Christ Life In Us Rom. 5:20-21 The Purpose of Law and the Power of Grace
Rom: 5:20-21 · Mike Doyle · Oct 12, 2025
Christ's Life in Us, No. 06
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/49261941125114

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Morning. I was sitting here trying to decide how much I need to read, but let me preface this a little bit. There's a huge change in the focus of the book of Romans when you get to chapter five, verse 12. And the big change is the change from sins that we commit, all the really bad stuff you do, to the thing sin itself, which we call the sin nature. So as you're studying through 512 forward, keep that in mind, that what we're looking at is not individual sins that you've committed, but the source of those sins, which is the sin nature. And then I thought, well, I don't need to read 512 to the end because I'm probably gonna talk some about those verses. So I think what I'll do is I'll start with 17, go through 21.

For if the transgression of the one, death reign through the one, Much more, those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the one Jesus Christ. So then, as through one transgression there resulted in condemnation to all men, even so, through one act of righteousness, there resulted in justification of life to all men. For as through the one man's disobedience, the many were made sinners, even so, even through the obedience of the one, the many will be made righteous. And today's verses, the law came in so that the transgressions would increase but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more. So that as sin reigned in death, even so grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

So those are the verses today. First thing I want you to notice, is that the definite article is not in front of the word law, because law here is a principle. And really what we're talking about is from 512 through 19, I would title it Christian Anthropology. Verse 12 through 21 shows God's modus operandi, or his method of operation, how he operates.

Because we put so much emphasis in contemporary Christianity on the one thing that he did, which he died to pay the penalty for your sins. But you gotta ask yourself, is that all he did? How about this sin nature that I have? I have this propensity to sin. Did he do something about that?

So the next thing we learn from these verses is that the unity with a single person brings death or life. It's all tied to one of two men, either Adam or Christ. With one man, sin comes in. Adam, historically and accurately, he was the one who brought sin.

The other man, he brought righteousness and life. So as Brian talked about, and I'll show you in a minute that it's not this, but this kind of thing. So in 512 through 19, through one man, one man, And I got to thinking this week, no place else that I can find in history, anthropology, is there an answer to where sin came from? Is there an answer other than this?

The reason sin is in the world is because this one man brought sin with him. And along with the sin, what comes with sin? Death, separation from God. And so it's spread to all men. How come? Because all men sin. All men sin. So the importance of this one man, Adam, from a standpoint of how sin got here, and what sin, and the origin of sin, and the death resulting from sin, it's one man. It turns out, as we go forward now over the next months, The fact that God did it this way is a really good thing. A really good thing. For until the law, sin was in the world.

But sin wasn't imputed when there isn't any law. The best example of that is Cain. When Cain killed his brother, he didn't violate a law. So Cain didn't get sentenced to death. because he didn't transgress, put it that way. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam until Moses. Adam and Moses obviously is the law giver.

So if you, I remember reading one of the old brethren guys got on a train and was going from like Chicago to the West Coast and he noticed that every town he went through there were graves. Sin reigns. Death is everywhere. Everybody's gonna die. So, and then verse 14 says, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, Adam was given a specific command not to eat of that fruit. He violated that, he transgressed. So why are people dying if they're not eating or violating principles or laws that God laid out of them?

And the answer is simple. That Adam was a type of him to come, the him to come is the Lord Jesus. Everything flows out of one of these two men. The free gift isn't like the transgression. For if by the transgression the one of the one many died from Adam, much more did the grace of God and the gifts by that grace of one man, Jesus Christ, abound to many. So you have one sin, Adam's sin, that abounds to every human being. You gather up all of those sins, all of them, from Adam going to the last sin that'll ever be committed, And the Lord Jesus took care of those on the cross, and now the gift of grace can be offered or abound to many, or everybody. On the one hand it's this, on the other hand it's that. In Greek it's men day. Brian's, I called him up, I said, can I steal one of your slides? He said, sure.

So, and then he says, and the gift is not like that which came through one who sinned. For one, on the one hand, judgment arose from one transgression, one transgression resulting in condemnation. On the other hand, The free gift arose from many transgressions resulting in justification. You ever have this thought? Here's a one-year-old child standing there who has never violated a law, never sinned. Why is that one-year-old condemned? He's condemned because he came from Adam.

You don't get lost and go to hell because of your behavior, it was somebody else. And you get what he is because you're from him. That principle is really, really important, especially as we move on into identification, because what is God gonna do? He's gonna take you out of one man and put you in another one. That's really where we're going in chapter six.

So for if by the transgression of one death reigned through the one, much more, on the other hand, those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign through the one, Jesus Christ. Through that one person, judgment came in and condemnation, but the act or the favor regarded regarding many offenses was in view with justification. What I mean by that is the act or the favor is something that God brings in through one man, one man, and has been accomplished in him on behalf of God's own righteousness, one man. So then through the one transgression, there resulted in condemnation to all men. Even so, through the act of righteousness, there resulted in justification of life to all men. It doesn't mean that they take advantage of it, but it's available to them. So 19, and Brian covered this last week. For as through the one man's disobedience sinners were made the many, that's the interlinear translation. Even so through the obedience of the one, the many will be made righteous. So I put it together like this. I don't attempt to pronounce that word.

But we're made means, this is a verb, it's an indicative, aorist, passive, and it's plural. It means it's a statement of fact. Every single human being, in reality, were made sinners. And the reason we say they were made, it happened in the past, and it was passive voice. It was done to them. to them. On the other hand, the same Greek word with a different ending on it were made indicative future passive. In the future, they will be made righteous.

Righteous. So now, my verses. And the law came in. that the transgression might increase, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more. If you jump ahead a little bit and look at Romans 7, 9, the apostle Paul says, I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin became alive in me and I died. It's a really important principle.

When the law came in, without the article, this is the law principle, stressing the Mosaic law in its quality as law, like Romans 2.14 says, for when Gentiles who do not have the law, do instinctively the things of the law. These, not having the law, are a law unto themselves. So we're talking about the principle of law. The principle of law is do this, and if you don't do it, you're condemned. Do this, if you do do it, you're rewarded.

So the principle is there in Romans 2.14 of law.

Romans 7.9, as I said, the commandment which man thought would be a means of life to him, he found to have the effect of revealing this actual state of death. So what's interesting here is that I think it's almost in the brain of most humans that if you tell me what to do and I do it, I'm going to be okay. So God says, be holy as I am holy.

Or you're condemned because you came from Adam. And if you want to be accounted righteous, you just have to believe that my son took care of your sin problem. And that doesn't leave any place for you to say, well, what else can I do? There is nothing else to do. because God took care of the problem, you didn't. You can't fix your sin nature. Now, the law came in alongside of sin, not as in any sense a means of salvation, that isn't why it was brought in, but that Israel, and through Israel everybody, might discover the guiltiness by breaking the law. For the law gives no power to keep the law.

The law just says, do it. And if you don't do it, there's a consequence. But it doesn't say, oh yeah, and if you do this and this and this, the law will give you the power to keep it. It doesn't give you anything like that. It just tells you what to do.

So, verse 13 says, through one man sin entered the world, and the word for entered is, again, I'm not gonna try to pronounce them. The word for entered is, and now the law enters alongside, and the word entered is the same, only with a preposition in front of it, which means alongside what? Here you have a sin nature, and then God brings a law in next to the sin nature. And man looks at that and says, oh, there's the remedy for my sinning. But what does he discover? That through the law is the knowledge of sin.

You don't have the law, you don't know. You can break them, and you don't know what you're breaking. You just know that, well, that doesn't seem good, like Cain killing Abel. Shouldn't have done it, but there wasn't a law against it. Well, now there is. So sin enters, the law entered alongside of it so that I would know, you would know, the Jews would know specifically that their actions were sinful or they were transgressions.

A transgression is a violation of the law. A sin is missing the mark. So what is a trespass? It is not to reveal sinfulness, but the sin was a trespass of law. The act of law-breaking would abound. We think that the law came in so that sin would abound. No, the law came in so that the act of law-breaking would abound, so that the catalog of your law-breaking or your violations or your trespasses would abound.

The law was not given to Adam or to Christ. It came in alongside sin, and sin had been in the world for 2,500 years. So imagine living in an environment for 2,500 years where people are dying, but there isn't any rule book. How do you know what to do and what not to do? Well, God intervened, told them certain things, but he didn't give them 600 laws like he did the Jews 2,500 years later. so that arrogant, self-confident Israel, which was a public example of all of us, might see God's standard for those in the first Adam, and promising to obey it, they fail. The purpose of the law is so that you fail. Why?

So that you'd have to seek out the Lord for the answer. how law in the New Testament is used. If you look at law in general, Romans 2, 12 through 14, for all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. But not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law will be justified. Ooh, I like that, because then it gives me something to do. For when Gentiles who do not, we've read this, who do not have a law, do instinctively the things that are of the law, these not having the law are law unto themselves. So referring to the period between Adam's trespass and the giving of the law.

Romans 7.1 says, against those graces which constitute the fruit of the Spirit, there isn't any law.

Romans 7.1 is, or do you not know?

Oops, I can't see my notes. I don't think I can move that. Do you not know, brethren, and I'm speaking to those who know the law, that the law has jurisdiction over a man as long as he lives? So that sets up another premise that's coming. As long as I, my life is attached to Adam, as long as I'm alive to him and sin and law is there, I'm condemned. There's no way out. No way out. So God makes it pretty tough, at least from a human performance standpoint, by putting the law in place for a man to come to the realization that he's going to need a lot more than just obeying a law.

The perceived aim of the law was to restrain the evil tendencies of the natural man in his fallen estate, Galatians 5.23. But if you are led by the spirit, guess what? You are not under law. Yet in experience, law finds itself not merely ineffective, it actually provokes those tendencies to greater activity.

When we were looking at Elliot John's photograph this morning. I hope you put a photograph up there when he's about two years old. When you tell him, don't touch this bottle. What's he gonna do? He's gonna touch it. And the reason is, is that you pointed something out to him that he shouldn't do, and that's in nature in him says, oh yeah, watch this. So, It's interesting what law really does. And then the problem I have with reformers is that they have way too much law in their theology.

So they spend all their time looking the do and the don't dos rather than just relaxing and beholding the glory of the Lord. The intention of the gift of the Spirit is to constrain the believer to a life which a natural tendency shall have no place, and to produce in him the direct opposite. One of the greatest gifts we have is the Spirit of God in us who constrains evil, and he creates an environment under grace where we want to submit to him, and we want to. Our tendencies are put out because we now have this new life that has a tendency towards doing what the Lord would call us to be. Law, therefore, has nothing to say against the fruit of the Spirit. Therefore, believers are not under law, 518. The law finds no place in his life because insofar as he is led by the Spirit.

Galatians 3.19, then why did you get the law? Or why is the law there? It was added because of transgressions. A transgression is a different term than a sin. Having been ordained through angels by the agency of a mediator until the seed should come to whom the promise had been made.

And then we get to Romans 5.20, And then we find out that the law came in alongside, that the transgression or the violation of a law would increase.

And then you find out something really neat, that whereas sin increased, grace abounded all the more. Two different Greek words are translated here for abounded. The first one used of sin. means to increase, sin increased. The second one is used of grace, which means to abound beyond measure, to overflow. Where the transgression might increase, grace superabounded. So I look for pictures of what superabounding looks like. Abounded, hooper, whatever, hooper, I'm not gonna say the word. The excess is that grace much more abounds, way more than sin does.

Now, that as sin reigned in death, Even so, grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Here comes the other man, and this man brings with him a whole different thing than sin reigning. reign here is a verb, it's indicative, eris, active, to reign as king right now. Everybody in the world who is not in Christ, sin and death reigns over them as king right now. and they never, unless they believe in the personal work of Christ, ever get out from that reigning principle. So the sin nature controls as an absolute monarch in all non-believers, all of them, and some believers. There isn't any, well, you know, he's really a good person or he's coming to Christ, no. If you're not a believer, this is where you live. And you're, we talked about in Sunday school this morning, slaves and masters. You're a slave to the king who is sin. It reigns, it controls absolutely. And it reigns in death. It reigns in death, unto death, in the sphere of death.

People, we think, as soon as I use the word death, what do you think of? Your great, great, great aunt in a coffin someplace. No. You want to see death work? Turn on your television. Go out on Colfax Avenue and watch the activity. That's death. Death is operative. It's not still. It's moving all the time. The first creation headed by Adam functions in a sphere of death. Death is a vigorous, functional reigning of the sin nature in the domain of the world. That's what death is. It is as sin reigned in death, even so, grace might reign. Through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord might reign.

It means that it's aristentic, it's a fact, but it may or may not happen. It's active voice. Grace is provided in superabundance in order that grace might reign as king through righteousness. Now think about that. We've talked a lot about grace. We stole a definition from Macaulay, grace is the unlimited and unmerited blessings from God based on a totally adequate work of the cross. But the other thing that grace is, is that it's a reigning principle. You get just like sin was a reigning principle. Grace is a reigning principle. If you live under grace, it reigns over you. God's plan is that grace should have a kingdom where sin and death had a kingdom. And not only that, that grace might reign through righteousness, righteousness. There was a demand for righteousness. from the glory of God.

So Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake. Where did the Jewish law come from? It came from the glory. It came from heaven to the Jews. And Moses is up there on the mountain getting it and his face glows. But what kind of a reaction did it have on Moses? He was fearful. And he quaked, why? Because he knew that the righteousness of God had come to him and said, this is the way you should behave.

When Israel saw the glory on Moses' face, they were afraid because they were afraid of his demands so much so that Moses had put a veil upon his face. I think one of the problems that we have when we sit down and talk to a non-believer and we start talking about God's righteousness, it scares them. It scares them because God's righteousness from the heavenlies. Look what Paul did when he met the glorified Lord Jesus Christ, the righteous one. He was blinded. He was on the ground. First word out of his mouth was Lord.

It's fearful. righteousness, the rightness of God, which is given to you, results in eternal life. And eternal life is not a complicated thing. It's not a different substance like you have in your kitchen. You have this kind of oil and that kind of oil and that kind of oil. Or if you come out of the denomination I do, they got this kind of grace and that kind of grace and this kind of righteousness and that kind of righteousness. And eternal life is what? We all have eternal life in the sense that we're going to live forever. But John 17 tells us that eternal life is to know the Lord Jesus and the one who sent him. To know them. That's what eternal life is.

Sin has reigned in the power of death. The principle of lawlessness dominating man has brought in death. But grace now reigns through righteousness, through eternal life, and it does it right now. It is through the principle of righteousness being established in the souls of believers that grace reigns to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Sometimes I think we don't connect the beginning with the end. When you're looking at the end game, it's interesting how Romans did this. you go through all of Romans and it deals with man on the earth and sin and righteousness. And this second to last verse in 16, it talked about the mystery. And what was the mystery? The mystery is, is that God had decided way back in eternity past, that he was gonna take certain human beings and he was gonna raise them up to heavenly glory that matched the glory of his son. What we're learning now are all the mechanics that God goes through to get us there.

Do you see that? For me and you to be holy and righteous and qualified to be there, all of these things take place and all of them God does. He does every one of them. So that eventually we're all there as members of the body of Christ and the bride of Christ. We're holy and we're righteous just like Christ is. So when you know the end game, you kind of can see when you go through Romans, oh, this is step one, two, three. Okay, I see the steps. I see where we're going. I see what God is doing.

That as the sin nature reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness resulting in eternal life in Christ Jesus. All divine claims. should be first righteously met at the cross, and therefore all should be through Jesus Christ. Without that cross and without Jesus Christ, nobody is righteous. I'll put it this way, or has the righteousness of God.

I have his life. I have, I enter into all that he is. For if by the transgression of one, death reigned, through the one, much more, those who receive the abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the one, Jesus Christ. That's you and me. Now, I did, about four pages of observations. Hopefully they make sense. Now this is the argument of Paul. If the demand for righteousness was from the glory and it was a ministry of condemnation, how much more does the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory? Understand the question?

Next observation, the believer is not before God as the man in Adam who was under his judgment, but you and me, believers, are before him as Christ is. The man who bore the judgment and has been raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, Christ glorified God in bearing all judgment. Righteousness, therefore, involves self-judgment. If I'm righteous and you're righteous, it's gonna involve self-judgment and the setting aside practically of my own will, the sway of grace in the soul and works in this direction, and the blessed end in view is eternal life. The Spirit of God works in the believer so that at some point, The only thing important to him is to do the will of God and not his own will. There is a man in glory at the right hand of God right now. I hope we saw that in Romans 5, the difference, and saw the difference between these two men, Adam and Christ.

So neither are sins, nor our sin nature has in this passage anything to do with our condemnation but Adam's act only. You get that part? Your sins don't condemn you. What Adam did and you in him did does. And not our new life in Christ nor our walking in good works unto which we were created has anything to do with constituting us righteous but Christ's act of death only. That's why we're righteous.

Adam was a figure of him who was to come. And if by one man's offense death reign, by one, much more, much more, they which receive abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness shall reign in one, Jesus Christ. Three things. Believers right now are reigning in life. Believers are constituted righteous by God. Grace reigning in them through righteousness to eternal life. That's going on right now in this room. These show the complete triumphant work of God in relation to all that had been the ruin of the creature. God wins. God wins.

He has met the reign of death by making it possible for us saints to reign in life. Where many had been established as sinners, he has shown that he can bring about that many shall be established as righteous. And where sin reigned in the power of death, He has brought in the reign of grace through righteousness and eternal life in that way. And he has brought it in all about one man, Jesus Christ.

So the ministration of righteousness comes from the glory. You're indwelt by the spirit of God. Where'd he come from? Glory. Instead of a demand for righteousness, there is a maintaining of righteousness from the glory in your heart. It comes from the glory. It is a divine righteousness. It is God's righteousness. It's not a demand that was administration of condemnation like the law was. This is administration of righteousness, administration of the Holy Spirit. Consequently, what we find is that it's not only that you have a Savior in glory, but that you are brought in divine fitness to that glory. Does that make sense to you? You're fit to be there. You belong there. No impediments.

I'm spending a little time here because some people hold the idea of imputed righteousness. You know what imputed means? It means that I got it and I'm going to give some to you or give it to you. I don't think we have any righteousness but Christ's righteousness. The righteousness of the glorified man. I have his righteousness. Why? Because I have his life. Because I'm in him.

And so as I get In Romans 5.18, justification of life, I have his life and I enter into all that he is.

In the end of the fourth chapter of Romans, I am cleared from all my sins. is delivered for our offenses and raised for our justification, but we are beyond because we have the life of the one who cleared us. You don't get the life of Christ imputed to you. You're in him, and because you're in him, you get everything that he is before a holy God. So, we all have what is known is justification of life. We have absolutely no barrier between us and the glory.

Now, next week, next couple weeks, God is gonna do the next step and explain to us how he pulls this off. And so we'll start in the Romans six, one, two, and three next week, and we're gonna find out that what God did in order to make us reign in life through righteousness and justification of life, he had a plan.

And this plan is really, really neat, how he doesn't fix anything in the old man. He's got a whole new thing. And it's really critical for us as believers to understand what he did and how he did it. So the first 10 verses of chapter 6 are all going to be mechanics, for lack of a better word. How did he do this? How did he put this piece and that piece and that piece and that piece together so that I could be, you could be, in Christ righteous and justified by life?

And that's what Romans 6 is going to tell us. So let's close. Father, how thankful we are for what a gracious God you are to us. How much you loved us is demonstrated in the fact of all that you have given us through the work of your son, the last Adam, the man that is so and only important to us. And we thank you, Father, for him. And we pray in the name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.