Dead, Buried And Free

DEAD, BURIED, AND FREE

Romans 5:20-6:14

INTRODUCTION:

Mother and baby skunk walking close to paper mill.

Baby asks, “Mom, what it that smell?”

Mother takes deep smell and says, “I don’t know but we’ve got to get some of that.”

That could be an example of STINKIN’ thinkin’

Our scripture today is definitely an example of stinkin’ thinkin’.

Paul was working with a group of people who said about the stupidest thing Paul had ever heard.

Have you ever heard something really stupid come out of someone’s mouth.

It was so stupid all you could do was stand there with your mouth open and shake your head????

Like the woman on “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?”

I know a girl who was helping carry firewood from the woods to the truck and said, “Wouldn’t it be easier to cut the tree down and let it fall in the truck?”

That is how Paul felt when he heard the stupid thing they were saying in Rome…

Whenever we sin God gives us grace… the more we sin the more grace God gives… therefore… it is a good thing for us to sin so God can be more gracious.

We can continue to sin and still be OK

READ SCRIPTURE

As we celebrate Independence Day.... or Declaration Day... tomorrow, I want us to really celebrate our TRUE INDEPENDENCE.

To do that we have to get some clear thinking… ABOUT SIN

Paul uses three words that teach us about sin...

DEAD BURIED FREE

Paul says Christians should be DEAD

“I thought you were getting up a bus load to go right now.”

Paul confronts the ones who feel it is OK to keep on sinning by asking, “Should we go on sinning in order to show God’s love? NO... NO... a million times NO!!

INFACT>>>>WE CAN’T … WE DIED TO SIN!!!!!!!!!. HOW CAN WE CONTINUE TO LIVE IN IT?

DIED = SHOULD HAVE DIED... to sin.

So, why should Christians NOT continue in sins?

WE ARE DEAD TO SIN

Not dead like the people who are in the cemetery... not our body has ceased to function.

No, instead we are to be dead to sin like the man who goes to the dentist and gets his jaw numbed… it is dead.

You can stick it with pins, burn it with fire.., it is dead to the world.

To be DEAD TO SIN = to be unresponsive to sin, to be insensitive to sins allure.

Paul says WE SHOULD BE DEAD TO SIN.

He puts it this way in Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me.”

In 2 Corinthians 5:17, Paul says, “If any man is in Christ, he is a NEW CREATURE, OLD THINGS HAVE DIED AND ALL THINGS HAVE BECOME NEW.”

Luke says, in 9:23, “And He was saying to them all, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.”

The day when you prayed the sinner’s prayer and invited Christ into your life as Savior…

YOU PROMISED TO DIE!!!!

You promised that you would begin the process of killing off the old creature and will begin to nurture the new creation in you.

Now some of you have promised to kill the old creature but you obviously plan to kill it by over-indulgence, foundering, or by letting it die of old age.

God expects you to KILL IT!!

How?

STARVE IT TO DEATH!!!!!

Refuse to go there any more, think it any more, do it any more, see it any more, touch it any more.

We have to kill the old nature the same way the mountain gorilla, the elephant and the Cheetah are becoming extinct… loss of habitat.

Deforestation… urban sprawl… poaching

We need to kill off the old nature by reducing its habitat

Take away it’s territory… it’s control

On Monday you are watching TV, evil nature has the remote. HS comes in and says “I want to change the channel to something better for you.” E.N. says, “No way, I have the remote.”

You take the remote away from E.N. and give it to H.S.

E.N. stomps out of the room fussing.

On Tuesday, you are in the kitchen with the HS warming up a dish of nutritious food and in comes EN and takes HS’s meal out of the microwave and puts in some leeks and onions. HS complains and E.N. sticks out his tongue.

You tell EN that HS has control of the menu and he has to take his leeks and onions out of the house

EN gets upset and screams…”You always take his side. It is not fair.”

The next day EN is on his way to the bathroom with his red towel and his little devil slippers with the light up eyes. At the same time HS comes with his pure white towel and his angel shoes with the cute little wings and light up halo.