The Book Of Romans.
Sunday, September 7, 2008.
Romans 6:1 - 14. Dying To Live.
I considered another title to this teaching which was -- Putting Sin 6 Feet Under, and that idea will also play a major roll in our study today.
But, a full 15 times in the first 14 verses of this chapter the word death or died or dead is repeated. So if you are looking for a theme in these verses, it must be present in the concept of dying.
But how does dying fit in with life and living? Let’s see if through our study today we don’t come to a much better understanding of a seemingly paradoxical statement that Jesus made;
"For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it.” Mark 8:35.
And this is the kind of loosing your life that you can only do while you are still living.
Here is another verse that will help us and really should come to be a Victory Cry for every one who calls themselves a follower of Jesus.
Galatians 2:20
I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.
This verse that I call a Victory Cry could not begin with more dyer words and actually repulsive words; I have been crucified...
If you lived in the time of the Apostle Paul and happened to see a man carrying a cross down the middle of main street flanked on both sides by Roman guards, there would be no doubt in your mind of what was going to happen next. That man was going to die.
Now what is that old pirate saying, you know the one from the Disney Land ride; Dead Men -- Tell No Tales. Here is what else they don’t do... They don’t lie, cheat, steal, or go with girls who do.
They don’t demand to have things their own way. They don’t hold grudges, and here is the big one -- They Don’t Sin! Ever try to tempt a dead man; Oh come on don’t just lie there you are going to live this or that!
This is The up side of dying, while you are still alive. Let’s see here that would have been another great title for these verses -- The Up Side Of Dying.
Jesus said; N. L. T.
Luke 9:23 Then He said to the crowd, "If any of you wants to be My follower, you must put aside your selfish ambition, shoulder your cross daily, and follow Me.”.
When Jesus says shoulder your cross, or in other translations, take up your cross every day, He is telling us to consider ourselves Dying To Live. Each day the believer is to accept the sentence of death.
What are we dead to? You ready? Every dark, shameful, unholy act, thought, purpose, way of living that our flesh can come up with, including every omitted good that we failed to accomplish.
We are to be dead to all the things that would cause separation between us & a Loving, Caring, Good & Compassionate God.
In fact there are things that we should love to be dead to. Illustration of this? Like when you marry -- you had better be dead to single living or there will be serious repercussions in your home. And all the married couples said? Amen.
Let’s let these verses loose on our hearts, shall we?
Please follow along as I get us started I will be reading from;
Romans 6:1 - 7.
1 WHAT shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?
2 Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?
3 Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?
4 Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
5 For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection,
6 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.
7 For he who has died has been freed from sin.
Please join with me in a word of prayer...
Though this chapter refers constantly to death make no mistake about it, you can mark down Romans 6 as one of the most powerful life giving & life changing chapters in the bible. And that is no exaggeration.
I mean this chapter is just powerful in the truth that it delivers to the one who really wants to live the life that God has for us.
See that first verse;
1 WHAT shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?
To really understand it let’s tie it together with the end of;
Romans 5:20 ... But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more,
The beauty of this is that however dark, or deep, wide or high your sin is, greater still is the grace that God has for us.
Isn’t that lovely? Yet Paul anticipates that there will always be that wise guy in the crowd who will say; Let me get this straight, when I sin a lot, I get grace a lot? Well then Let’s Sin A Lot.
Verse 2 responds with a resounding; Certainly not!
KJV: God forbid. NLT: Of course not!
NASB: May it never be!
My Translation: What are you nuts!
I guess that is why I am not a bible translator.
And as if to say; And Here Is Why not, look at the end of verse 2; How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?
0A
We who believe, died to sin, then let’s go ahead and ask the question; When did I die, and where is my grave?
Verse 3, which is a real pivotal verse for this teaching, tells us;
3 Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?
Water baptism here becomes a picture an illustration of what happens to the believer when faith is placed in Christ.
Down into the water of burial we go with Christ and then BAM -- up and out of the water in resurrection power. But don’t miss the death that takes place in there. We really need to get this and so I was think that maybe at our next baptism, I should hold people down a little longer, you know, until most of the bubbles are gone.
Verses 6 & 7 the identification gets even stronger;
6 knowing this, that our old man (our life Before Christ) was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin.
7 For he who has died has been freed from sin.
Oh, I hope we are starting to get this, because it will free us to live for Jesus. Here is what this is saying;
That when Jesus was crucified, we believers, were right there with Him. That His cross became our cross and His grave became our grave.
If you go to Jerusalem and visit the grave site of Jesus and look in, that grave site is our grave site. Golgotha, that is where we were crucified in Christ Jesus.
And since we are partakers of His death, we shall also be partakers of His resurrection life. So the believer has a new nature.
2 Corinthians 5:17
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.
The problem is that the new nature is that it is still housed in the old tent, spirit now alive to Christ, flesh still unrepentant, unbroken, and not going to heaven.
The flesh still says, give me, give me, give me, & I want, I want, I want.
See those words in verse 6; that the body of sin might be done away with...
Well, I still fight sin, who knows what I mean? Some days the battle is greater than others. So we need to really understand this; done away with, and I found that it means Rendered Powerless or Paralyzed.
On one hand Wonderful, Awesome Good News -- the believer doesn’t have to sin! I am not sins slave. Yes, I love this.
But alas it also means that sorrow or sorrows, I will never be able to enter a Phone Booth, are there still Phone Booths, and emerge with a giant S C on my chest, Do not fear, it’s me, Super Christian and I am unaffected by temptation.
And so from this breath to our last on earth, it is ‘Onward Christian Soldier -- marching as to war’, putting up the good fight of faith, until at last this corruption puts on incorruption. Oh, what a day that will be.
Still, I don’t have to give into my flesh. There is a power greater in the life of the believer than sin -- The resurrection life of Jesus within us.
Like gravity, the power that makes everything fall, & thing, drop, and everything droop -- or so my mirror is trying to tell me lately.
So gravity works and keeps on working UNLESS, and this is a glorious UNLESS; Unless there is a greater power to render it powerless, unless there is a greater power that can stop or paralyze it.
Like a rocket that wants to leave the earths atmosphere, there must we enough power to break free of the gravitational pull or down it will fall.
And so the believer, who is dead to sin, who has resurrection power within, can break free from the gravitational pull of sin.
Let’s walk through the rest of our verses together;
8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him,
9 knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over Him.
10 For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.
Are you now more sensitive to those words Die, Dead, Death now, good than also be sensitive to the Life and the Lives on the other side of them.
You see Jesus is our only hope to live a life that is; Lived to God, lived for His glory.
11 Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Want power over sin? Reckon yourselves to be dead ... to sin...
Whatever your favorite sin is, whatever calls to you, like in the OLD DAYS -- Reckon yourselves dead to that sin and to that call.
Now it is to be; I know you are calling, but no ones home. I hear you knocking but you can’t come in...
The word reckon is an accounting term. So Paul is saying; Add it up. Jesus died for your sin, and lives to bring you a new life, you are now dead to the old life.
If anyone here is struggling with the sense that they don’t fully understand how this works, let me assure, that even with out a full understanding you can appropriate this truth into your life now.
Listen, I don’t know how that nuclear reactor works down there in San Onofre, they don’t need to ever hire me. But when I go home, and flip a switch the light goes on.
Now one bible commentator I came across, hit the truth of this word squarely on the head; To Reckon is to ‘have an absolute, unreserved confidence in what one’s mind knows to be true.’
Now that is the kind of Reckoning that will change our lives in a real & powerful way. It is this kind of Reckoning that will give others around us a Hope about what Jesus will do for them & in them.
Because the old man, he is like a dog at the end of a leash, all he can do is bark at us. He was rendered powerless over us at the cross and the grave. And I am not his puppet; I don’t have to live the way I used to live anymore.
John 8:34 - 36.
34 Jesus answered them, "Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin.
35 "And a slave does not abide in the house forever, but a son abides forever.
36 "Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.
Let’s say this together; I reckon myself dead to sin.
‘I Reckon Myself Dead To Sin.’
And the Apostle Paul the wonderful teacher that he is, he has given us understanding & illustration & meaning now gives us the Application, showing us how to apply this powerful truth to our daily lives.
Verse;
12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts.
Quickly; the one who reigns is the one with the most power.
13 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.
14 For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.
I’ve got a choice to sin or not. I can ‘present’ my self to sin or I can present my self to God.
Think deeply about this Christians, meditate on it, take it in. Pray it in; Lord I belong to you, I do not belong to sin. I died with you, my old life is gone and buried, my mind is yours, my heart is yours, my ears, hands and feet they are yours.
Charles Spurgeon said;
“God has so changed your nature by his grace that when you sin you shall be like a fish on dry land, you shall be out of your element, and long to get into a right state again. You cannot (continue in) sin, for you love God. The sinner may drink sin down as the ox drinks down water, but to you it shall be as the salt of the sea. You may become so foolish as to try the pleasures of the world, but they shall be no pleasures to you.”
So for us, we are those who are Dying to Live, we are the ones who know the way up is the way down. And that to gain your life is to lose your life for Jesus Christ.
The Grace that has saved us is the same Grace that will change us day by day and moment by moment, more into the glorious image of Christ.
Let’s Pray.
