“The Last Adam”, Why?
For a long time, the idea that Jesus was the ‘Last Adam’ puzzled me a lot. I could see that Adam was the beginning of Mankind and that Jesus was the ‘first of many Brethren’, so this satisfied me for a time.
Yet the fact the description was ‘Last Adam’ rather the ‘Second Adam’, still played on my mind. It was only when I looked into the roll that Adam played and compared it to what Jesus accomplished did it come more clearly into focus.
When I meditated on the first several chapters of Genesis and the narrative around Mankind being made in the image of God that I began to understand the deep mystery that these titles convey.
If we consider that Adam in the first instance was both Male and Female, reflecting the ‘Image of God’ then we need to see how this relates to Jesus who as it is clearly shown in the Scriptures was not married yet is being compared to Adam as he was at the beginning.
Adam by having intimate relations with Eve produced the Human Race. Jesus in being born into the Human Race now has the ability to produce a Heritage of His Own but He does it in a Spiritual Way through His death and resurrection, a New Creation.
Now I am about to present a concept that I have never heard in Church doctrine so please hold your criticism till you make time to contemplate all that I have shared so far.
As part of the process that we call “Being Saved” i.e., we say that we have died to sin and are made Alive in Christ. We also state as Paul often proclaims, we have the Spirit of Christ. We also say that we are a New Creation and we are “joined” to Christ.
The way I see it that in being “being saved”, we actually die, we lose the spirit we received from Adam that our parents gave us and receive the Spirit of Christ. In this moment we must die physically for split second till we are made “Alive” by the Spirit of Christ taking the place of the Adamic spirit we had. When the spirit departs, we die, then we are “born again’ and truly are Born from Above.
Although this may be difficult to comprehend when you place this concept along side passages that talk about being ‘married’ to Christ, being a joint heir, being part of the body of Christ and so many more, it to me makes so much sense.
Lets move to the next point: -
PaulT.