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The River ChurchSermons

Righteousness

Through One Man

Jayson Combs · Sunday, 29 June 2025 · Romans 5:12-21 · 30:15 · 3,998 words

Romans S10 · 5:12-21 Waterford

There is no public page for this message yet — the transcript below is the whole of it.

The sermon explores Romans 5:12-21, showing how sin and death entered the world through Adam and continue to affect all people. It presents the idea that Adam represents humanity, just as Christ represents those who believe. The message challenges listeners to consider what reigns in their lives, whether it is sin and death or God's grace. It calls believers to live under the reign of grace and invites those who have not accepted Christ to turn to him for salvation and freedom from sin.

What this sermon is about

Ranked by keyness against every other sermon in the corpus. Each one is a word this sermon actually said — nothing here was written by a model.

adam 48 reign 27 represent 22 sin 79 death 42 eve 8 mankind 9 representation 5 belt 4 trespass 8 corruption 5 champion 4

Topics

Sin 16 Grace 5 Freedom 2 Salvation 2 Adoption & Sonship 1 Faith 1 The Law 1 The Flesh 1 Righteousness 1

Scripture referenced 23

Verified against the transcript. A reference the recording does not support is never listed here.

Romans 5 1:09 Romans 5 1:52 Romans 5:1 1:57 Romans 5:2 2:07 Romans 5:2 2:19 Romans 5:5 3:00 Romans 5:6-11 3:07 Romans 5:11 3:25 Romans 5:12 6:37 Romans 5:12 9:16 Romans 5:12 9:32 Romans 8 9:58 Romans 8:21 10:02 Genesis 3 10:48 Genesis 2:15 11:21 Ephesians 2 14:17 Genesis 3 16:02 Romans 8:14 21:47 1 Corinthians 15:22 23:35 1 Corinthians 15:18-21 23:50 Romans 6 25:14 Romans 6 25:45 Romans 6:17-18 25:45

Transcript

Every word, as spoken, with the second it was said. Each word links to its own entry in the index.

Pre-service announcement — 9 lines, 0:43. Excluded from every count and search on this site, kept here so nothing is hidden.

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Good morning. Welcome to the River Church.

If you have your Bible, Romans chapter number 5 is where we will be at.

If you're new, my name is Jason Combs.

I have the privilege of being the location pastor here, and I love it.

And so grateful to be able to share the word with you this morning.

And to go to God's word.

So we are studying the book of Romans.

And last week, we studied the beginning of chapter 5, verses 1 through 11.

And last week was this exciting, wonderful, joyful passage.

It was just, to be honest with you, it was one of those ones that was like,

okay, I'm excited to preach this one.

Not that I'm not excited to preach the other ones, but it's a joyful,

like I like preaching joyful sermons. They're fun.

And it was just...

Talking about what does it look like?

What are the results of truly being saved?

And so Paul, through the first four chapters, is really defending the point of what a true believer is.

What does that look like?

What happens when somebody's saved?

In chapter 5, he speaks of the joyous results.

In verse 1, it talks about the result of being saved is that we have peace with God.

We're no longer at war with God because of Christ.

We have peace with the Lord.

And then verse 2 says we have access to the grace of God.

That we now come into friendship with the Almighty God.

Just keep reading.

In verse 2, it says that we have a hope of glory.

That really, when we look at this, we see the Lord dealing with our past sins.

So that we have peace with God.

And then the presence to have the grace of God poured out on us.

That we are in friendship now.

With the Lord.

And then we get to look forward to the hope of glory.

To spend eternity with the Lord.

And things are so good.

As Paul is saying, things are so wonderful.

He says, even when things are bad.

When there's difficulties.

We're alright because we know the great Almighty God can use everything to grow our hope in Him.

In verse 5, it says we're soaked in God's love.

That God's love is poured out on us through the Holy Spirit.

And then verses 6 through 11.

We come to an understanding.

It speaks of mankind that we who are weak and ungodly and sinners.

We who have rejected God.

That at the perfect time, God sent His Son and He died on the cross and He rose again.

And verse 11 says,

More than that, we rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Through whom we have now received reconciliation, friendship to the glory of the Lord.

So last week, we just talked about enjoying God.

Enjoying the Lord.

The goodness of God.

The peace of God.

Now, as we walk in a broken world, we can enjoy the Lord.

But, we have a negative Nancy in the audience.

We have a Debbie down.

We have someone.

Now, at 8 o'clock, Nancy was sitting back there like, are you talking about me?

No, I'm not saying here.

I'm saying as Paul is writing.

As I said, when Paul writes, many times you find his writing is responding to a difficult question.

So, as he talks about the joy.

The joyous peace and hope of the Lord.

It's almost like somebody brings up a question.

Yeah, but have you looked outside?

Do you see the difficulties happening?

Do you see the cancer?

Do you see the sickness?

Do you see death?

There are infants dying.

There are people starving.

You talk about the joy of the Lord.

Yeah, things don't look great out there.

One pastor said, it's like he's answering the question from the excitement and promises of change in the beginning of the chapter.

Someone is asking, how can you make such confident claims in light of the enormous power of death and sin that is now in the world?

And Paul, as I'm reading, it's almost like he responds to this question by saying, yeah, you're right.

Things are a mess.

Things are worse than you think.

As we come to this chapter, he talks about the reign of death.

The reign of sin.

So, me being visual.

I have another visual for you just because I want you to maybe think about something during the week.

So, when I think about someone who is reigning or like the undisputed champion, you know, they always carry around a belt.

It's important, right?

If they're the undisputed, and I know some of you are looking at me and going, wait a minute, pastor.

That's a wrestling belt.

This is two weeks in a row you've used a wrestling illustration.

You've gone too far.

It's the only wrestling belt I have, right?

I didn't buy it.

Somebody gave it to me, right?

So, when you think about the undisputed.

Undisputed champion.

They walk around.

They're the one who rules at that weight class.

They're the strongest.

They're the dominant.

And they have their belt.

I'm the undisputed champion.

So, in a sense here, I want you to think as Paul responds to the mess.

He says, yeah, I want you to know.

I want you to think about this undisputed victor over mankind that is reigning.

That is ruling.

That is ruling.

So, let's read a little bit.

Matthew, or excuse me, Romans 5, verse 12 says this.

Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man.

Just look at how many times the word one comes up over and over here.

Just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin.

And so, death spread to all men because all sin.

For sin indeed was in the world before the law was given.

And so, just to keep you flowing along.

He's saying.

He's saying sin came one man.

And they're saying, wait a minute.

There wasn't even the law.

So, people, again, the argument.

The law is Moses brought the Ten Commandments.

The law.

This says what's right and wrong.

And so, people can even think, well, before the law, I mean, there was no law.

And so, he's pointing to there was sin before the law.

But sin is not counted.

It's a little different where there was no law.

Yet, death reigned from Adam to Moses.

The consequence of sin.

Adam, you have Noah, right?

You have responsibility to sin.

Death reigns from Adam to Moses.

Even over those who sinning was not like the transgression of Adam.

Who was a type of the one who was to come.

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.

And the free gift.

The free gift is not like the result of that of one man's sin.

For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation.

But the free gift following many trespasses brought justification.

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 the righteous reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.

Talking about what will reign.

It talks about the reign of death.

And so in the beginning, Paul is saying, yeah, I get it.

Things are bad.

One pastor says, Paul goes on to describe the effects of sin in the human race in depths beyond what anyone would think.

Another pastor said that mankind's ruin in just 25 English words is given in verse 12.

He said, here's the foundational statement of our human condition.

The foundation of ruin.

And you look back at verse 12.

Sin came into the world through one man.

Death through sin.

Death spread to all men because all sin.

So again, one pastor says it this way.

The order is the entrance of sin, the entrance of death, the spread of universal death because all sin.

Paul acknowledges the disaster.

Romans 8, a couple chapters, he talks about sin and creation.

Romans 8, 21 says,

But the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.

And not only creation, but we ourselves, we have the firstfruits of the Spirit grown inwardly

as we wait eagerly for the adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.

In this passage, Paul says, death reigns.

And he takes us all the way back to Adam.

So all the way back to the beginning of our Bible in Genesis chapter 3.

And he says, for by one man, one man, we see corruption comes.

We see death comes.

And now he's pointing to Adam in the beginning that God created Adam.

God created man and woman.

And Adam is in the garden and Adam has friendship with the Lord.

Community with the Lord.

And Adam specifically is given a commandment.

It's in Genesis 2, 15.

The Lord took the man, put him in the garden of Eden to work it and to keep it.

And the Lord God commanded the man saying,

You may surely eat of every tree of the garden.

But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat.

For in the day you eat of it, you shall surely die.

Here Paul tells us, one man's sin came.

Corruption has come.

Death has come.

The answer was, you shall surely die.

And so what Paul is doing, he's using Adam as the figure that we are all connected to.

And he's using this to defend the position that there is one man who represents mankind.

Now, if you look to Genesis as just poetic teaching.

If you look and say, well, Adam really isn't real.

It was just a poetic teaching.

And just trying to teach.

To teach us truth.

If you do that, you will struggle.

It will disrupt the truth that Paul is teaching here.

Because Paul connects Adam to every single one of us.

If you know the story of Adam and Eve.

That they were in the garden.

Eve was tempted.

Eve took of the fruit.

Adam took of the fruit.

And they sinned.

And what did sin do?

They hid from God.

What did sin do?

It brought separation from God.

What did sin do?

It brought death.

So Adam is placed here as that one man.

And you may argue, but Eve took first the fruit.

It's her fault.

And so we look and we see the responsibility of Adam to lead his family.

We see the responsibility that Eve was deceived.

But it seems that Adam wasn't deceived.

He deliberately knew what the truth was.

He deliberately disobeyed.

So in this passage, the Bible says,

By one man, sin came.

And death through sin.

And so death spread to all men.

This isn't as cheery as the sermon is last week.

But the truth is, sin brings death.

And you may say, wait a minute.

When Adam sinned, he didn't die.

Well, when we look at sin in the Bible, there is the physical death.

And yes, Adam did die.

And Eve did die.

We see the consequence of sin.

That has spread to all of mankind.

All of mankind is now appointed to die.

Death came.

But death is not only physical.

Death is spiritual.

Ephesians 2 says,

You were dead in the trespasses and sin in which you once walked.

It is a physical and spiritual.

When you go to the book of Revelation,

talking about the Lord returning,

it talks about a second death.

Those who have rejected the Lord.

Not only losing your life here,

but the second death.

This picture of being separated from the Lord for eternity.

When we study the Bible and we look to death,

the Bible speaks of death differently.

The world speaks of death.

The world looks at death and they go,

Look!

Circle of life.

If I was good, I'd just start singing it.

It's just the circle of life.

It's just the give and take.

It's just what's going to happen.

But the Bible says it's not.

It's the circle of death.

I don't think they'd have sold as many records if they'd have made that song.

Look!

I love how one person said it.

Human death is a consequence of sin.

Not a part of the...

The natural cycle of life and death.

Death is a foe, not a friend.

It's a curse, an outrage.

It is a bitter fruit of the fall.

It is not the natural process.

The Lord gave us life.

Sin brings death.

There are some that even argue,

Well, Adam and Eve, they were still created to die.

No, when you study, you look at the end of Genesis 3,

you see, no, they were given life eternally.

Eternal sin brings death.

And then the end of this verse says this,

Because all sinned.

This is where we begin to dig a little bit deep into this passage.

Now, you may be sitting there going,

Pastor, we've already covered this.

The Bible says,

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

When we talk about it, look at my life.

Yep, I did that bad.

I did that bad.

I did...

Yep, I have sinned.

Because I have done wrong things,

I am separated from the Lord.

And this is true.

But this meaning here is deeper than that.

You may think,

Okay, Pastor, I know.

We all have sin nature.

We have sin nature in that because Adam sinned,

we have that nature.

We are prone to wander.

We are prone to sin.

Like, in us is this sinful nature.

Just ask your one-and-a-half-year-old.

It's there, isn't it?

You didn't have to teach it.

You didn't have to go,

Okay, let me teach you how to lie.

Let me teach you how to...

Like, it's all right there.

And yes, this is true.

The sinful nature.

One said humans choose sin because they are sinful from birth.

They have Adam's sinful nature.

Moral corruption shows early, right?

God designed Adam as a representation of humanity.

And so God imputed his sin to the human race.

His nature is ours and we follow his example into sin.

So again, one said Adam's sin has sway over us.

It dominates us.

How quickly we are dominated by sin,

whether it's sex or it's food or it's whatever it is.

How quickly we're dominated, right?

The heart is wicked.

Now, this is true that we are sinful.

This is true that we have a sin nature.

But in this passage, I believe it's saying more than that.

Because it says,

Because all sin have sinned in Adam.

So one said Paul is saying that the whole race sinned in one single past action.

See, I've heard this thought before.

People will go,

Man, if Adam just wouldn't have messed up, I'd have been okay.

If Adam would have kept it together, we would have all been good.

We'd have all been fine.

The Lord created Adam.

It's a representation of you.

It's what you.

It's what you would have done in the garden.

See, the Bible says all sin.

We all sinned in Adam.

This is why, like, when we're born, we're not like, oh, clean slate.

No, we, mankind, sinned with Adam.

Adam is our representation.

And I know what some of you may be thinking.

Why does Adam get to represent me?

I don't like it.

As I was studying this, one of the authors was talking about how in our Western culture,

we don't want people to represent us.

We have a me mentality.

In the Eastern culture, it's a little bit more.

Our family represents us.

And our parents and our grandparents, we're all together.

But in our culture, it's a me.

What do you mean somebody can represent me?

Why don't you put me in the garden?

Do you want to test me?

I'd do better.

Well, if I look at your record, it says you wouldn't.

So this author talked about how, in a way, it looks a little political.

We can use this to help us.

Like, we vote for somebody to represent us.

But I didn't vote for that person.

Right?

But they represent you.

So what?

What they do affects you.

So even if they say, hey, we're at war, and you go, I'm not at war, they represent you.

I'm not at peace.

We're at peace.

There's this representation.

The author used this point also.

He said, it's like the power of attorney.

Somebody doesn't even need to be there.

They represent you.

So the pushback is, I don't want him to represent me.

And the question is, do you believe God knows you?

The Bible says we created Adam.

We sinned with Adam.

He perfectly represents us, how we would act, who we are.

You may say, I don't like the exchange.

I think this is an unfair exchange, that Adam is the one that represents mankind.

I think this is unfair.

This is when passage transitions.

Here, it says that Adam is a type of Christ.

It says, verse 14,

Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam.

Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come.

So he goes and says, see, Adam, how did he represent us?

He brought, there's corruption, there's death, sin reigns.

But Adam is a type of one who is Jesus.

And after all these things I've said, you'd be like, how does,

and all the things you said about Adam, how does that, how is that a type of Christ?

How is that a shadow of Christ?

He's a shadow of Christ that Adam is a representation of mankind.

But because God offers, because God loves us, he offers his son to represent.

See, there's many who scream, I want to represent myself.

And God goes, no, you don't.

Because we, if we represent ourselves, we have completely rejected God.

But God loves us in that when we are ungodly sinners, he sends his son Jesus to say,

Christ will represent you.

Who?

Who Christ is and his perfection and who he is.

Now God looks at us and says, you know what?

I see you as the one who represents you.

And if you're a Christian, it's the most joyous thing because it's not by our works.

We know God looks to Jesus.

And that's where we receive our approval.

First Corinthians 15, 22 says, for as an Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.

Verse 18 through 21, it says, therefore, as one trespass, Adam led to condemnation for all men.

So one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men.

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.

Now the law came to increase the trespass.

But where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.

So that as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness,

leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The challenge to think about this morning is what is reigning in your life.

If we are believers, what we have done, we've looked to Adam and said, you're fired.

You don't represent me anymore.

No more does sin represent me.

No more does death reign on my life.

Jesus is the one.

Now the grace of God reigns because Jesus is who represents me.

In Romans 6, it says, we know that our old self was crucified with him

in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing

so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.

For one who has died has been saved.

Set free from sin.

Maybe you need to hear this.

If you're in the Lord and you know the Lord, you have been set free from sin.

He goes on to say in verse 17 and 18 in chapter 6,

Thanks be to God that you who were once slaves to sin have become obedient from the heart

to the standard of teaching to which you were confirmed

and having been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.

Being saved is this massive change.

When we talk to people in the world, there's always this argument of,

you know what, I've done these little sins, but they're not massive sins

because I've compared my sins to people who do massive sins.

So I got this little box of sins, but I'm going to be okay

because little box of sins should be all right.

What Paul is doing here, he's crushing the idea that we are just a little sinful mankind.

He's saying we're sinful from the beginning.

We've rejected the Lord and the beauty of his love for us.

It's that while we rejected him, Christ died for us.

So maybe you're here and you've never truly accepted Christ.

The truth is you never fired Adam.

Sin reigns in your life.

You've not received the righteousness of God, the justification from you.

You haven't received the salvation of the Lord.

It is not by your works.

As Paul has said over and over again, it is by believing and putting your faith in Christ.

Repent of your sins this morning.

Cry out to Jesus and say, Jesus, save me.

Be Lord of my life.

And the Bible says you will be saved to be a new creation, a new creature, to a new life, born again.

And if you're unsure or don't know, don't leave.

Cry out to the Lord this morning.

Say, Lord, I trust you.

I believe in the cross.

I believe you rose again.

And the miracle happens that if you accept Christ, it is Christ who represents you for eternity.

To stand before the Lord.

The Lord sees the righteousness of Jesus.

But maybe you're here this morning.

You've accepted Christ.

But if you're honest, the grace of God is not reigning in your life.

Who Christ is and the call he has for your life is not reigning.

Right?

Because when grace reigns in our life, we are different.

We act different.

We respond differently at work.

We respond differently at home.

We respond differently in our marriage.

We respond differently as parents.

We respond differently as teenagers.

It looks different the way the world sees it.

They are under the reign.

They're undisputed champions.

They are following after sin.

But if we know the Lord, we have a new life.

Let's run after the grace of God.

Let's run after and ask the Lord, help me to grow in your grace that that may reign over my life.

And how I talk and how I live and where I go and what I do.

I love Romans because it so shows power of true salvation.

And grace reigning in your life.

Are you still in a place where death reigns?

This morning, you can accept the grace of God.

Accept his truth and accept his way.