Caller: One question is on Christ being the 2nd Adam and also one about when does the 6,000-year period start - at the time of the Creation week or does it start at the time when Adam and Eve sinned?
Pastor Doug: Well of course, the 6,000-year theory is just that. It's a theory. And I believe the theory. For our listeners what that states is that there have been 6,000 years approximately from Creation to the present day. The Bible tells us in Revelation 20 the 1,000 years - the millennial reign when we're living and reigning with Christ in glory - that's 1,000, it's like a 1,000-year sabbath and because of that, many have believed that six years the Jews used to farm their land. The seventh year they would harvest and it would remain desolate for a year. Well Jesus says He's coming to harvest the world in Revelation and there's a number of analogies that really give a lot of credibility to the idea that, after 6,000, Christ is going to come, then a 1,000-year Sabbath, then He makes a new heaven and a new earth.
Caller: Okay so you feel that it actually starts at the Creation week not when Adam and Eve fell?
Pastor Doug: Well you know I don't think there would be much difference - let me tell you why. After God made Adam and Eve, He told them to be fruitful and multiply. And remember, they were made full-grown. They hadn't had any children yet, which makes me suspicious that less than a year went by before sin entered the world. And so whether we're saying it's Creation or a few months later when the devil tempted them, there's very little variation there. See what I'm saying?
Caller: Yeah. I can figure. That's why I asked the first part - when Jesus died if He was the second Adam. Did Jesus die when Adam and Eve sinned?
Pastor Doug: No. When the Bible tells us that Jesus is the second Adam, what that's simply saying - and Paul addresses this quite a bit in Romans I believe as well as other places - we are all infected with sin by virtue of Adam's decision. Adam, who was born with no natural propensity to sin, chose to disobey God and sin then contaminated his posterity - the whole race.
In the same way, Jesus, who was born with the fallen tendencies of the human family, He overcame in the same strength that you and I can overcome and we then can have victory through Him by being adopted into His family, by having Christ in us.
So as the whole world fell through the sin of the first Adam, the whole church can be victorious through the victory of Christ, the second Adam.
Caller: Yeah I agree with all of that. I guess to me the reason why I was just thinking of, you know, if there was a reason why Christ got to be a certain age
Pastor Doug: Oh you mean when He died?
Caller: Yes.
Pastor Doug: Well He was in His prime. I don't know how old Adam looked when he sinned or what his age was. We know he lived to 930. I think it's interesting. This is free Paul, but I just thought about this yesterday. I heard a Minister say one time that God put Adam to sleep and He opened his side and out came Eve. Jesus, when He gave up the ghost and He went to sleep, His Side was pierced and a flow of blood came out and the church was born, His Bride. That's a beautiful analogy.
Co-Host: That sure is.
Caller: I like that.