LIFE OUT OF DEATH DEATH TO SIN/NEW LIFE IN CHRIST Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin. For he who has died has been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts. And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace. 1
INTRODUCTION: It is certainly true that we cannot live a holy life in our own strength. Christianity is not a do it yourself religion. Philippians 4:13 I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Colossians 1:11 Strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy. Ephesians 3:16 That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man. We are united with the One who is at work in us to strengthen us with His mighty power. However, we have all known the awful sense of hopelessness caused by sin s power. We have resolved scores of times never to give in again to a particular temptation, and yet we do. Then Satan comes to us and says, You might as well give up. You can never overcome that sin. It is true that in ourselves we cannot, but we are alive to God, united to Him who strengthens us. 2
I. CERTAINITY: 8-10 v.8 Christ s one death to sin brought not only the death of sin but the death of death for those who, by faith, have died with Him. These truths in verse 8-10 are referring to the first seven verses about the believer s death to sin. I live a new life in Christ. There is a major stressing of the permanence of this glorious truth. The assurance that we shall also live with Him applies to believer s ultimate and eternal presence with Christ in heaven. But the context, live forever on holy living, strongly suggests that Paul is speaking primarily about our living with Him in righteousness in this present life. Again, it carries the idea of CERTAINTY. shall also live v.9 Knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over Him. 3
Because we have died and been raised with Christ (v3-5), we too, will never die again. The sin that made us subject to death is no longer master over us, just as it no longer has dominion (master) over Him. Let s marry v.9 and v.10 Romans 6:10 For the death that he died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Because death is the penalty of sin (Romans 6:23), to break the power of sin is to break the power of death. 3 KEY WORDS 1. PERMANENCE we shall live with Him v.8 Christ.dies no more v.9 Death no longer has dominion over Him v.9 He died to sin once for all v.10 He achieved a victory that will never need repeating. 4
Hebrews 7:26-27 For such a High Priest was fitting for us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and has become higher than the heavens; who does not need daily, as those high priest, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the people s, for this He died once for all when He offered up Himself. Hebrews 9:12 Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. Hebrews 9:28 So Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation. Hebrews 10:10 By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. I. Peter 3:18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit. 5
2. PENALTY Romans 6:10 For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Christ obviously never had the same relationship to sin that every other human being has. He not only was never mastered by sin but never committed a sin of the least sort. Hebrews 4:15 For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. How could Christ have died to sin? Some suggest that believers have died to sin in the sense of no longer being sensitive to the allurement of sin. Christian experience tells me different. (Christ was never sensitive to sin s allurements.) He Died To Sin s Penalty By taking upon Himself the sins of the whole world. I John 2:2 And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world. 6
By faith in Him, empowered by His divine and limitless grace, believers have died to sin. 3. POWER v.9 Death no longer has dominion over Him. Christ broke sin s power over those who belong to God through their faith in His Son. II Corinthians 5:21 For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. These twin truths (penalty/power) are a beautiful line in Augustus TopLady s Hymn Rock of Ages Be of sin the double cure, save from wrath (penalty) and make me pure (power). We are not only identified with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection, but also His virgin birth. He in His physical birth and we in our spiritual birth are both conceived by the Holy Spirit. II. COUNT/CONSIDER 11-14 Persuasion, to depend on someone, to have value and significance to look forward to as certain. 7
You can count on it -anticipate In the present passage Paul again answers questions he knew his readers would wonder about. If we have been freed from sin by Christ (7) why does it still give us so much trouble? If we are now holy before God, why are our lives so often unholy? If we are righteous, how can our lives better manifest that righteousness? 3 Key Words In 6:11-14: I. KNOW Deals with the Mind 11 reckon consider; the idea is You must know and fully believe what I have just said, or else what I am about to say will make no sense. Verses 1-10 are divinely revealed, foundational truths behind Christian living, apart from which you can never hope to live the holy lives your new Lord demands. Scriptural exhortation is always built on spiritual knowledge. Scripture is replete with specific commands and standards for conduct and behind all of them are divine truths, explicit or implicit, upon which these commands and standards are founded. Christian living depends on Christian learning; duty is always found on doctrine. If Satan can keep a Christian ignorant, he can keep him impotent. 8
For a Christian to live out the fullness of his new life in Christ, for him to truly live as the new creation that he is, he must know and believe that he is not what he used to be. He must understand that, despite his present conflict with sin, he is no longer under sin s tyranny and will never again be. The true understanding of his identity is essential. Faithful divine living without divine knowledge is impossible. Sin and death have no dominion over Christ. We are in Christ, therefore, sin and death have no dominion over us. Jesus Christ not only died for sin, but He also died unto sin. That is, He not only paid the penalty for sin, but He broke the power of sin. Through Christ we reign in life (Romans 5:17) so that sin no longer controls our lives. The big question now is, I believe (know) the facts of this biblical truth, but how do I make this work in daily experience? 9
II. RECKON Deals with the Heart 11-12 Has to do with the heart. Reckon is used 41 times in the New Testament and 19 times in Romans alone. It s translated count or impute; to take into account, to calculate, to estimate. Used in the sense of fully offering a truth, of having unreserved inner confidence in the reality of what the mind acknowledges. Reckoning is a matter of faith that issues an action. It is not claiming a promise, but acting upon a fact. God does not command us to become dead to sin. He tells us that we are dead to sin and alive unto God, and then commands us to act upon it. Why then do Christian s find it so hard to believe they are actually free from sin s dominion? III. YIELD Deals with the Will 12-14 Present has to do with the will. Because of the incomprehensible truths about his relationship to God that the believer knows with his mind and feels deeply committed to in his heart, he is therefore able to exercise his will successfully against sin and by God s power, prevailing its reign in his mortal body. 10
In this present life, sin will always be a powerful monarch who is determined to reign in the believer s life just as he did before salvation. Sin is personified by Paul as a dethroned but still powerful monarch who is determined to reign in the believer s life just as he did before salvation. The apostle s admonition to believers is for them to not let sin reign because it now has no right to reign. It now has no power to control a believer unless the believer chooses to obey its lust. I Peter 2:9, 11 But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul, Because a believer is a new creature in Christ, his immortal soul is forever beyond sin s reach. The only remaining beachhead where sin can attack a Christian is in his mortal body. One day that body will be glorified and forever be out of sin s reach, but in the meanwhile it is still mortal, that is, subject 11
to corruption and death. It still has sinful lusts because the brain and thinking processes are part of the mortal body and Satan uses those lusts t lure God s people back into sin in whatever ways he can. CONCLUSION: Sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law, but under grace. Roman 7:12 teaches that God s law is holy and righteous and good. But the law cannot break either sin s penalty or its power. It can only rebuke, restrain, and condemn. The Christian is no longer under the condemnation of God s law but now under the redeeming power of His grace. It is in the power of the grace (ability/power to obey) that the Lord calls him to live. When the Bible teaches that we are dead to sin, it s not in the sense of being free or dead to its solicitations, but to its power to condemn us. Along with this identification with Jesus comes a new motivation to love, obey and serve the Lord. This motivation leads us to quit the sin and to present ourselves and our member as slaves to the One who has done it all. And with that motivation comes blessed reinforcement of the will form the Holy Spirit who now dwells within us. 12