Imputation (Part 1)

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the

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Apostle Paul said, but we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

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In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

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By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her

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King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry.

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Radio -free Europe. This is Mike Abendroth, and we talk about things that are biblical on this station.

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On this program, we talk about things that are provocative. I want you to think.

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I want to goad you. I want to prod you. I want to push you. I want to, sometimes

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I want to make you mad enough to read your Bible and to try to prove me wrong.

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And we want to do this in a very loving format, in a very dialogical format.

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And you can share, and you can type in our Twitter account or Facebook, and you can react too, and you can give your input, because what you think about these topics matter.

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I would not be very good at that. I would not be a very good postmodern.

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I wouldn't be a very good emergent church leader. That's just the way things go. And so I guess

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God wires different people differently. And for me, I think we say in Nebraska, different.

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That's different. One of my listeners said that I pronounce my hours as my hours and my hours as my hours.

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I don't really want to do that. This is our radio station. Or maybe it's or and are.

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I hate it when I do it, but hey, that's just the way it goes. Today, one of my favorite all time topics, one of my ultimate favorites.

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This is my Casey Kasem out of top 10. This is right up there. These are some of the things that if I had, you know, one or two or three or four, maybe 10 messages to deliver, this would be one of the most important messages that you could teach from the

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Bible. So you need to get your thinking caps on. I hope you didn't take them off. You always need to keep them on.

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Today's the topic that could revolutionize your life, your thinking. The topic is, drum roll, imputations.

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The topic, I didn't say amputation, imputations. The three great theological imputations.

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Say, well, that doesn't matter to me. I need some real life. I have all kinds of issues in life and I need help.

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Well, since this is my show, I think this is the way I help you. Whether you have relationship problems, finance problems, health problems, sin problems, you need to stop looking at those problems at least for the next 22 minutes.

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And you need to think about God and his word and his truth and the three great imputations.

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If you take your Bible and opened it up and somehow it could be a pop -up book, you know, the kids pop -up books and you open it up and it's got a skyscraper and it comes up really high or it's got an animal.

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We used to have animal pop -ups and there'd be a big gorilla swinging from a tree, pop -up book. And then the kid would get ahold of them by themselves and just rip it to smithereens.

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Schmidreens. Schmidlap. Messerschmitt. We would have.

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You'd think, oh, this book could cost a lot of money. Well, we'd get it down at the library anyway. In the sale bin for 50 cents, but they would just rip them up.

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If you could use the Bible and it would be a pop -up book and the key truths would pop up, three imputations would certainly pop up.

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And if you can understand these three imputations, you understand the way God works, the way

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God thinks, the way God saves, the reason we need a Savior, you can understand this concept so that it will help your praise, it will help your understanding, it'll help everything about those issues.

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Now, I could ask you the questions on No Compromise Radio. Questions like, have you ever heard a sermon on three imputations?

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What I'd like you to do is I'd like you to go to the home of S. Louis Johnson, Believer's Bible Chapel in Texas.

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Just type in S period space L -E -W -I -S space

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Johnson, S. Louis Johnson, and find his sermon on three imputations. You will be very, very encouraged when you listen to this topic, the three imputations.

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Now, this is gonna have to be a series because I can't get to all the information in such a short time, but we have three imputations.

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And if I were to ask you the question, what are the three imputations? What would you say?

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Three theological imputations found in the Bible, the three big ones, the ones that rise up in the children's pop -up book style.

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We have Everest K2, and what's the third largest mountain in the world?

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I don't know, if you're a mountaineer, if you're a, I was gonna say spelunker, but that wouldn't work. If you are a mountain climber kind of guy, you would know.

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But anyway, these three, it would be Mount Everest, K2, and D4. R2 -D2.

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The three imputations are, Adam's imputation to all his posterity,

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Christ imputing his righteousness to all those who would ever believe, and having our sin imputed to Christ.

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Those are the three imputations. Three imputations. Adam's sin to all those except for Christ.

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Adam's, that's the first one. Second one is Christ's righteousness to all those who would believe in our sin, all the believing ones' sin credited to Christ account.

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So those are the three imputations. And so we'll define imputation, and then we will talk about the first imputation on the rest of today's show,

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No Compromise Radio. What is imputation? To impute something to a person means to set it to his account, to number it among the things belonging to him.

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The biblical terminology is to reckon, to count, to impute.

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If something's imputed to someone else, it is then theirs legally.

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It is put to their count, put to their charge, put to their credit. That is set to someone's account.

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So if you have to impute something, you set it to someone's account. If a sheriff deputizes another citizen, that citizen did not have any authority until it was imputed to their account.

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And the Bible uses the word imputation as a legal term in a variety of different ways.

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And I think this first way will help you in our understanding when we get to the three great imputations.

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Philemon, there's only one chapter, verses 17 and 18. And here we have

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Paul telling Philemon that if that runaway slave, that scoundrel slave who got saved

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Onesimus comes back to Philemon, place any of the debts that Onesimus has rung up, put them on Paul's account, that is imputation.

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So if you consider me your partner, Paul says to Philemon, receive Onesimus, receive him as you would receive me.

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If he has wronged you at all or owes you anything, charge that to my account,

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Philemon, 17 and 18. So to impute means to set something to one's account.

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When a bride and a groom get married, the old vows included the groom saying to the bride, with all my worldly good,

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I thee endow. That's imputation. Placing all the groom's assets are also now in the account of the bride.

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And actually, when the bride gets married and she has a lot of debt, that's imputed to the account of the groom.

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And you say, yeah, but could it go the other way around? Yeah, that's true, but it's my show and I'm a guy. So we have to have it set up that way.

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No, just kidding. The wife is rich and the husband is poor. All her assets are imputed to the husband's account as their one new person, the mysterious union of a couple.

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So impute just means to reckon or to account or to set something to one's account.

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Early on in the Bible, it's discussed when God called Abram and he said, look at the stars and so shall your seed be.

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And Abram believed God and it was counted, reckoned, imputed to him for righteousness.

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And so we have the word reckoned in the Bible regularly. And so it's an important concept. You say, well,

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I don't want to learn big words. Well, you ought to want to learn big words because you learn big words with your work, with your hobbies, with your children, with your whatever.

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But in the Bible, you don't want to learn any big words. You're a monosyllabic kind of guy.

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We want you to be a polysyllabic person. And if imputation is a Bible concept and a Bible word, then you ought to learn it.

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God wants you to know. And so this word in the New Testament for imputation is a nice sounding word.

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It's called logizimai. It means to reckon, to calculate, to count, to take something into account, to credit something or someone, to charge to someone else's account.

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By the way, when I was in corporate America as an unbeliever and we would go to national sales meetings, we would try to find the sales manager that we liked least in the country.

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And then we would kind of follow him up to his room or pretend we were going to our room and see where he was.

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And if he was at the Four Seasons, room 1210, and we knew his name was

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Jim Bob, then we would then have a big bar tab, a big dinner tab, big massage tab, and we'd sign our name

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Jim Bob, room 512, room 204, whatever it was, and he would get credit for that.

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I don't know how technical that is for imputation, but it's an interesting story. To impute means to set something to one's account.

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And it is important for lots of reasons. As I alluded to just earlier, it's important because it's in the Bible. Let me go further.

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It's everywhere in the Bible. If you look at Romans chapter four, it's used 10 times.

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King James switches between counted and reckoned. But here we have in Romans chapter four, something called by one man, the imputation chapter.

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This is the imputation chapter, where if you say, well, I don't want to understand imputation, then

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I guess Romans four is out for you. No, you need to understand it. Abraham, a man who is a wonderful model of justification by faith alone.

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It's imputation. And so let me read to you Romans chapter four, selective verses, and listen to the word count, or reckon, or impute.

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ESV just puts them all as count. Romans four, what then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather, according to the flesh?

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For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the scripture say?

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Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness. Not to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift, but as his due.

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As to the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.

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Just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works.

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Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man against whom the

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Lord will not count his sin. Is this blessing then only for the circumcised or also for the uncircumcised?

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We say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness. How then was it counted to him?

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Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised.

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He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of righteousness that he had by faith while he was still circumcised.

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The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well.

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He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead, since he was all about a hundred years old, or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb.

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No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.

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That is why his faith was counted to him as righteousness. But for the words, it was counted to him, were not written for his sake alone.

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Oh, it's not just for Abraham, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him, who raised from the dead

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Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification. Friends on No Compromise Radio, counted is an important word.

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Imputation, logizimai, to reckon, that's an important term. And it is so important because when we get to the topic of Roman Catholic versus Protestant beliefs on justification, are you imputed with the righteousness of Christ Jesus?

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Are your sins imputed to Christ's account? Or as the

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Roman Catholics teach, is Christ's righteousness infused into your account?

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Imputed or infused, Protestant or Catholic. Matter of fact, Wesleyans, they believe in imparted righteousness.

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And so we do ourselves a favor when we try to understand imputed righteousness.

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That is an important topic. So what about the imputations?

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Do you remember what the three imputations are? The three great imputations for the rest of today's show and probably 65 other shows.

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We're going to do Adam's imputation. The imputation of Adam's sin to the posterity of Adam.

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So imputation numero uno. God imputes to everyone short of Christ Jesus Adam's sin in the garden.

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God reckoned that sin to your account. God counted Adam's sin against you.

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God charged Adam's sin in the garden to you. Hmm, you like that?

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Well, who would? Only problem is the more we learn,

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I think you will like the concept of imputation. I think you're going to like it because the other options you're going to find weren't so good.

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Now, let's talk a little bit more about the imputation of Adam's sin being credited to your account.

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First of all, let me read 1 Corinthians 15 verses 20, 21 and 22 as we see a glimpse of federal representation, a glimpse of what

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Adam did and how it affects other people. But in fact, 1

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Corinthians 15, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead.

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For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.

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In the garden, Adam sinned and God credited that to your account.

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God in His wise understanding, in His omniscience, He knew that it was the most glorifying and the best to have

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Adam as a federal representation of you and everybody else short of Christ Jesus.

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Adam was the one who was your representative in the garden.

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Now, some people don't like that Adam was a representative, but I would say quickly that we live in a world full of representation.

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We live in a world of federal representation. When President Obama goes to war with Libya, we are now at war with Libya whether we like it or not.

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When Jeanette Rankin, the first Congresswoman elected to Congress voted no against going to war with Japan after Pearl Harbor, she was voted, her vote was overruled by the other people's vote, unanimous except for hers.

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And then she, because of federal representation, because of federal government, she went to war with Japan, even though she voted no.

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We have lots of examples of federal representation. When the President does something, the

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Secretary of State does something, by federal representation, then we are included in that.

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You have two senators who represent you if you live in America. You have a governor, et cetera.

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We have lots of illustrations of federal representation. But why don't we look at Romans 5, verse 12?

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This is the passage. If you have your Bible and you just open it up and it naturally falls open to a spot that's near and dear to you, to a spot that is a theological high point, it should open to Romans 5.

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Not only because the first 11 verses of Romans 5 talk about the effects or the results of justification, wonderful verses, but chapter 5, verse 12 is the passage.

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It is the passage to teach us about Adam's imputation credited to our account.

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Now, Romans 5, 12, you've got to get this. Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, so death spread to all men because all sinned.

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Just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, so death spread to all men because all sinned.

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There is a solidarity in the human family. Through one man,

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Adam, we have condemnation. We have death because it was credited to our account.

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And before you get all upset, don't forget that there's another Adam, the last Adam, and we have righteousness in that Adam, that last

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Adam, through faith in Christ Jesus. And we are going to have a great reckoning, a great counting of his righteousness to our account.

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So you like one, but maybe you don't like the other. You'd have to take both because the way God works is through counting, through reckoning.

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Now remember, back in the garden, here we have the theological interpretation of Genesis chapter 3.

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So Paul obviously believes in Genesis chapter 3. He now gives us an insight into this mystery of what was going on.

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One man, we have death because of that one man. That one man sinned.

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Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, did

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God actually say, you shall eat of any tree in the garden? You shall not eat. The woman said to the serpent, we may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, you shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it lest you die.

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But the serpent said to the woman, you shall not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be open and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.

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So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was a delight to the eyes and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit and ate.

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She also gave some to her husband who was with her and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened and they knew that they were naked and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin cloths.

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So the middle ages, they would say, what's the fruit? The fruit is sexual intercourse. And that was bad.

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Well, that has nothing to do with it. That's not right. They were told to be fruitful and multiply. Other people said, well, what was on that tree?

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It wasn't really a tree. It was a vine, it was grapes. And you pick the grapes and the grapes ferment and you get drunk and then that's the problem.

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That has nothing to do with it at all. The issue at the garden was what? Will you obey me? Will you believe what

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I say? Will you do what I ask? That's exactly what it is. You see down at the root of all sin is unbelief.

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Sin is lawlessness, that's true. But here, do you take God's word for it or don't you? That is the issue.

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And now we have the federal head, Adam. We have the federal head, Adam. And when he ate, what happened?

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He has sinned and then all of the people of that sin is credited to all those in Adam.

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It didn't happen when Eve ate. Eve ate first. Eve scarred herself.

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Eve was then going to die. Spiritual death then, yes, and then physical death later. But all that sin did not affect the universe.

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All of her sin did not affect all those who would be in Eve. No, here we have

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Adam, the federal representative. When he sinned, then as Lewis Johnson would say, all hell broke loose.

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I did also think it was interesting when I asked Lewis Johnson said about a country preacher who said Adam used to take his boys to the entrance of the

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Garden of Eden after they had sinned. And he wanted to teach them a little lesson about how sin affects people.

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And he would take his boys as close as he could get. And then he would, with the language of a country preacher, say, take a good look in there, boys.

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That's where your ma ate us out of house and home. Well, there may be some truth to that, but Adam was the federal head.

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He was the one representing all of us. Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man.

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You see it over and over five times. One man, one man, one man, one sin, one man.

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Death spread to all men because all sinned. That wasn't just a bad example of Adam.

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That's what the Pelagians say. Oh, just free will. Well, why does everybody follow that same bad example? No, this was credited to the account of every person short of Christ Jesus.

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So I can't get much farther because there's lots of things to say and I'm just not talking fast enough.

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We are learning today about the federal representation of Adam. Adam's sin imputed to all our account.

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That's why, by the way, people die between Moses and between Adam. There is no law, but this earlier broken law was given credit to those people.

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That's the reason babies die, not because they are sinning, but because they've been credited with Adam's sin.

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And we know there's a second Adam and we're gonna get credited with his righteousness if we believe, so it's going to be a good deal.

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Hang in there. The payoff is going to be great. Three imputations. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston.

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You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE its staff or management.