Rom. 5:12…By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.

THESE words teach us a lesson that all the books of philosophers could never do. They were sensible of the depravity and misery of human nature; but how was it depraved, and what was the spring of all the troubles the life of man is exposed to, they were utterly ignorant. We all see a flood of misery let into the world; but what way the sluice was opened, we can only learn from divine revelation. And in this passage we have it, vis. By one man sin entered into the world, and misery followed it close at the heels. This one man was Adam, the natural root, and the federal head of all mankind, ver. 14. In the words we have,

1. A flood of misery passing over the world, Death passed upon all men. For understanding this, ye must compare it with Gen. 2:17. "In the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die." This awful threatening is marked to be accomplished here. Death there implies loss of communion with God, which was evident in the fulfilling of the threatening, Gen. 3:24. when God drave out the man, viz, from paradise, and placed a heavenly guard to prevent man's access to the tree of life. It also implies a being under God's wrath and curse, as the threatening imports. This is spiritual death. It further implies temporal death, a liableness to the miseries of this life and to death itself, Gen. 3:16-19.; and also eternal death; which appears from man's being excluded [from] paradise and the tree of life, ver. 22. This threatened death, says the apostle, passed Upon all men. "It is appointed unto all men once to die." viz, a natural death. There is no discharge in this war. All men are spiritually dead, dead to God and happiness. And they are all subject to eternal death, in the separation of both soul and body from God and the felicity of the other world.

2. How the sluice by which this misery has overflowed the world was opened. (1.) The personal cause was one man, viz. Adam. (2.) The real cause was his sin, the sin of eating the forbidden fruit. This sin was the sin of all: for all (viz, on whom death passed) have sinned, not in their own persons, for infants on whom death has passed, have not so sinned; but have therefore sinned in Adam. And this sin of the first man is the cause of all the misery that has overtaken the human race.

The text affords the following doctrine.

Doct. "All mankind, by their fall, lost communion with God, are under his wrath and curse, and so made liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, and to the pains of hell for ever."

In discoursing from this doctrine, I shall show,

I. That all mankind are made miserable.

II. That this misery came by their fall in Adam.

III. What that misery is that hath by the fall overtaken all mankind.

IV. Deduce some inferences for application.

I. That mankind, and all mankind, are made miserable, needs no laborious proof. Sad experience in all ages confirms the truth of this assertion. Troops of misery receive us as soon as we come into the world, whereof some one or other always accompany us till we be laid in the grave. Let men be clothed in rags, or wear a crown, the garment common to all is misery. Every sigh, tear, or sorrowful look, is a proof of this.

II. That this misery came upon men by the fall, is also clear from the text. Man came not out of God's hand with the tear in his eye, or sorrow in his heart, or a burden on his back. He never put on his dole-weed or mourning garment, till he had by sin made himself naked. Death never could enter the gates of the world, till sin set them wide open, Gen. 3. And then one sin let in the flood; and many sins followed and increased it. The first pilot dashed the ship on a rock, and then all that were in it were cast into a sea of misery. Our first parents fell, and we being in them felt with them the sad and mournful effects of their fall.

III. I proceed to shew what that misery is which hath by the fall overtaken all mankind. It may be taken up in these three things.

1. Man's loss by the fall.

2. What he is brought under by it.

3. What he is liable to in consequence of it.

FIRST, Let us view man's loss by the fall. He has lost communion with God. He enjoyed it before that fatal period; but now it is gone. It implies two things. 1. A saving interest in God as his God. Man could then call God his own God, his Maker, his Husband, his Friend, his Portion, being in covenant, with him. 2. Sweet and comfortable society and fellowship with God: and all this without a mediator, God and man not having been enemies or at variance. This sweet and agreeable communion he lost, as appears from Gen. 3:8. where it is said, "They (our first parents) heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden." When God spoke to him before, it was refreshing and comfortable to him; but now it was a terror to him; evidently shewing that all correspondence was broke up.

Thus man lost God, Eph. 2:12. the greatest and the fountain of all other losses. He is no more the God of fallen men, till by a new covenant they get a new interest in him. This is the greatest of all losses and miseries. Had the sun been for ever darkened in the heavens, it had been no such loss as this. God is the cause and fountain of all good; and the loss of him must be the loss of every thing that is good and excellent. Man is a mere nothing without God; a nothing in nature without his common presence, and a nothing in happiness without his gracious presence, Ps. 30:5. "In his favour is life." Ps. 63:3. "Thy loving-kindness is better than life." That day man fell, the foundation of the earth was drawn away, and all fell down together; the soul and the life departed from all men, and left them all dead, having lost God, the fountain of life and joy. Hence we may infer,

1. Man is a slave to the devil, 2 Tim. 2:26. When the soul is gone, men may do with the body what they will; and when God is gone, the devil may do with the soul what he will. Man without God is like Samson without his hair, quite weak and unable to resist his spiritual enemies, as Samson to oppose the Philistines. Satan has over men in nature the power of a master, Rom. 6:16. so that when he bids them go, they go; and when to come, they come; …that of a conqueror, and so he makes them his slaves and vassals;
…and that of a jailor, keeping them fast bound in chains, so that they cannot escape from his clutches, Isa. 61:1.

2. Man has lost his covenant-right to the creatures which he had when in favour with his Maker; and therefore Adam was driven out of paradise. Men have no right to the creatures, or their service now, but that of common providence, until it be otherwise restored by their coming into the bond of the new covenant.

3. Hence man is in a fruitless search after happiness in the creatures, set, as a poor infant that hath lost the breasts, to suck at the dry breasts of the creatures, where nothing is to be met with but continued disappointments.

4. Man cannot help himself, John 15:5. His help is alone in God in Christ, without whom one can do nothing. He is like a poor infant exposed, that cannot help itself, Ezek. 16. He is like one grievously wounded, who can neither make a plaster for his wounds nor apply it. Ah! how miserable Is the case of man under the fall?

SECONDLY, Let us consider what man is brought under by the fall.

1. He is brought under God's wrath. Hence sinners are said to be "the children of wrath," Eph. 2:3. Wrath in God is mixed with no perturbation, but is pure from all discomposure. It imports,

(1.) That sinners are under the displeasure of God. He can take no delight in them, but his soul hates them. There is a holy fire of anger burning in his breast against them. Should the sun be continually under a cloud, and the heavens ever covered with blackness, what a miserable place would the world be? But that is nothing to the divine anger: "Who knows the power of thine anger?" says the Psalmist, Ps. 90:11.

(2.) God deals with them as with enemies, Nah. 1:2. "God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth; the Lord revengeth, and is furious, the Lord will take vengeance on his adversaries; and he reserveth wrath for his enemies," Isa. 1:24.…"Ah, I will ease me of mine adversaries, and avenge me of mine enemies." To have men in power enemies to us, is sad; but to have God an enemy, is beyond expression dreadful: seeing we can neither fight nor flee from him, and he can pursue the quarrel through all eternity.

2. They are under his curse, Gal. 3:10. "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things that are written in the book of the law to do them." Now, God's curse is the binding over the sinner to all the direful effects of his wrath. This is the dreadful yoke which the broken law wreaths about the neck of every sinner as in a natural state. God's curse is a tying of the sinner to the stake, that the law and justice of God may disburden all their arrows into his soul, and that in him may meet all the miseries and plagues that flow from the avenging wrath of God.

Thus every sinner, while in a natural state, is under the wrath and curse of God; a burden on him, that if not removed by him who was made under the law, and bore the curse thereof, will sink sinners into the lowest pit of hell.

THIRDLY, Let us next consider what man is liable to, both in this world and that which is to come.

First, In this world, he is liable.

1. To all the miseries of this life. Now these are twofold.

1st, Outward miseries. There is a flood of these that man is subject to; as,

(1.) God's curse upon the creature for our sake, Gen. 3:17. "Cursed is the ground for thy sake." Under the weight of this curse the whole creation groans and travails in pain, longing for deliverance. It is not the groan of a wearied beast desiring to be disburdened of its load, but a groan the effect of the fall of man. The treason and rebellion of man against his rightful Lord and Sovereign, brought distress and misery upon. all that was formed for his use; as when the majesty of a prince is violated by the rebellion of his subjects, all that belongs to them, and was before the free gift of the prince, is forfeited and taken from them. Their lands, palaces, cattle, even all that pertains to them, bear the marks of his sovereign fury. Consult Deut. 28:15, &c.

(2.) Outward miseries, such as sword, famine, and pestilence. Many times the curse of the Lord makes the heavens as brass, and the earth as iron, binds up the clouds, and restrains their necessary influences, so that the fruits of the earth are dried up. It raises divisions, wars, and mutinies in a kingdom. All the confusions and disorders which are to be seen among men, are the woful fruits and native results of sin. It kindles and blows up the fire of discord in families, cities, and nations. This is that fury that brings a smoking fire-brand from hell, and sets the whole world in a combustion. Pride and ambition, covetousness and desire of revenge, have made the world a stage of the most bloody tragedies. We have some terrible threatenings with respect to these judgments, Deut. 28, Lev. 26. And they are all summed up in one verse, Ezek. 5:17. "I will send upon you famine, and evil beasts, and they shall bereave thee; and pestilence and blood shall pass through thee, and and I will bring the sword upon thee: I the Lord have spoken it."

(3.) Miseries on men's bodies, sickness and bodily pains, as burning fevers, languishing consumptions, distorting convulsions, ugly deformities, gout and gravel, and all the dismal train of wasting diseases and acute pains. Sin hath made man's body a seminary of diseases, and planted in it the fatal seeds and principles of corruption and dissolution, and made him liable to attacks from all distempers, from the torturing stone to the wasting consumption.

(4.) On our estates, as losses, crosses, wrongs, and oppressions. How often do those in trade suffer heavy losses by the bankruptcies of their debtors, by unfair practices, and sinistrous dealings, by cheating and tricking, by extortion and rapine, &c?

(5.) On our names, by reproach, disgrace, &c. Many estates are blasted, and families reduced to poverty and contempt, which sometime have made a good figure in the world. People are made to groan under pinching straits and wants, and yet they seldom consider the bitter root from whence all this springs. It is sin that makes men poor, mean, low, and contemptible in the world, and that brings reproach and disgrace upon their names, Deut. 28:37.

(6.) On our employments and callings. These are many times full of pain, labour, and disappointments. Men earn wages, and put it into a bag with holes, and they disquiet and vex themselves in vain. Whence are our cares and fears but from sin? Fear is the ague of the soul that sets it a shaking. Some fear want, and others alarms. Whence come all the disappointments of our hopes and expectations but from sin? When we look for comfort, there is a cross; where we expect honey and sweetness, there we find wormwood and gall.

(7.) On our relations, unequal uncomfortable marriages, false and treacherous friends, harsh and cruel masters, undutiful and unfaithful servants. It is sin that makes children ungrateful and undutiful to parents: they that should be as the staff of their parents" old age, are as a sword many times to pierce their hearts. It is sin that makes wives disobedient to their husbands, and to defile their beds.

2dly, Inward spiritual miseries: As (1.) "Blindness of mind," Eph. 4:13. the devil putting out the eyes that would not receive the light of the gospel, 1 Cor. 4:4. (2.) "A reprobate sense," Rom. 1:28. whereby men are left of God so as to have no sense of discerning betwixt good and evil, but take bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter. (3.) "Strong delusions," 2 Thess. 2:11. whereby men, forsaking the truth, doat on the fancies and imaginations of their own hearts, and embrace lies for solid truths. (4.) "Hardness of heart," Rom. 2:5. whereby men's hearts are hardened from the fear of the Lord, and proof against conviction, and means used for awakening them. (5.) "Vile affections," Rom. 1:20. eagerly desiring sin and vanity, and all manner of filthiness, without regard to the dictates of reason and a natural conscience. (6.) Lastly, Fear, sorrow, and horror of conscience, which torment men, embitter life, and often bring death in their train, Isaiah 33:14.

2. At the end of this life, man is liable to death, Rom. 6:23. "The wages of sin is death." The soul must be separated from the body; the man falls into the hands of the king of terrors, and goes down to the house appointed for all living.

Object. But if these things be the effects of the fall, how comes it that those who are delivered from the curse of the law and the wrath of God by Jesus Christ, sustain these outward miseries, and die as well as others? Ans. Because the delivery is but imperfect; but when they shall be free from sin, they shall be free from all these. In the meantime there is a great difference betwixt them: for the sting of God's wrath as a judge is taken out of them to the godly, and they are not accomplishments of the threatenings of the covenant of works, Rom. 6:14. but of those of the covenant of grace, Ps. 89:31, 32, 33. and why may not the Lord take some of those things threatened under the covenant of works, and give them a gospel-die, and inflict them according to the second covenant, as well as he does with the commands, which they are still obliged to obey?

Secondly, Let us consider what man is liable to in the world to come. He is liable to the pains of hell for ever. There the Jordan of wrath will overflow all its banks, and that throughout eternal ages. These pains of hell consist in two things, the punishment of loss, and the punishment of sense.

In the punishment of loss. This is unspeakably great, and cannot be sufficiently set forth by the tongue of man. I shall only glance at it a little, without enlarging on particulars. (1.) They will lose all the good things which they enjoyed here in the world, their wealth, their riches, their profits and pleasures, and whatever things they set their heart on while here. (2.) The favourable presence and enjoyment of God and Christ. They will be for ever banished from the beatific vision of God in glory. For he will say to them at the last day, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels," Mat. 25:41. (3.) The blessed company and society of the holy angels and glorified Saints in heaven. (4.) All the glory and blessedness above. (5. All pitty and compassion, having none to commiserate, their condition, or regard their pain. (6.) All hope and expectation of deliverance and outgate from their misery. (7.) All possibility of deliverance from their torments. The door of the pit shall be shut upon them for ever, and their fetters shall never be loosed. Thus sinners in hell shall lose every thing that is good and agreeable, even God the chief good, and all the happiness he has prepared for them that love him.

2. In the punishment of sense. They shall suffer the most grievous torments both in soul and body, and that without intermission, for evermore. These torments are beyond expression, and our most fearful thoughts cannot equal the horror of them. "Who knows the power of thine anger?" says the Psalmist. No man can tell what those plagues and woes are which infinite justice and almighty power hath prepared for obstinate sinners. O that we may be prevailed upon to flee from this wrath that is to come, that so we may not fall into the hands of the living God, and may not be made the dreadful objects of everlasting vengeance.

I conclude with a few inferences.

1. See here the great evil of sin. Many reckon it but a small matter to transgress God's holy and righteous law. They can curse and swear, lie and steal, and commit many other enormous crimes, and yet have no trouble or remorse about it. But if they would consider the dreadful effects of sin, they would be of another mind. Sin is the worst of evils, and big with all kinds of evils whatsoever. It has brought a flood of miseries into the world, which has overflowed the whole creation, under the weight of which the earth and all its inhabitants are groaning. It is the great makebate between God and sinners; it has shut the door of access to God upon us, and exposed us to his wrath and curse in this life and that which is to come.

2. Woful is the case of all who are in a state of nature. They are far from God; they have no interest in or fellowship with him; they are under his wrath and curse, liable to all the miseries of this life, and to the vengeance of eternal fire in the world to come. They are fallen under the power and tyranny of the devil, and if mercy prevent not, shall dwell with him in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone for ever. Whatever your situation and circumstances in the world may be, O ye that are yet in your natural state, ye are in a miserable condition; for ye are without God, the fountain of all good. Ye may read, pray, and communicate, but ye can have no communion with God. Men may be pleased with and bless you; but ye are under God's wrath and curse; and will continue so till ye by faith embrace God in Christ as your God.

3. Lastly, Arise, O ye sinners who are yet in your natural state, and depart; for this is not your rest. Come to the Lord Jesus, who alone can open the door of access to God, whose blood quenches the fire of wrath, and who can deliver from the curse of the law. Who would stay in a house ready to fall? who can sleep sound in a case where God is an enemy? Lay these things seriously to heart, and flee from the wrath ye lie under, for the plague is begun already; and speedily flee from the wrath to come: for it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.