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JESUS: ADAM’S
SUBSTITUTE
Unless indicated otherwise, all Scripture
references are to the New International Version, UK
edition
WHY DID Jesus have to
die?
For this overview we’ll take Romans 5: 19
as the basis for our explanation: ‘For just as through the disobedience of
the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one
man the many will be made righteous’.
To properly understand the question and its
answer, we need to go back to the time when Adam fell into sin through
disobedience. (For simplicity, we will leave Eve out of this equation.) By his
transgression Adam came under the dying process and lost his perfect standing
before his Creator. God had warned Adam that the penalty of disobedience was
death (not life on another plane) (Genesis
2: 17). Adam’s offspring came
under his penalty.
In order for Adam to be acquitted, Divine
Justice demanded an equivalent substitutionary payment: Adam the perfect
man could be bought out from under the sentence of death only by another perfect
man. The redemption of Adam would mean the redemption of his race, the entire
human family. But as no one could be found amongst Adam’s race to pay such an
exact redemption-price,[fn1] it was necessary that the Son of God be born
in the flesh, but not of Adam’s lineage. Hence the Virgin birth. On the cross
Jesus paid the Ransom-Price with His own self (1
Peter 2: 24).
Couching this in another figure, we might say
that bail has been paid at the front desk, but the cheque has not yet been
cashed. The release of the prisoner is guaranteed, but there is a delay between
Cross and Deliverance. The hiatus has been a difficult, fruitful one. Difficult,
because of the unspeakable sufferings through which the human family has had to
pass, collectively and as individuals; troubles so complex that many have lost
belief in God and have abandoned what faith they may have had. Fruitful, because
in the interim God has been selecting a Bride for His Son, a small company of
faithful followers who have proved loyal during this period in which faith is
essential, the age of Election. The age to come (the Millennium) will be one of
Free Grace, during which the full benefits of Christ’s sacrifice will be applied
for all and God’s love for mankind will be irrefutably demonstrated and the
present distress compensated for.
[fn1] Romans 3: 10; Psalm 49: 7-9 (Return to text)
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