Romans 5 and the significance of Adam
When asked about the importance of the fact that Adam was the literal and historical person that the Bible claims he is, as opposed to being symbolic, and how it relates to our salvation (commenting specifically on Romans 5:12-21), John Piper said this:
“I think that the whole structure of Paul’s arguments falls to the ground, and since he is not creating arguments out of nothing, but rooting them in reality which is past and future, that is relating to sin and our future salvation, our salvation would evaporate. That may sound like a lot to hang on the historicity of Adam, but Romans 5 documents our problem as people who have sinned in Adam and it documents our rescue as One who explicitly modeled His teaching to reverse the error that Adam committed and the misery, the fall, that has come upon us. So if you put stock in the inspired word of God as not just creating arguments out of nothing, but as being rooted in history and therefore able to relate to future real-life history, namely our lives, I would say the denial of the historical person of Adam is a gospel-threatening denial.”1
1 “Adam, Christ, and Justification” by John Piper (Desiring God Radio broadcast 9/12/2006)
2 comments:
I was sad to hear that John Piper has Prostate cancer, my grandfather died of the same type. Hopefully he will be able to make it through this difficult time.
I should really find out more about how he's doing. The only news that I got from his ministry lately was that the radio program is going "non-conventional" at the end of this week. They're only going to be doing web audio, not radio stations. May God bless and keep Him as long as He has a plan for him.
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