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

1 corinthians 15:22

The one who brought death came before the one who brought life; Adam’s sin was undone with Jesus sinlessness. Adam’s rebellion was undone by Jesus obedience. Adam’s mortality was reversed by Jesus eternal nature.

We partake in the sin and death of Adam as a matter of course and the redemption of Jesus as a matter of divine election and our own devotion. Where death comes first as a matter of spiritual fact, Jesus comes to cover over death with something better, a resurrection to eternal life.

But hold on, there’s a final factor here. What can we learn about that eternal life by examining the Savior. Indeed, he was before Adam and is now and forever. In fact, Christ holds the power of creation by which Adam was made (John 1). The Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last. This is what is meant by “eternal life”; we leave the mortal life of Adam and join with a life that has no beginning and no end in Jesus.

So, in the end, or rather, in the beginning, Jesus creates us anew in resurrection and we find life right where it ought to be: with God, as it was at first.

Ethan Kirl