Our Bible studies through Romans sometimes hurtle through chapters, sometimes linger on verses. Last night, we looked at Romans 5:12: “Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned…”
The Christian doctrine of original sin is fundamental to the Gospel – if there is no sin, there is no need for a Saviour, no need for salvation. The doctrine of original sin, including the theological term ‘the total depravity of man’ (meaning that sin has tainted every aspect of humanity, rather than all people being horribly wicked in every action they do), is expounded clearly in Romans 5 but is rooted in the Genesis 3 narrative of the Fall of man.
2009 saw the bicentenary of Darwin’s birth and 150 years since his ‘Origin of Species’ was published, which heralded a change in belief away from creationism (the belief that God created the heavens and earth as narrated in Genesis) towards evolution. Evolution teaches that life ‘evolved’ from nothing (there are various theories as to how this happened, including the ‘Big Bang’ theory) and that God was not involved; in fact, many evolutionists don’t believe in God at all.
Does this matter? Do you have to believe in creation to be a Christian? There are so many theories out there, even amongst Christians… surely you just go with the theory you think is the most suitable?
It’s obvious that there are many, many views on this topic and Christians definitely disagree on the subject, but it does matter what we believe, since the whole of Paul’s argument in this section of Romans is dependent on the comparison between Adam, the first man, and Christ: how the one brought sin and death into the world through his disobedience and how Christ brought salvation and redemption to the world through His obedience. If we simply evolved from nothing and Adam did not really exist, but is simply an allegory, we are in trouble when we come to Romans 5.
At the risk of stirring controversy, let me say that I believe in creationism and am deeply concerned about the way evolution is taught as fact in schools and is portrayed as fact in society, often with a corresponding denigration of Christianity. I may not have all the scientific answers (if you are interested in the topic, I would commend the ministry of Creation Ministries International to you and advise you to read widely from the material they produce at http://creation.com/), but I do believe that if you take away the doctrine of God’s creation of mankind through the one man, Adam, you are running the risk of removing so much truth that you are left with a watered down Gospel that has little impact on the world at all.
Paul teaches in Romans 5:12 that sin came into the world through one man. Adam sinned primarily because he disobeyed a direct command of God, not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Sin always involves a choice: we choose to obey God’s direct command or we choose to go our own way, seeking our own pleasure, believing that we know best.
The consequence of Adam’s sin was that mankind is now infected with sin. Sin is like pollution – often unseen, far-reaching, contaminating, damaging. The penalty of sin, Paul teaches, is death – the separation of the body from the spirit (James 2:26), a death that encompasses physical decay but also spiritual separation and alienation from God (Eph 2:1-2, Is 59:2). Adam’s actions mean that not one aspect of humanity is unaffected; sin is now in our DNA, so to speak. The harmony and pefection of the Garden of Eden have been lost.
Sin, therefore, is serious. It’s so serious that it took God’s rescue plan to sort out this problem – we were unable to sort it ourselves, since sin is part of our nature now. It’s very easy to be blind to our own sins (clearly seeing other people’s!) and we need to heed the warnings of Scripture about the deceptive and pervasive nature of sin and not tolerate it in our lives. We must always be aware, however, that it’s not just a case of the specific sins we commit, but of the sinful nature itself. The battle is far deeper than we often like to admit.
Thankfully, that’s not the end of the story! More to follow!