Paul now reinforces his point and the comparison between Adam’s act and Christ’s act. Through the one sinful act, condemnation comes to all men, through the one righteous act. All are justified. Note that we already have been given a qualification of “all” in verse 17, those who benefit from Jesus are those who receive grace. Therefore, whilst it is not explicitly drawn out here, comparison with 1 Corinthians 15 and the context we have seen so far suggests that we should think in terms of two “human races”, those in Adam and those in Christ (v18). Through Adam’s disobedience many are made sinners, through Christ’s obedience, many are made righteous (v19).
Verse 20 makes two surprising and astounding statements, first that the purpose of the law was not to deal with the problem of sin but to allow, enable even, sin to increase. The second is that where sin increases, grace increases even more. To fully understand what those statements do and do not mean, we will need to read on (v20). The purpose though is that just as sin reigned in death, now grace will reign through righteousness bringing about eternal life. The point is that sin exercises a form of dominion, it achieves its aim by bringing death to all. However because of Jesus, grace has greater authority, achieving its aim of bring about life through the means of justification by faith (v21).
Faithroots 