BS2H - CHRIST-THE OPPOSITE OF ADAM
The entire Old Testament pointed to the arrival of one man – Jesus. One way we can see this is to study what scholars refer to as “types” or parallels in the Old Testament, to Jesus in the New Testament. One of these parallels is Adam. The Apostle Paul tells us in Romans 5:14 that Adam was a “pattern of the one to come.” How so?
Their Names
What was Adam called?
Luke 3:38
What was Jesus called?
Luke 1:35
Notice that “son” is only capitalized when referring to Jesus. While Adam was a created son, what was Jesus?
John 1:14
“The only begotten Son of God” --- Jesus was the only one of his kind. He was not part of the creation as we are. He was born by the Spirit of God overshadowing Mary so that He would be fully man but also fully God.
Their Roles
What did God put Adam on earth to do?
Genesis 1:28
What did God send Jesus to earth to do?
Isaiah 9:7 / Jeremiah 23:5 / Daniel 7:14 / John 1:49 / John 18:37
Adam (or men and women in general) was given the task of having dominion over (or the management of) all created things on the earth – i.e. the plants and the animals (not each other).
But Jesus was sent to be king in God’s kingdom government and He would reign over men’s hearts. Until we submit to the king we are in rebellion against God’s government.
What They Did
God had given Adam and Eve only one test of free will. They could eat from every tree in the garden except for one tree –“the tree of the knowledge of good and evil”. If they ate from this tree what would happen?
Genesis 2:16-17
What did Adam and Eve decide in regard to this one test from God?
Genesis 3:6
This one act of rebellion started a long spiral down for mankind and the earth in general. Sin, sickness, and death were now part of everyday life when in fact they were never meant to be.
Now Jesus came to reverse all that Adam’s rebellion had started. How did He do this?
John 14:31
All who align their lives with Christ become His bride (the church). By Christ’s obedience to God, He has redeemed us and therefore how shall we respond?
Revelation 19:7-9
Consequences
Every action we take has some consequence. When Adam disobeyed God in the one thing He asked him not to do, it brought consequences not only on Eve and himself but on every child born after them right up to our day. What were those consequences?
Genesis 3:16-19
Jesus was God’s gift of grace to the world. He came specifically to die on our behalf so that we could be restored to God and have eternal life with God. While Adam brought condemnation for all of us, what did Jesus bring by his death on the cross?
Romans 5:18
And what does justification do for us? Bible teacher Derek Prince says justification makes you and I “just-as-if-we-had-never-sinned”.
Adam made all of us complicit in his sin. But what does Jesus provide for all who will believe in what He did for us by His death?
Romans 5:19
To be made righteous means that we are made right in God’s sight. He no longer sees us as the sinners we are in Adam.
Adam’s sin brought death to the world, but by rising from the dead Christ brought back to us the possibility of having eternal life with God.
1 Corinthians 15:20-22
Firsts
Adam could claim that he was the first person whom God created.
Genesis 2:7
What did this first man called Adam become?
1 Corinthians 15:45A
Becoming a “living soul” or a “living being” denotes a man who is animated by the “breath of life” (Genesis 2:7). Man was given more than just a physical nature with animal instincts. He was given a mind that could reason, emotions that could feel, and a will that could choose. This is the race that we all join automatically when we are born.
How did the Apostle Paul refer to Jesus in….
1 Corinthians 15:45B
Paul then goes on to explain more of the contrast between the first Adam and Jesus Christ as the “last Adam”.
1 Corinthians 15:46-49
While Adam imparted to us our physical and soul nature, Jesus was to be a “life-giving spirit” for us. Man is the only work of creation existing on three levels: body, soul (mind, will, emotions), and spirit. When Adam sinned, the life of God’s Spirit left him and he died spiritually. Therefore, all of us “born in Adam” are born physically and mentally alive---- but spiritually dead. Jesus came to reverse this.
How does Jesus have the power to make our dead spirits alive?
Reread: 1 Corinthians 15:47
God was going to send a “second man” or “second Adam” from Heaven that would be able to do this.
How does this make Jesus a “first”?
God originally made Adam and Eve with His own Holy Spirit filling their human spirit. When Adam and Eve sinned, God’s Spirit left them and they died spiritually.
When God sent Jesus to earth WHO was He full of?
Luke 4:1
Jesus was the head of a whole new race of “Adams” that would be full of God’s Spirit, the way men and women had originally been made. He was the first man alive on earth since the fall of man who was filled with the Spirit of God. Jesus is therefore the first of a “new-creation” race of people. And who can be part of this new-creation race?
2 Corinthians 5:17
In actual fact, God has put ALL of us in Christ so we can be part of this new race.
1 Corinthians 1:30 / 2 Corinthians 5:18-19
We are physically alive in Adam, but we become spiritually alive in Christ. It’s a work God has done for all of us but it’s still our choice whether we accept it and enter into that life.
Romans 5:17-19
Adam is the first human physically and mentally alive. Jesus is the first human (after the fall of man) to arrive on earth also spiritually alive. Since Jesus is both God and man, He is the reset button for how all of us can be whole and complete: alive spiritually, mentally, emotionally, and physically.
For all of us were meant to live our human lives with the life of God’s Spirit filling us.
Ezekiel 36:27 / Romans 8:9 / 1 Corinthians 3:16
Final Comparison
Adam’s rebellion brought all that is bad upon this earth and the consequences continue to ripple down the centuries. Instead of feeling close to God we feel distant, isolated, and lonely. Instead of loving God and then loving each other, we experience violence and hatred.
Through Christ’s obedience to be our redeemer, we can have our lives restored to the way God originally made us. This means we can experience life in its fullness by having a close relationship with God that naturally wants to love and care for others.
Therefore….as we study what Christ was like, we in fact see that He was quite the opposite of what Adam became.
Adam through disobedience brought sin and death.
Christ through obedience brought us right-standing with God and life.
What was Jesus like? He was like His Father in every way. When we study His life, we come to know what God is like for both are one and the same.
Next Study: BS3-WHAT DID JESUS TEACH?