Last week I argued that the Bible requires Adam to be the first human and the father of us all. I went through some scriptures that support this, especially Acts 17 and Romans 5.
I argued that the Bible says he is, but also that he has to be to be our federal head. Paul’s argument in Romans 5 (and 1 Corinthians 15) requires it.
To pick up the thread again, I want to argue the other way around: why is it a problem if Adam isn’t my federal head?
The Fall
If Adam is not my representative head, then my fall in Adam becomes a fiction. I’d be on the hook for my own sins, but not born into sin. In which case, presumably I can rescue myself if only I could obey? I pick up this thread below.
If I’ve still fallen in Adam despite not having any connection with him, then instead the fall seems to be applied to me by divine whim with no grounding in reality. It sounds unfair, though I’m wary of that argument as lots of things do that aren’t, but how can I trust my salvation if God is arbitrary and acts on a whim? God is sovereign over all but acts in accordance with his character and the rules of the cosmos. The cosmos is ordered, not wild. Salvation is logical and in accordance with the scriptures.
Instead, my salvation in Christ is real. God is not arbitrary. The fall is not a fiction: I am born with both inherited guilt and inherited pollution and I continue in my father Adam’s footsteps.
Original Sin
If we deny that all are born in Adam, it would, perhaps, be theoretically possible for me to have not sinned and attain righteousness myself. Why then do I need the cross? Perhaps I just need to be good.
This is a strain of what was condemned as Pelagianism in the early church. It doesn’t save but grows our pride. It’s thinking just like Adam’s in the garden. Perhaps I too could be like God. It ends up much the same way.
Instead, I desperately need rescue. I cannot do good without the Spirit as I am turned in on myself. I can be rescued through faith in Christ: his life is purchased for me and I can receive it. In fact, I can’t even fall myself, because all I have is gift.
Identification
If I am not in Adam then Christ didn’t save me. The logic of salvation is, as Gregory Nazianzen put it, ‘what is not assumed is not saved.’ If Christ took on the flesh of Adam’s line who I am not related to then can he save me? My representative must be a member of the whole. It’s a little bit like how an MP must be a citizen of the UK and we take umbrage if they don’t live in their constituency: how will they represent those they aren’t among? This logic is baked into us by Christendom. I can’t be represented by some other guy I have no connection to. Did Jesus only come for the Jews? Or his immediate family?
Instead, he came for all the nations of the earth. He took on my humanity, not just any humanity, as my representative. He chose me, purchased me, and stood in my place. I won’t face what I deserve but will get what he deserves. He did this for you too, and for every people group under heaven.
The World
If Adam is not my head, if the he was not the first man who fell but just a man who fell, or even a ‘Just So’ story to explain the world as it is, then we’re faced with a terrifying prospect: perhaps the world is meant to be like this. Perhaps pain and suffering are normal.
It’s utterly horrifying to think this way, a vision without hope. If this is in fact the world as it should be, not just as it is, then why would we hope for a future that is different? Why would God even come to save?
Instead, the world is not right. Sin is an intruder, in the cosmos and your heart. The cosmos will be fixed. So will we as we look into the face of Christ and are changed (1 John 3). There is hope for a new heavens and a new earth. Death will die. The enemy will be thrown in the lake of fire. Sin will be no more (Revelation 21-22). Goodness is coming.
This matters
Adam matters to the faith. We don’t like that because we’re concerned that some scientific discoveries or interpretations cast that into doubt. I’m not equipped to help there in more than broad brush strokes, but we should trust the Bible.
When we start to run down the roots of removing Adam from the story, what we’re left with isn’t Christianity. I do think this is a hill to die on. If Adam isn’t my head, neither is Christ. Adam is real and Adam’s sin flows to all of us. That one man who knew God was tricked by a snake and brought ruin to everything. There was another man who faced a test in a garden (Mark 14), another man who battled a serpent (Hebrews 4), another man who stood with a woman in a garden at the start of a new creation (John 21). These two men: Adam and the Lord Jesus Christ define history.
Some will disagree. Many of them are brothers and sisters. I don’t think we assume that because I think someone’s theology leads to an implication that they necessarily believe that themselves. Very few of us are consistent in everything we think, everywhere. I imagine I’m not. Some of those brothers and sisters have thoughtful arguments to the contrary, for all I think them wrong.
My point is that when we consider these questions our most important angle is to consider Adam and Christ as our federal heads. I don’t think talking about the genre of Genesis gets you very far when thinking about who Adam was, the real question is always going to be in Romans 5.
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