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If we see great streams of people journeying from every direction towards one common destination, we infer that this spot must be the centre of some unusual attraction. It is a pretty sight to stand some summer Sabbath morning upon a rising ground, and see the lanes dotted with pilgrims wending their way towards the church of God. Suppose a wayfarer encounters groups of travellers, and the nearer he draws to the adjacent town, finds the crowds increasing, and the interest heightening on every face. He asks the object of this unusual excitement, and learns that the foundation stone of a great temple is to be laid by a great man; that there is to be a procession and a gala day of banners, music, and rejoicing. So does a survey of the landscape of past history disclose the lives of many men tending towards one point; and, standing as we do upon our gospel vantage ground, we can see a long procession of lives tending in their acts and history to one point; we can hear the music of many a deed celebrating beforehand one greater deed than all. There was a divinity shaping the ends of many of the lives of the Old Testament worthies, to the purpose that they might be typical of that life which is our life, and by which our stifled souls might breathe again with their destined immortality. A mark had been impressed upon the lives of men in earlier times, and a map had been sketched upon the page of history, whose lines converged towards the one great central fact, that Jesus Christ should come into the world. If we look amongst the men whose lives were eminently typical of the Redeemer, we shall not find one in whose case it will be a more easy task to trace the parallel than that of Adam. But just in proportion as the similarity is striking, so will the points of difference be prominent.

I. POINTS OF CORRESPONDENCE.

1. Both were formed by and came directly from God. Here, of course, we speak of Jesus in His humanity. In the method of his birth the first man differed from all the rest of his posterity, and the only parallel we find to it is in the miraculous conception of the Child of Bethlehem. Of course, even in this, the points of difference are greater than those of likeness. But it was the breath of the Lord which breathed into Adam's nostrils the breath of life; it was the Spirit of the Lord which overshadowed the Virgin.

2. Both were formed in the same glorious likeness, designed as the mirrors to reflect the life and image of the Author of all life. And as in Adam, ere he fell, the unblushing cheek, where shame had been "ashamed to sit," formed the mirror which reflected the likeness of the Father, so was that same likeness printed on the form and feature of the spiritual life of Jesus Christ, so that He could claim His heavenly pedigree, and declare, "He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father."

3. The fatherhood of both over a numerous race.

(1) The tawny slave who hoes the rice field in the burning sun; the dark-eyed denizens of China and of India; the fiery Afghan; the tall Circassian; the dwarfish Hottentot; the fur-clad dweller amidst northern ice; and the naked panter in the tropic heat; the homeless Jew and clannish Gentile; the readers of the Koran, of the Shasters, of the Bible; the worshipper of the sun, of Juggernaut, and of Jesus; each creature who bears the form and likeness of a man, dates his paternity to Adam.

(2) The seed of the Second Adam shall be also numerous. All souls are His, purchased by Him, that they may be born again through Him. And though the work of regeneration by no means keeps pace with the increase of the race, He shall yet "see His seed," and that seed shall outnumber sand or stars for multitude, and be gathered out of all lands. And they shall bear the family feature clear in life and lineament. As by nature they once "bore the image of the earthly," so by the redundant grace of this new birth shall they bear impressed upon them the "image of the heavenly."

4. The lordship and dominion with which each was invested.

(1) Man was made only "a little lower than the angels," and has been "crowned with glory and honour." He holds dominion over the very work of God's own hand; he wounds the earth that it may give him food. All things are put beneath his feet; the beasts range plain and mountainside, but they cannot range so widely as the thought of man; the birds soar high, but they cannot cleave their way to such fair altitudes as man's ambition may attain; the fishes dive down into the ocean gorge, but they cannot pierce to such a deep profound as that intelligence which marks mankind and sets the human over the brute creation.

(2) And if a man is thus large in lordship and dominion, how much more the Son of Man, who came to reassert the creature's claim after it had been flung away, by sharing His own dominion with that creature. The dominion of Jesus is illimitable. While man is made a little lower, He is made "so much better than the angels, as He hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they." For when the power of Omnipotence showed forth its mightiest sinew, it was when it "wrought in Christ, and raised Him from the dead," etc. (Ephesians 1:20-23).

5. The conjugal union ordained by God respecting them. Paradise was inadequate to appease the need of the first man, and bring him to rest, till woman was created. And so the Maker hushed him into a deep sleep, and from his side He took the comrade meet for him, and made his happiness complete. Now this is one of the most striking types of Christ's union with His Church. He is the Bridegroom, and that Church is "the bride, the Lamb's wife." Adam and Eve were not more intimately and emphatically one flesh than Christ and the Christian are one spirit. "This is a great mystery; but I speak concerning Christ and the Church."

II. POINTS OF CONTRAST.

1. "The first Adam was of the earth, earthy; the Second Adam was the Lord from heaven."

2. The first Adam possessed the Divine image, and effaced it; the Second Adam put on the human image, that He might restore in us the Divine. The serpent hissed its evil breath, and filmed the brightness which God had spread over His creature's brow; and, just as the foul vapour on a looking glass blurs the reflections on its disc, so did the image stamped by the Creator there become distorted and disturbed. But Christ rubbed off the taint of the tempter's breath, and wrote the name of God upon the creature in His own blood.

3. The spirit of apostate Adam was proud, unbelieving, discontented, and rebellious; that of the Second Adam was humble, submissive, obedient, and faithful.

4. The first Adam was the medium of death, while the Second brought salvation and life.

5. By the first Adam paradise was lost; by the Second that paradise is regained.

(A. Mursell.)

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KJV: (For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law.

WEB: For until the law, sin was in the world; but sin is not charged when there is no law.