Romans 5: 13-14. "For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come."

The Apostle Paul, in his letter to the Romans, emphasised the great doctrine of justification by Faith - that we are justified by Faith and not by the Works of the Law. The error of the Pharisee who insisted on "Salvation by works" was not confined to Paul's day, but has lived in the minds of men unto this present day, and arises from a total ignorance of the cause and nature of spiritual death.

The inspired Apostle declares that the cause of spiritual death is sin. "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin." When the Apostle speaks of death entering into the world by sin, he implies that there was a period when death was unknown and a point in time when death entered into a realm where previously it had not been experienced. The term death was understood by our first parents, for God said: "In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." The term as used by Paul describes more than physical death; although that formed a part of the punishment imposed upon our first parents and their posterity. Death as used in Genesis, Chapter 3, and by the Apostle in our text, did not have a delayed action, but the sentence was carried out on the very day and instant that the transgression was committed. It is evident that it did not apply to physical death only - as Adam survived the expulsion from the Garden for many years - but at that moment when sin entered, the righteousness of the soul expired. The title to Eternal Life hereafter and spiritual life in the time present was lost. The instant God's law was violated, the shroud of spiritual death spread over the soul, and man was no longer susceptible to spiritual realities: he was just as insensible to the spiritual as a dead man is to material things. "For the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit, neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned."

The Apostle gives us a clearer interpretation of the nature of spiritual death when he says, "Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression." The death of the soul was clearly as characteristic of nature as physical death, that sweeps the successive generations from the face of the earth; the sentence embraces the whole human race.

The error of the Pharisees, Salvation by Works, and that of their spiritual children of to-day, is their failure to recognise that the law given on Sinai was not the cause of spiritual death.

The law given on Sinai did not apply to the environments and circumstances that prevailed in Eden. Furthermore, Paul states that the law did not exist, "For until the law, sin was in the world; but sin is not imputed where there is no law." In other words, spiritual death embraced the whole human race between creation and the giving of the commandments on Sinai.

It might be asked, What law then was it that involved all men and all generations in one common condemnation? It was the law that can be summed up in that great doctrine of God's Sovereignty, the infinite obligation to love, honour, and obey Him, and glorify His holy Name, and it was imposed upon Adam as the representative of the human race. Not with Abraham, Isaac or Jacob, nor with Moses on Sinai's mount, for they all had come under the condemnation of spiritual death, "for death reigned from Adam to Moses." The law was not given to Adam in ten commandments, but by a direct command for obedience. "Of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it, for in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." The representative nature of Adam's transgression brought spiritual death upon the whole human race.

Those who reach maturity have the evidence of their own personal experience, for we have all sinned against the light of known duty and violated the dictates of our conscience. But, in order to avoid any misunderstanding, the Apostle states that sentence of death is passed upon "them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression," that is, upon infants who were incapable of sinning as Adam did, who could not by any voluntary choice put forth their hands unto iniquity; nevertheless the elements of a corrupt nature were there, and experience proves that it only needs the development of that nature for the expression of sin.

The Jews were constantly insisting on their superiority to others, upon the fact that the law was given unto them ... but the Apostle emphasises that both Jews and Gentiles are under the same sentence of spiritual death.

To build a religion around the ten commandments will prove as fatal to-day as it did in Israel, when Christ wept on the slopes of Olivet over Jerusalem. The commandments are holy, just and good, but their uncompromising demands searching deep into our secret affections and desires, bring us all in guilt before God. The law of Sinai reveals our state of spiritual death, and bolts and bars the gates of heaven and eternal life against us.

The Holy Scriptures clearly teach that condemnation came upon all men by the representative nature of Adam's transgression, in the violation of the infinite obligation imposed by God's Sovereignty to love, honour, and obey Him. Nevertheless, the Gospel reveals, "For, if through the offence of one, many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ hath abounded unto many." The Lord Jesus Christ, by His sacrificial death on the Cross, and in His offices as Prophet, Priest, and King, has not only done away with the sentence of spiritual death - being imputed to us by Adam's transgression - but also actual sin. For actual sin cannot be charged against infants, but spiritual death is. We stand in need not only of spiritual resurrection, but forgiveness of all our accumulated guilt. "For the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification."

Man's greatest need is the resurrection from spiritual death, and this is beyond the power of the law of Sinai. It is the work of God, the Holy Spirit through Christ. And being quickened from death, he needs forgiveness for accumulated offences. Thus Christ gave His life in our stead and suffered for our offences.

Salvation is a gift, the gift of God, freely offered in the Gospel; it is life from the dead that is preached unto you, which brings within focus the realms of eternity, and breaks down the barriers of human imagination, and displays to us the limitless powers of God's sovereignty. In this resurrection from spiritual death, God deals with each one of us as individuals.

The Apostle says that the law is a school master to bring us to Christ, but if you heed not the law as it exposes your spiritual poverty, that law will condemn eternally, and the "commandment which was ordained to life" will, for you, be unto death.