For Those Who Know How To Mess Up
Read: Romans 5:12-21
12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned— 13 for sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. 14 Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come. 15 But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many. 16 And the free gift is not like the result of that one man’s sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brought justification. 17 For if, because of one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ. 18 Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. 19 For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous. 20 Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, 21 so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Way back in the old days when I was a silly teenager with delusions of invincibility, I put off typing a research paper until the night before it was due. As midnight approached, I reached the end of the sixteen pages, only to have the power suddenly cut off. All that I had written disappeared. I had not been saving the paper as I’d been writing, and this was before the time of AutoSave (of course!). I was ruined.
But in stepped my father. As I read the paper aloud, my sweet father sat up all night, retyping that paper for me with his much speedier fingers. I was saved. Years later, I still remember the relief I felt at the moment he offered to help me. I still feel deep gratefulness for his selflessness. I still shake my head at the girl who tried to cram that paper in at the last minute—such foolishness!
Years later, wow! I can still mess things up. Leave it to me, and I will make anything more complicated, stressful, frustrating than it should be. A child’s moment of insecurity will be compounded by my impatient response. A bit of advice glibly offered to a friend turns out to steer her in the wrong direction. After 50 years of driving, I can still pull too close to another car while parking and leave dents on two vehicles. I can send an email I later regret faster than you can blink, and I can put off what ought to be done until it’s way too late to do it.
This is what we humans do. We mess things up and make things worse. Adam started it. Thinking he was invincible, he went forward, disobeyed his good Creator, and took the fruit. Through him, as Romans 5:1 tells us, sin entered the world, infecting every last one of us. “Death reigned through that one man” (verse 17). He began—and I am not exaggerating—the ruin of us all. I do not blame him. I know I would have messed it up, too.
But in stepped our Father. As we stood helpless, our good Creator, overflowing with grace, sent the Son as our ransom. He alone knew how to address the situation and rebuild our lives. As a single man began our sin, so a single God-man would end it. The beauty and perfection with which our complicated mess was fixed is stunning to me. No one else could have come up with such a thing. What does man dream up to solve the sin-problem? A million rules. A million sacrifices. A million dollar payment plan. Ignore the problem altogether and deny there is a God at all. But all our attempted righteousness is but as filthy rags before God (Isaiah 64:6). No, only our God knew what the answer was. Only our God would design a remedy in which He Himself suffered for us. One man for all of mankind.
Charles Spurgeon also marveled at the unique design of God’s ransom for us:
“Such a plan was never heard of in human courts of law; or if it has ever been spoken of there, it was because, first of all, both the ears of him who heard it had been made to tingle while God revealed it out of his own heart. ‘I have found a ransom’ (Job 33:24). Nobody would have thought of that way of the deliverance of a sinner from the pit of hell through a ransom if God had not thought of it….the Lord himself says, ‘I have found a ransom.’ It is the man who sinned, but it is God who found the ransom. It is the man who is going down to the pit, but it is God who finds a ransom. Surely, if you have sold yourself to sin and Satan, you must find the ransom to get yourself set free, must you not? ‘No,’ says sovereign grace, ‘the man has sold himself into slavery, but I have found a ransom. I have broken the bonds from off his neck, and set him free by a price immense which I myself have found, — found it in my own bosom, where my only-begotten and well-beloved Son was lying; found it in myself, for I have given up myself to bleed and die for mortal men.’ Oh, this is wonderful grace indeed, — that God should deliver, and should deliver through a ransom, and should deliver through a ransom that he has himself found!”
Thank you Father, Son, and Spirit for the wondrous plan you worked out. I needed your rescue from the curse of Adam’s legacy, and I could not dream up a way out. The relief I feel is palpable. Like my sixteen-year-old self rescued by her father, I stare at your selflessness in wonder. No matter how foolish I was and am, no matter how much of a mess I make for myself and for others, you step in. Ruin is not the end of the story. Grace is. It always is.
