For a paperback book in outline form which addresses over 150 difficult verses that Arminians use against Sovereign Grace, check out: Problem Texts for Sovereign Grace: Rooting Arminianism Out of Every Verse.
For a master copy of the outline, click here:
Problem Texts for Sovereign Grace
81. 1Co 15:22
A. "For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." (1Co 15:22)
B. Does this verse teach universal atonement? Is the "all" which Adam mortified the same "all" which Christ vivified?
C. The death and life in context is physical death and life (1Co 15:12-13,21).
D. The "all" who physically die in Adam is the entire human race, with a few exceptions.
i. "All" who die in Adam are all whom Adam represented.
ii. Sin entered the world by Adam (Rom 5:12).
iii. Death came by sin because the wages of sin is death (Rom 5:12 c/w Rom 6:23).
iv. Sin and death passed upon all men by natural generation (Rom 5:12 c/w Psa 51:5).
v. Men are sinners by nature (Eph 2:3).
vi. The first Adam was of the earth and all his descendants bear his earthy, natural image (1Co 15:45-49 c/w Gen 5:3).
vii. Therefore, in Adam all (the entire human race) die (1Co 15:22).
a. The only exceptions to this are:
b. Jesus Christ (Joh 10:17-18).
c. Enoch and Elijah who were taken to heaven before death (Gen 5:24; 2Ki 2:11).
d. Those who will be alive at the Second Coming of Christ (1Th 4:15; 1Co 15:51-52).
E. The "all" who are made alive in Christ are all of His elect.
i. "All" who are made alive in Christ are all who Christ represented.
ii. The "all" who are made alive is defined in the next verse as "they that are Christ's at his coming" (1Co 15:23).
iii. When Christ returns all that are in graves will be resurrected, but only some of them will be resurrected unto the resurrection of life (Joh 5:28-29).
a. The "all" whom Christ shall make alive are those whom He will resurrect to the resurrection of life (1Co 15:22 c/w Joh 5:29).
b. The rest are resurrected to the resurrection of damnation which a resurrection of eternal death (Joh 5:29 c/w Rev 20:14-15).
iv. The "all" whom Christ shall make alive are "all which he (God the Father) hath given me (Jesus Christ)", and Jesus will "raise [them] up again at the last day" (Joh 6:39).
v. Those who are glorified by the resurrection of the body (Rom 8:17,23) are only those who were foreknown and predestinated, not the entire human race (Rom 8:29-30).
vi. The last Adam, Jesus Christ, is a quickening (life giving) spirit (1Co 15:45).
a. Those to whom Jesus gives new life in the resurrection bear His spiritual, heavenly image (1Co 15:46-49; 1Jo 3:2).
b. Jesus doesn't quicken (resurrect) all the descendants of Adam and give them new spiritual bodies like His, but rather He only quickens whom he will (Joh 5:21 c/w Joh 5:28-29).
F. Just as the "all" whom Christ will physically make alive are not the same "all" of whom Adam caused the physical death, so it is spiritually; the "all" and the "many" which Adam caused the spiritual death and condemnation of are not the same "all" and "many" which Jesus Christ caused the spiritual life and righteousness of (Rom 5:15,18-19).
i. It is true that Adam was a figure of Jesus Christ (Rom 5:14).
a. Figure n. - II. Represented form; image, likeness. 9. a. The image, likeness, or representation of something material or immaterial.
b. Likeness - 1. The quality or fact of being like; resemblance, similarity; an instance of this.
c. Whereas Jesus Christ bears a likeness to Adam, He is not an exact image of him, but rather is the express (truly depicted, exactly resembling, exact) image of God (Heb 1:3).
ii. Jesus was like Adam in that He represented many people in his actions (Rom 5:19, etc.).
iii. Both Adam and Jesus Christ were the federal heads who represented their seed (offspring, progeny).
iv. Adam's seed are the entire human race (with the exception of Jesus Christ), to whom he passed sin and death (Rom 5:12).
a. They are the lump of mankind which Adam fitted to destruction (Rom 9:21-22).
b. They are referred to as both all (Rom 5:12,18) and many (Rom 5:15,19).
c. Many adj. - The adjectival designation of great indefinite number.
d. The all and many which Adam represented are truly the entire human race with not one left out (Rom 3:9-12), except the Lord Jesus Christ, for in him is no sin (1Jo 3:5).
v. Jesus Christ's seed are NOT the same amount of people as Adam's seed.
a. This is the limit of the likeness between Adam and Jesus Christ.
b. Christ's children are the children which God gave him (Heb 2:13 c/w Joh 6:39 c/w Joh 17:2).
1. They are those whom God chose in Christ before the foundation of the world (Eph 1:4).
2. They are the vessels of mercy which God had afore prepared unto glory (Rom 9:23).
c. Let's look at all the verses which compare the work of Christ and Adam, and see that Christ DID NOT represent all of the same people as Adam.
d. Rom 5:15 - "But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many."
1. Did the gift by grace abound to the entire human race as Adam's offence did?
2. No, God's electing grace is only to a remnant of mankind, not to all of mankind (Rom 11:5).
3. The gift by grace is the gift of righteousness (Rom 5:17), the gift of eternal life (Rom 6:23), and the gift of eternal salvation (Eph 2:8).
4. These gifts by grace are NOT given to the entire human race (Mat 23:33; Mat 25:41; Rev 20:15).
5. Therefore the many who are dead by Adam's offence are not the same many which the grace of God abounded unto.
e. Rom 5:18 - "Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life."
1. Justification - Theol. The action whereby man is justified, or freed from the penalty of sin, and accounted or made righteous by God; the fact or condition of being so justified.
2. Did Jesus justify the entire human race by His righteousness as Adam condemned them all by his offence?
3. No, He certainly did not.
4. Only those who were foreknown and predestinated are justified by Christ (Rom 8:29-30).
5. The "all men" whom Jesus justified are men "out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation" (Rev 5:9).
6. There will be many resurrected on the last day who will be unjust (Act 24:15).
7. Therefore the all men whom Adam condemned are not the same all men whom Christ justified.
f. Rom 5:19 - "For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous."
1. Righteous adj. - 1. a. Of persons: Just, upright, virtuous; guiltless, sinless;
2. Did Jesus by His obedience make the entire human race righteous as Adam made them all sinners? Certainly not.
3. If the entire human race were made guiltless and sinless, they would all be going to heaven, but that is not the case (Rev 20:15).
4. When Jesus justifies (makes righteous) a person, he is made an heir of eternal life (Tit 3:7), which cannot be lost (Joh 10:28).
5. Therefore all those whom Jesus made righteous by His obedience have eternal life and shall never perish.
6. Therefore the many which Adam made sinners are not the same many which Christ made righteous.
7. Though Christ didn't make the entire human race righteous, he did make many (great indefinite number) righteous (Rev 7:9).
vi. If Jesus undid the "original sin" of Adam for the entire human race, then that means that every person is born into this world without sin and is essentially a Christ, born innocent and sinless.
a. This means that each one of us when we were born was no different than Jesus Christ.
b. The scripture flatly condemns this idea.
c. Foolishness is bound in the heart of children (Pro 22:15).
d. We are all by nature the children of wrath (Eph 2:3).
e. We are all conceived in sin (Psa 51:5) and speak lies upon leaving the womb (Psa 58:3).
f. Even if Christ did undo the "original sin" of Adam for all mankind and restored them all to the pre-fall condition, in that "all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God" (Rom 3:23), which (sinning) they do from birth (Psa 58:3) and youth (Gen 8:21), they would all be in the identical condition in which Adam left them as soon as they sinned themselves: dead in trespasses and sins and incapable of seeking or understanding God (Rom 3:9-12).
g. In that case, Christ undoing Adam's "original sin" for all of the human race would have accomplished absolutely nothing for them because they would be in the same condition in which Adam left them as soon as they were born and began sinning.
vii. Christ only undid the "original sin" of Adam (and all their personal sins as well) for His elect children whom God foreknew, predestinated, justified, called, and glorified, and none other (Rom 8:28-30).
For a master copy of the outline, click here:
Problem Texts for Sovereign Grace
