Romans 6:23 (Amplified Bible)
For the wages which sin pays is death, but the [bountiful] free gift of God is eternal life through (in union with) Jesus Christ our Lord.
Romans 6:23 (King James Version)
For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Just like in John 10:10, destruction was already in the world because of the fall of man. Now the solution comes next. Just like there's a problem, then there's a solution. The solution to the problem will not be sought after because we have not yet encountered the problem. But even there's a problem, the LORD JESUS is always the solution to our problems. It's like employer and employee relationship, sin is a terrible and evil employer, when you work for it and promoting it's effects, like an evil employer: sin pays you with death, that's the payment of every work or toil you give to it. But the free gift is not compared to the compensation where you have to work for it, it's grace, it's a gift, you don't deserve the gift, but it's given to you anyway because it's based on the generosity of the Giver: the LORD JESUS CHRIST to give you the gift of eternal life. Grace is incomparable with sin, there's no point to compare it. It's eternal life with the LORD JESUS CHRIST while here on earth our relationship with the LORD. The pleasure and profit of sin as so-called and enjoyed by this dying and corrupted world because of the enemy is not deserving to be called fruit. Sinners or unbelievers does work to be paid with death by sin, namely: (1) ploughing iniquity, (2) sowing vanity, and (3) reaping the same. Therefore whatever they do will end up in death. Imagine a very wealthy person sowing in charities with his millions of money but got surprised when he ended up in hell when he died. It's because every person born in this world are imprisoned in a jail cell called sin, whatever they do, they might sing, dance, and do dramas but still they are a prisoner. There's another prison called "GOD's Grace" and whatever the prisoners do there end up in life. Thus we are called "slaves to righteousness"
Readings:
Romans 5:12 (Amplified Bible)
Therefore, as sin came into the world through one man, and death as the result of sin, so death spread to all men, [no one being able to stop it or to escape its power] because all men sinned.
1 Corinthians 6:9-10 (Amplified Bible)
Do you not know that the unrighteous and the wrongdoers will not inherit or have any share in the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived (misled): neither the impure and immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor those who participate in homosexuality,
Nor cheats (swindlers and thieves), nor greedy graspers, nor drunkards, nor foulmouthed revilers and slanderers, nor extortioners and robbers will inherit or have any share in the kingdom of God.
Galatians 3:10 (Amplified Bible)
And all who depend on the Law [who are seeking to be justified by obedience to the Law of rituals] are under a curse and doomed to disappointment and destruction, for it is written in the Scriptures, Cursed (accursed, devoted to destruction, doomed to eternal punishment) be everyone who does not continue to abide (live and remain) by all the precepts and commands written in the Book of the Law and to practice them.
James 1:15 (Amplified Bible)
Then the evil desire, when it has conceived, gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is fully matured, brings forth death.
Galatians 6:7-8 (Amplified Bible)
Do not be deceived and deluded and misled; God will not allow Himself to be sneered at (scorned, disdained, or mocked by mere pretensions or professions, or by His precepts being set aside.) [He inevitably deludes himself who attempts to delude God.] For whatever a man sows, that and that only is what he will reap.
For he who sows to his own flesh (lower nature, sensuality) will from the flesh reap decay and ruin and destruction, but he who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.
John 17:3 (Amplified Bible)
And this is eternal life: [it means] to know (to perceive, recognize, become acquainted with, and understand) You, the only true and real God, and [likewise] to know Him, Jesus [as the] Christ (the Anointed One, the Messiah), Whom You have sent.
Ephesians 2:8-9 (Amplified Bible)
For it is by free grace (God’s unmerited favor) that you are saved (delivered from judgment and made partakers of Christ’s salvation) through [your] faith. And this [salvation] is not of yourselves [of your own doing, it came not through your own striving], but it is the gift of God;
Not because of works [not the fulfillment of the Law’s demands], lest any man should boast. [It is not the result of what anyone can possibly do, so no one can pride himself in it or take glory to himself.]
John 10:10 (Amplified Bible)
The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, till it overflows).
Romans 6:16-22 (Amplified Bible)
Do you not know that if you continually surrender yourselves to anyone to do his will, you are the slaves of him whom you obey, whether that be to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience which leads to righteousness (right doing and right standing with God)?
But thank God, though you were once slaves of sin, you have become obedient with all your heart to the standard of teaching in which you were instructed and to which you were committed.
And having been set free from sin, you have become the servants of righteousness (of conformity to the divine will in thought, purpose, and action).
I am speaking in familiar human terms because of your natural limitations. For as you yielded your bodily members [and faculties] as servants to impurity and ever increasing lawlessness, so now yield your bodily members [and faculties] once for all as servants to righteousness (right being and doing) [which leads] to sanctification.
For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.
But then what benefit (return) did you get from the things of which you are now ashamed? [None] for the end of those things is death.
But now since you have been set free from sin and have become the slaves of God, you have your present reward in holiness and its end is eternal life.
Romans 6:23 (King James Version)
For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Outline:
A. Wages of sin is death
"For the wages of sin is death;"
1. Sin pays it's employee
2. The payment is death
3. catch: momentary pleasure
4. consequence: eternal destruction
B. Gift of GOD is eternal life through JESUS CHRIST our LORD
"but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord"
1. Gift is a gift not a payment
2. We don't deserve the gift - it's GOD's Grace
G - GOD's
R - Redemption
A - At
C - CHRIST's
E - Expense
3. The payment is eternal life here on earth and ages and ages to come
4. The gift comes through JESUS CHRIST
Conclusion:
Go for eternity, go for eternal life, go for the gift which is free not for the payment which has a catch.
Romans 5:20 (Amplified Bible)
But then Law came in, [only] to expand and increase the trespass [making it more apparent and exciting opposition]. But where sin increased and abounded, grace (God’s unmerited favor) has surpassed it and increased the more and superabounded,
