The doctrines of grace have been a part of biblical instruction since the first century when the apostles and prophets of the early church inscribed them into holy Scripture. These teachings of the Bible did not originate with the New Testament. They go back to Genesis when it quickly became apparent that God’s grace was mankind’s only hope of escaping the deserved punishment for sinning against him. The first Adam willfully did what God commanded him not to do. All of humanity is in Adam and came into captivity to sin because of him.

The desperate plight of humanity is evident. We can sin, but we have no control over the consequences. Nor are the consequences entirely hidden though we cannot foretell exactly how they will play out in life. It was clear to Adam and Eve that death would be the punishment for disobedience. How they would experience that death may not have been readily apparent to them, but there was no scenario in which death was of minimal concern or in any possible way escapable.

What came to be immediately after their transgression was far more terrifying than they might have expected. They could not control sin. They could not stop it. They could not escape it. It only became worse as time and family life went on. Their first-born son brutally murdered their second-born son. Generation after generation were under the power and penalty of sin. The entire earth was subjected to futility and it languished under the curse because of human sin. Death was now everywhere. What life there was became darkness. Only a very few in those ancient generations clung to a hope that came in the briefest words of condemnation God spoke to the serpent who had deceived Eve. “I will put enmity between you and the woman…he [the woman’s offspring] will crush your head and you shall crush his heel” (Genesis 3:15).