvel in this: Paul wants us to marvel in GRACE.
V15 says: But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died through the one man’s trespass, much more surely have the grace of God and the gift in the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, abounded for the many.
V 17: If, because of the one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one, much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.
If you are in Adam, and we are all born in Adam - you’re under the reign of death.
If you are in Christ, you are reborn and you will reign in life. All because Christ’s gift is greater than Adams’ sin.
Twice (5:15, 17) he says, “much more surely.” And that has to do with the abounding gift of grace.
Grace is: "divine love and protection bestowed freely upon mankind".
It’s vitally important that we live in and from the abounding of God. In the much more of grace.
Paul wants us to know that God’s grace and God’s provision for us isn’t random, haphazard or insufficient. According to the Bible, there’s always plenty. There’s always more than enough. There’s an overflow. In fact that’s what the word ADOUND means. An overflowing quantity
We come from Charleston. Our church was on an island. One side was ocean. The other side marsh and the intercostal waterway.
Whenever there was high tide during a super moon. The water would ABOUND. It becomes so full that the water encroaches on yards and creeps over roadways. Downtown Charleston floods because it’s built at sea level and water would fill the streets so that College of Charleston students could be seen kayaking through portions of the city.. That’s what it means to ABOUND.
Paul is saying that God’s grace and provision ABOUND to you through what Jesus has done for you.
Think about what God is like. God is gracious. He is lavish. He is intentional. He is a giver. John 3:16 says, “For God loved the world so much that he gave his Son…”
As Alan Redpath writes,
“When God gives grace, He does not reluctantly open a little finger and maintain a clenched fist full of gifts. God’s hands are nail-pierced hands and they are wide open. This fountain of grace is always pouring itself out with no limitation on heaven’s side at all.” Romans 8:32 says, “Since [God] did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else?” (NLT)
You might wonder: To whom does grace ABOUND? The answer is: to the person who needs it most! In Romans 5:20 Paul writes: “But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more.” (NKJV)
Grace is needed most where sin exists and when trouble comes. Like a light in a cavern, God’s ABOUNDING grace becomes more brilliant in the midst of darkness.
When I came to Christ in College (when my baptism came alive in me through faith) - I saw my desperate need…..
The Question is will you receive this abounding grace. Will you drink from the stream of Christ?
And if you have - live daily drinking from the abound grace he has for you. From who he has remade you to be in Christ. With all that affords you… And off this to those around you…
Amazing grace story:
15 But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died through the one man’s trespass, much more surely have the grace of God and the gift in the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, abounded for the many. 16 And the gift is not like the effect of the one man’s sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the gift following many trespasses brings justification. 17 If, because of the one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one, much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.
18 Therefore just as one man’s trespass led to condemnation for all, so one man’s act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all. 19 For just as through the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so through the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.
