The Flip Side of the Imputation Coin

Already had two posts on imputation... might as well continue, right? Right.

To fully understand the truth and beauty of imputed righteousness, we need to also understand the flip side of the coin:

Therefore, as through one man's offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man's righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous. (Romans 5:18-19)

There was no need for an atoning sacrifice if there was nothing to atone for! Christ's righteousness was imputed to us only because something else was first imputed to us: sin. This is precisely what original sin is. "Original sin" does not mean that Adam committed the first sin, and that we simply follow in the same path that he did, being born righteous and then choosing unrighteousness. As evidenced here in Romans (and elsewhere), judgment - and through judgment condemnation - came to all men as a result of the offense of one man. This means that just as Christ's obedience was imputed to us, Adam's disobedience was first imputed to us!

And if this somehow seems unfair to us, we need to realize that Adam was a representative for the entire human race. It is presumptuous (and wrong) to assume that we would have done any better in his position! It's as if we were with Adam, in Adam, when he fell for himself, and for us.

I say that knowledge of original sin, imputed to the entire human race, is important for fully understanding imputed righteousness, because if we don't understand that we were dead in our sins when God breathed life into us, then we won't understand the fullness of the grace involved in the gift of imputed righteousness.

I'll end by quoting a session of The White Horse Inn, entitled "A Radical View of Grace", which stresses the importance of imputed sin in the gracious gift of imputed righteousness:

If any part of us is not contaminated by sin, then the grace of God is simply cooperating with that portion that remains uncorrupted, and therefore is not grace.