Romans 6:15-23 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? By no means! Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
You have received THE GIFT OF GOD through the shed blood of Jesus Christ, eternal life instead of death. Because of Christ, you are eternal beings in his family. Your hope rests not in your works, but IN CHRIST’S WORKS. You did not change your life from death to life, Christ did. Your holiness before God is determined by the HOLY ONE. Freedom from sin is the key to a holy life lived IN CHRIST. You must know that your are set free from sin because of Christ’s work before you can truly live the life of an ambassador of Christ to the world. You used to live according to the dictates of the flesh: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. (Galatians 5:19-21) You used to honor the works of the flesh, the works that lead to eternal damnation; but now being free because of the love of God in your heart, you honor his works of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. (Galatians 5:22-23) You express love for the world by loving your neighbor as yourself. Working to do good for other people; revealing the truth of a holy life is your ambition. As Jesus said, in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. (Matthew 7:12.) IN CHRIST, you have become a slave to righteousness. Your life seeks to honor Christ. When your thoughts are on God, you love him with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength because you know you have been set free from sin and death. This is the life of a Christian: no other life satisfies his or her soul. Singing the song of gladness the Spirit places in your heart, you live by the Spirit’s will not your own.
But we ask ourselves, what about the sin in our lives? If we are holy, slaves to Christ, his workmanship, why are we sometimes caught up in wrongdoing, and why does our attitude not always reflect Christ? These are important questions for Christians. We know we cannot mimic the ways of the world and then claim we are living IN CHRIST. We cannot live a secular life and then proclaim we are spiritual. We cannot obsessively desire more and better things in this life, living in discontentment, and then say we are satisfied with the work Christ has done in and through us. The Bible says, But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. (1 Timothy 6:7-8) In today’s passage Paul says, But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance. We are no longer Romans with allegiance to the flesh and the things of this world. We live by the Spirit of God. When we fail, when our spirits seek fleshly solutions to our lives or when we indulge the flesh by doing things contrary to God’s holiness, we repent out of love and loyalty to our Savior. We are his, bought by a high price, so we repent of our sins. When Rome invades our lives, we seek the sword of the Spirit, God’s Word, because the Bible feeds our souls. What about chronic sins—those we repeat, knowing they are wrong, outside of God’s holiness. Foremost, we no longer live by the law that condemns us. When the early church pondered circumcision and the law, the disciples and Paul concluded that none of them were able to satisfy all the law’s requirements on their lives. The law only condemned them. We should not immerse ourselves in sin, but when we fail, we should consider this an outcropping of the old man who is alive in our Adamic DNA. Our hope is not in restructuring Adam’s DNA, but in the new creature that God has created in us. We are dead to sin and alive in Christ through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. The old nature is terminal, the new creature is eternal. As we focus on God and his work, chronic sin loses its hold on us, and the old nature grows weaker, losing its preeminence. We ARE God’s ambassadors in this world. Sin deflects from God’s goodness and love; obedience to him enlightens the world to his nature. Praising Him for who He is, revealing him to this world, is our duty and joy as his ambassadors. When you despair because of sin in your life, look to Jesus Christ and to the new creature He has established. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. (John 3:16-18)
Alive IN CHRIST, we are considered dwelling places of the Most High, temples of God. Our temple has been cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ. As temples, the voice of God is within us. We should be sensitive to that voice. In the tabernacle that Moses built, there was a room called the Holy of Holies where the Ark was placed. From the top of the Ark underneath the cherubim’s wings came the voice of God. Moses went into that tabernacle to listen to God’s voice and to follow his instructions. We are that holy place. God has made us holy. His voice dwells within us, and we follow him as He directs. In the Old Testament, a cloud always hovered over the tabernacle. When the cloud moved, the tabernacle was taken down and moved with the cloud. When the cloud stayed over a certain location, the tabernacle stayed in that location. The voice of God was always in that tabernacle. We who are alive IN CHRIST also move in this world as He directs. We have been sanctified, set apart for his purposes, and we are dedicated to God’s will. The tabernacle in our lives will be moved many times. Wherever we settle, we will worship God, praise him for his goodness, direction, and comfort. He has made us new creatures with a new destination. We who were indistinguishable from the rest of mankind have received his favor. We are now his forever: you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. He will never leave us, nor forsake us. We will never have to say: Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lemasabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:45) Jesus paid the price: He was forsaken, but God redeemed him, raised him from the dead. Dear friends, as new creatures IN CHRIST, you will not be forsaken. Your sins will not separate you if you hold your faith in the One who paid the price of death for you. Believe that! For God is not a liar. But we do not use our freedom to fall again into sin. As Paul wrote to the church in Galatia: You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. (Galatians 5:13) As God’s ambassador, serve others humbly in love.
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