ADAM; HIS RELATION TO THE THEME
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The answer to this set of difficulties is the answer to Ecclesiastes' problem, the resurrection of the dead. `It is
sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption'. Sown, not as some think when a person is buried, but when he is
born into the world. For no one sows dead seed. The contrast is between the two Adams.
`As in Adam all die (wise as well as fools), even so in Christ shall all be made alive (wise as well as fools)'
(1 Cor. 15:22).
When once resurrection is believed and seen as the goal of God and the entrance into true life, then we reverse
the statement of the vanity of all labour, `forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord'.
`For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be
revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. For
the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of Him who hath subjected the same in
hope, because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty
of the children of God. For we know (as Ecclesiastes perceived) that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth
in pain together until now' (Rom. 8:18-22).
`By one man sin entered in the world, and death by sin ... When I would do good, evil is present with me ... O
wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?' (Rom. 5:12 and 7:21-24).
These and such like passages echo and illuminate the discovery of Ecclesiastes 6:10. We must avoid `judging'
the One that is mightier than we are. The book of Job reveals something of this:
`But how can mortal man be just with GOD?
If man contend in argument with HIM,
Of thousand things he could not answer one.
However wise of heart, and stout of limb,
Who ever bravèd HIM, and prosperèd?
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How then can I (address or) answer Him?
Or choose my words (for argument) with Him?
I could not be induced to make reply,
Though just: but I would supplicate my Judge
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If I appeal to strength; Lo! He is strong.
And if to justice; who could summon Him?'
(Job. 9:2-4,14,15,19 - Metrical Version of The Companion Bible).
The paranomasia of the two words contend and content may help us to see the Divine lesson. To fight against
the divinely appointed hiding of God's work `from the beginning unto the end' leads to contending with or judging
God. Judging need not mean condemning, it may mean justifying - God requires us to do neither. We are as wrong
when we labour to justify His ways with man, as we are when we rebel against His appointments. Better, far better,
to obey Him, walk humbly with Him, wait patiently for Him, and trust Him. Who are we to express our conviction
that `If God were to do so and so then He would be ... !' Is this asked of us? Have we still failed to learn the
humiliating estate of the sons of Adam? Not till resurrection dawns shall we begin `to know even as we are known'.
Elihu speaks in harmony with this, when he said to Job:
`But, surely, thou hast spoken in mine ears,
And I have heard a voice of words like these:
`A man without transgression, pure, am I:
Yea, I am clean; without iniquity.