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There's a debate that's been around for as long
as the gospel has been proclaimed and that's over the
question "Does it matter if we sin, now that we know
Christ's forgiveness?" |
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Should we punish ourselves when we succumb to
temptation? Does the righteousness we now have because we
believe in Jesus Christ mean that the way we behave
doesn't matter any more? |
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At the end of last week's passage, in Rom 5:20
we discovered that where sin increased grace abounded all
the more. So you might well ask, doesn't that mean that
if I sin a bit more, God's grace will just increase a bit
more? Grace is a good thing, so if my sin means that
grace increases, isn't that actually a good thing? |
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That of course is the question that Paul poses
at the beginning of ch 6: "What then are we to say?
Should we continue in sin in order that grace may
abound?" He understands where the question is coming
from, but his answer comes back quickly: "By no
means! How can we who died to sin go on living in
it?" The whole point of the good news is that we're
no longer under sin's power. So how can we continue to
obey our sinful desires? |
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Let me take you back to the diagram we saw last
week. Although we continue in Adam's line for a while,
our true life is now in Christ's line. We have died to
sin. Although, as we'll see in a few weeks time, our
bodies are still bound by the weakness of Adam, we've now
been raised to life in Christ. |
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In fact the life we live now is contingent on
both a past and a future reality. So when Paul talks
about us dying to sin there's a past, a present and a
future aspect to it. |
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The Past. |
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He says "Do you not know that all of us who
have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into
his death?" There are in fact 2 events in the past
which are important for us. The first, of course, is
Jesus death on the cross. In Jesus' death sin was
destroyed once and for all, death was defeated and we
were brought into a new relationship with God. The reign
of sin over humanity was overcome at that moment when
Jesus Christ, the sinless one, took on himself the
punishment due to all of humanity. The second event of
the past was our coming to faith, signified by our
baptism. Again death is involved but this time it's our
death. That's what baptism is all about. Baptism
symbolises death, death to sin. It symbolises the fact
that we've been incorporated into the death of Christ. As
a result we're now living outside the realm of sin as
we'll see in a moment. |
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The Future |
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There's also a sense in which our dying to sin
awaits a future fulfilment. There will come a day when
we'll die to sin finally and irreversibly just as Christ
has done. That is, on the day when we die physically,
finally and irreversibly. And having died we'll be raised
again, at Christ's return, to eternal life, with a new
body no longer subject to temptation and sin. Again this
new birth, this resurrection, is symbolised in baptism by
our coming back up from the water. |
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So the past reality is Christ's death and
resurrection on our behalf, the future reality is our own
resurrection, and in the meantime we stand in between, in
a place between two realms, the realm of sin and the
realm of righteousness in Christ. |
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The Present |
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And so we're faced by a present question and a
present imperative. Will we make the death to sin marked
by our Baptism a present reality in our daily living?
Will we die to sin daily and hourly as an active choice
of life? Will we be constantly putting to death our
sinful natures and rising to newness of life in obedience
to God? |
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You see the difficulty we face is this. The past
act of Christ is complete. We've taken hold of it by
faith, we've been sealed in it by baptism, but the final
reality is still in the future. We still live in that
place between death and resurrection. We still live our
lives in our old body. But Christ has died so we can be
freed from the enslavement that goes with that body. He
says "Our old self was crucified with him so that
the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no
longer be enslaved to sin." |
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The possibility is there for us to obey God in a
way that was never possible before we were raised to new
life. But we still have to take hold of that reality. We
need to put the old body to death, to bury it. Someone
once said that life is change, that the only sort of
organism that doesn't experience change is one that's
dead. Well it's equally true that for fallen human
beings, our present life means bondage to sin. And the
only way to escape that bondage is to die. Solzhenitzen
once described death as the ultimate freedom. Similarly,
Paul uses the idea of burial in v4 to indicate the
finality of our release from that bondage. |
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A funeral and the burial or cremation that goes
with it is a vital part in the process of mourning isn't
it? It provides a sense of finality that's important in
coming to terms with loss. You often hear about people
who have been lost and assumed dead but their bodies are
never found. And their families find it so hard to come
to terms with their grief. It's only when the body is
found and they can have a funeral and the person is
buried or cremated that they can finally begin to deal
with their loss and move on. So for us, our dying and
being buried with Christ means we're finally freed from
the power of sin. That's what happened to Jesus when he
died. He was freed from the power of sin and death.
That's why he rose again, because death had no hold over
him. And he takes us into his death so we too can be
freed from the power of sin and death. But we need to
take hold of that fact. We need to make it a daily
reality in our lives. |
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Similarly our future hope of being raised with
Christ begs the question will we begin now to live our
lives as though we were in God's presence already? He
says: "the life he lives, he lives to God." And
we're drawn into that life by the presence of the Holy
Spirit. So how are we who are in Christ Jesus to put sin
to death in our lives and begin now to live our lives to
God? |
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In v11 he moves from explanation to exhortation.
He says "You also must consider yourselves dead to
sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus." That is we
should consider the truth of our present life in Christ
Jesus and take it seriously. Set our lives to match the
past and present reality under which we live. |
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So what will that mean for us? What difference
will it make to our lives? Well, let me ask you, where
are you going to live your life? I don't mean what
suburb, or city, or country. I mean which line are you
going to hold to as you live in the tension of the last
days? What is it that will rule your life? Sin or God?
Mind you, there may be a certain parallel there. You may
well decide to live your life in a particular suburb or
city or country because they offer certain advantages of
environment or opportunities or comfort or safety.
Similarly we need to decide where we'll live our
spiritual life. Where is it that will best match who we
are in God's eyes. Where is it that will best enable and
equip us to serve the one who's now our Lord. |
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You see some people try to live their lives this
way. They say, "I'm a Christian now, so I know I'm
saved. I'm not worried about whether God loves me or
accepts me. I know he does. But I'm not going to change
anything in the way I live, or the things I do, or the
places I go. I'll just carry on the way I always have and
trust God to look after me." Or they say, "I
can't be perfect anyway. So what if I sin a little? God
will forgive me." |
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So what's wrong with that sort of attitude? The
problem with it is that the place they live their lives,
the way they frame their thoughts, the activities that
take up their time, aren't necessarily the places, the
thoughts, the activities that God wants them to be
involved with or that'll help them in their future life
with him. Too often the things of the past are the things
associated with the rule of sin over their lives. And the
problem with being satisfied with a little bit of sin in
our lives is that even a little is too much. Even a
little can corrupt all the bits that are good. |
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So God says, "No longer present your
members to sin as instruments of wickedness, but present
yourselves to God as those who have been brought from
death to life, and present your members to God as
instruments of righteousness." |
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Now when he says "Present your
members" he means every part of our lives, of our
bodies. We can't separate out parts of our lives that are
for God and parts that are reserved for our own use. We
have to choose where we live our whole lives. And he
gives us 2 choices: we can present our members to sin as
instruments of wickedness, or we can present them to God,
as those who are now alive, as instruments of
righteousness. |
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So is that possible? Do you feel like you're
able to choose where you live? This is tricky isn't it?
Sometimes we feel unable to live the way we want to. We
feel like it's all too hard. But the picture we're given
here is of the possibility of a new beginning. The
picture of death followed by new life is a picture of new
beginnings, of second chances. But it isn't just that we
can make new choices. If that's all it were, then we'd be
in the same pickle as before, wouldn't we? We'd be just
as likely to make the wrong choices all over again.
That's what's wrong with asking someone "If you had
the chance to live your life over again would you take
it?" Even if you did take it you'd be just as likely
to make the same mistakes as you did the first time
wouldn't you? If not even worse mistakes! |
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But what he's talking about here in this passage
is more than just a second chance at the same old life.
It's actually a new life. But it's a life that we
need to choose to walk in, if you can understand what I
mean by that. You see, God has never made people follow
him. He doesn't want his people to act like robots.
That's why it was possible for Adam and Eve to disobey in
the first place. Because he wanted their willing
obedience. |
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So now, he raises us to new life in Christ, and
at the same time he urges us to choose to walk in that
life. So we get these different ways of thinking about
that choice. We're to consider ourselves dead to sin and
alive to Christ. We're to present ourselves to God as
those who have been brought from death to life and we're
to present our members to God as instruments of
righteousness. There's to be an active choice on our part
about the direction we'll head, about the lifestyle we'll
choose. |
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But also, there's a new freedom given to us to
make that choice possible. He finishes the passage by
saying: "sin will have no dominion over you, since
you are not under law but under grace." There's a
sense in which our previous inability to do what was
right was limited by the fact that we were subject to law
and judgement. That old order was an order limited by the
death that was inherited from Adam. But now we live under
grace. Jesus' risen life has freed us from death. We're
liberated by the knowledge that our sins are forgiven.
We're liberated by the knowledge that the resurrection to
eternal life awaits us. We're liberated by the risen life
given to us by the presence of the Holy Spirit within us.
And that new freedom means that we can make the choice
that we're urged to make here: to live all of our lives
in the line of Christ. To present our members to God as
instruments of righteousness. |
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The final statement is this: sin no longer has
dominion over us. In other words we're now free to rebel
against sin's rule and to choose to follow Christ.
There's a sense in which this new way of living is
dependent on us choosing to say "Yes" to God,
yet at the same time it's made possible only by God's
grace at work in us through the indwelling of the Holy
Spirit. Our choice doesn't make us worthy, but our choice
is necessary if we're to live Christ's risen life in the
midst of this fallen world and while we're still in these
fallen bodies. Here is the challenge of the gospel.
Consider yourself dead to sin and alive to God in Christ
Jesus, and in response exercise your will to put to death
that which belongs to the old life, presenting your
bodies to God as instruments of righteousness. |
