Westminster Project 6.3 - 4

3. Because they were the root of all mankind, the guilt of this sin was imputed to all their posterity descending from them by ordinary generation; and the same death in sin and the same corrupted nature was conveyed to their posterity. 

4. All of our actual transgressions proceed from this original corruption, by which we are utterly unwilling, disabled, made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil. 
(WCF 6.3-4)

One of the great questions of the human experience is: how did Adam’s sin actually affect us? How did his one mistake put us all at odds with our Creator? How did our first parents’ rebellion become ours? This is what the confession addresses here.

First, “they” (Adam and Eve) were the root of all mankind. What does that mean? Essentially, Adam was the head and representative of all humanity who stood before the Lord on our behalf. He was “the root,” and when he rebelled and sinned in the Garden, it caused spiritual death (Gen 2:15-17, 3:17-19, Rom 5:12-21). This means his sentence cut him off from God and thus affected all who would come from his union with Eve (Gen 2:21-24). 

The confession puts it like this: “the guilt of this sin was imputed to all their posterity descending from them by ordinary generation.” Simply put, because the wages of sin is death, that spiritual death not only killed Adam and Eve but spread to all their descendants. Thus, “the same death in sin and the same corrupted nature was conveyed to their posterity.” Pastor Voddie Baucham sums it up nicely: “We’re born as vipers in diapers” (see Gen 3:16, 4:1-7, Rom 5:12-21).

Think about it like this: both my parents are British. They were born in England and lived there. However, before I was born, they immigrated to Australia and had me in the hills of Blackwood, in southern Australia. There was nothing I could do to make them have me in the United Kingdom—they had already left that land and had me in a completely different country. Similarly, our first parents were once in the kingdom of God, both physically and spiritually. But before any of us were born, they were cast out, and we have all been born outside of that spiritual life. We are born as citizens of this world, dead in trespasses (see Rom 3:9-12).

Second, because we are born spiritually dead and citizens of this world by nature, we naturally sin (Jn 8:44, Phil 3:20). The 18th-century theologian Jonathan Edwards hits the nail on the head: “We are not sinners because we sin, but we sin because we are sinners.” His point is simple and captured by the confession: “All of our actual transgressions proceed from this original corruption.” So, is it just that we are punished? Yes—because not only by nature are we sinners (what is called original sin), but we also sin continually and are therefore guilty of personal sin as well.

All it takes is for any of us to reflect on God’s revelation and moral law, and we will quickly see—and hopefully agree—that “we are utterly unwilling, disabled, made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil.” That is why the redemption found in Christ Jesus is the answer to all of this. We were created by God and for God, created for relationship with Him. But because of sin, we have been cut off and severed from true and eternal life. 

The good news is this: instead of leaving His people in this “country,” our God made a way for us to be reconciled to Him and to be brought back to that heavenly country. Jesus is the answer. Jesus is the perfect representative, the second Adam. He is the way, the truth, and the life—and no one goes to the Father but by Him (2 Cor 5:21, Jn 14:6, Rom 5:12-21).