INTRODUCTION
• Over the past few weeks we have been looking at the life-changing book of Romans. Throughout the book thus far we have seen the connection of faith to salvation. In order for us to be justified (or declared innocent) before God, we must have faith in Jesus. We also have seen that salvation and redemption come only through Jesus.
• Today we are going to look at a great benefit of belonging to Jesus.
• The title of today’s message is “Broken Chains.” It tells a story of a people who were once enslaved who are now free!
• This message goes right to the heart of true freedom that is offered through Jesus verse the “so-called” freedom we have outside of Christ.
• One of the saddest things I see happen to some Christian’s is the way many of them never seem to get on their feet. They have been given a wonderful gift, yet they never seem to quite understand just what they have.
• In the message today we will see that in Jesus we have a new life, a new master, and a new purpose. Many people struggle because they have been their state of being so long they really do not think things can change.
• In 1863 the Emancipation Proclamation was proclaimed in America. The word spread from Capitol Hill down into the valleys of Virginia, and the Carolinas, and evens into the plantations of Georgia, Mississippi, and Alabama. The headlines read, ’Slavery Legally Abolished!’ However, the greater majority of slaves, in the South, went right on living as though there had been no emancipation. They went on living like they had never been set free. In fact, when one Alabama slave was asked what he thought of the Great Emancipator, whose proclamation had gone into effect, he replied "I don’t know nothing about Abraham Lincoln except they say he set us free. And, I don’t know nothing about that neither." How tragic. A war was being fought. A document had been signed. Slaves were legally set free.
Yet most continued to live out their years without knowing anything about it. They had chosen to remain slaves, though they were legally free. Even though emancipated, they kept serving the same master throughout their lives. Yet, so it is with many believers today. They have been set free, yet they have chosen to remain slaves to the same strongholds that have gripped them all of their life. Contributed by: Paul Berkley
• In our message today we will also see when our slavery to sin is broken when we are baptized into Christ. This is one of the reasons we teach that baptism is part of the salvation process.
SERMON
I. IN CHRIST WE HAVE A NEW LIFE (1-4)
• In verse one, we are asked the question of whether or not we should continue to sin so that we could receive more grace from God in our lives. If sin allows God’s grace to shine through, then why not?
• The answer comes to us on verse two. MAY IT NEVER BE! This is the wrong way to look at our life in Christ. Do we still sin when we are saved? Yes we do. Why? Are we in a position where we have to do it?
• Verse two explains why when we become Christians our focus needs to change. We asked how one who has died to sin still live in it?
• Before we are saved we are under the dominion or control or power) of sin. Before salvation we are slaves to sin. When we commit our first sin we die spiritually. Our spirit is no longer able to consistently control the desires of the flesh. When we are spiritually dead, we respond to the desires of the flesh that Satan puts before us. Then sin comes in and has a stranglehold over us.
• I have used the example of the drug addict. Are they free to do drugs or are they enslaved to doing them? This is what sin does to us. We are not free to sin, we are enslaved by sin, it is our master.
• Romans 6:16 tells us, “Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness?”
• Now Paul says the Christian has died to sin. When and where did this happen and what does it mean?
• Verses three and four explain what was said in verse two.
• One of the reasons we are not to sin is that since we are baptized into Jesus, we were baptized into His death.
• At baptism God imputes (or adds to our account) righteousness. When we repent and become immersed we can then enjoy the benefits of Jesus death. We are justified (or declared not guilty) at baptism.
• Verse four tells us that since we were buried with Jesus through baptism into His death, we are also raised from the dead through baptism.
• When we are raised with Christ in baptism we are raised to walk in a newness of life!
• When we are immersed we are raised up out of the waters of baptism to walk in a newness of life, we have an entire separation of the old life when we are buried with Christ, just like physical death cuts us off from the physical world.
• When something does physically, it no longer responds to the stimuli of the physical world. I have used the illustration of a dead pet before. When my cat dies, he will not chase string, purr when he is petted or drink anything.
• When we are baptized into Christ, we are to be dead to the things of the world.
• Newness of life is a new start, a new focus.
• 2CO 5:17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.
• GAL 3:27 For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.
• COL 2:12 having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.
• They way we are “IN CHRIST” is through baptism. Baptism is not some after thought we can do if we feel like it. We are not saved until we are immersed because until we are immersed, we are still in “IN” Christ and we are still enslaved to sin.
• Many times we struggle with the concept of “new life” because we are so used to and comfortable with the old.
• In the film The Shawshank Redemption, Ellis Boyd "Red" Redding (Morgan Freeman), tells the story of Andy ( played by Tim Robbins)—a young, successful banker wrongly convicted of murdering his wife in 1947 and sentenced to two consecutive life terms at Shawshank Prison. Halfway through the film, an old con, Brooks Hadlin, becomes enraged and threatens to take another inmate’s life—holding a makeshift knife at the inmate’s throat. A few tense moments later, Red and Andy persuade Brooks to lay down his knife. That’s when they discover that Hadlin had just received word that his parole was finally approved. The mere thought of freedom outside the prison walls was enough to send Brooks over the edge.
• Later, discussing it in the prison yard, an inmate concludes that Brooks had "bugged out," gone mad. Red quickly disagrees: Brooks ain’t no bug! He’s just…institutionalized. The man’s been in here 50 years—50 years! This is all he knows. In here, he’s an important man. He’s an educated man. Outside, he’s nothing, just a used up con with arthritis in both hands. Probably couldn’t get a library card if he tried. You know what I’m trying to say? You believe whatever you want…but I’m telling you, these walls are funny. First, you hate them, then you get used to them. Enough time passes…you get so you depend on them. That’s institutionalized.
• Too many of us have become institutionalized!
• When you are “IN CHRIST”, you have been given a new life. A new life requires a new master and a new focus. Let’s look at the new master first.
II. IN CHRIST WE HAVE A NEW MASTER (5-7)
• In verse five we are told that IF we have become united with Him. Notice that IF you have NOT been united with Him in baptism, you will not receive the benefits spoken of.
• The word “united” is only used in this verse in the New Testament. It comes from the process of grafting a shoot onto a tree. It means to “unite” or “grow together”. When we are baptized, we are “grafted” into Christ.
• Remember when Jesus spoke of the vine and branches in John 15. When you have faith, confess Jesus, repent, and become immersed, you are grafted in the vine with Jesus!
• Verse five also takes about the “likeness” of His death and resurrection. This tells us the two deaths, Jesus and ours are not absolutely identical. His was physical ours is a spiritual death to sin and spiritual resurrection, but both are real historical events.
• The passage is conditional, only those who have been buried with Christ will be raised with Him.
• In verse six we see that at baptism our “old self” was crucified. This does not happen the hour we first believe or when we say some made up sinners prayer. It happens at baptism. The body of sin is tossed aside when we are immersed into Christ.
• It is done away with. The Devil’s ability to use the body to get man to sin is greatly curtailed when a person is immersed. We are no longer slaves to the flesh. We regain control of the body through Jesus.
• We are no longer slaves to sin. Jesus becomes our master! The chains of slavery are broken!
• When we die to sin, we are free from sin.
• Now, we still sin, but we do so because we allow it to happen.
• 1CO 10:13 No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.
• We are never forced to sin, God will always provide a way to escape it, we have to look for it and want it. Sometimes we have sins we like to commit; we do it by choice instead of by drive.
III. IN CHRIST WE HAVE A NEW PURPOSE (8-11)
• Before we were saved, we lived life without any sense of purpose. When you think about it, is making a lot of money a real purpose to base your life on?
• When we understand that if we have dies with Jesus, we also should believe we will live with Him. Our life takes on new purpose. Our purpose is to live for the one who saved us and who broke the chains of sin that held us in its grip!
• Since we know we serve a risen savior, we have hope. Jesus defeated death. Since Jesus has a never-ending life, we will get the opportunity to continually live with Him.
• Verse nine tells us that while Jesus was a man, He was subject to the law of death also, death had dominion over Him (but only because He allowed it), but since He was raised from the dead, death has been conquered!
• Verse ten tells us the death He died, He died once for all. When Jesus was a man, He was subject to the same temptation we are. HEB 4:15 For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.
• When Jesus rose from the dead He conquered this also. This is why there is help for us when we are tempted.
• The life Jesus lives is in perfect harmony with God.
• The purpose for our life is to live in perfect harmony with Jesus.
• We are DEAD to sin and alive to Jesus!
• In verse 11 we are told to “consider” ourselves dead to sin. This word “consider” is an imperative command that must be continually carried out by the Christian.
CONCLUSION
• Why do we struggle so much? Maybe it is because we do not consider ourselves dead to sin?
• Maybe it is because we allow the Devil or other people to continue to remind us of a past that has been forgotten and forgiven?
• In His book, “In The Grip of Grace, author Max Lucado tells a story. It’s the story of the boy who was shooting rocks with a slingshot. He could never hit his target. As he was in his Grandma’s backyard one day, h spied her pet duck. On impulse h took aim and let fly. The stone hit, and the duck was dead. “The boy panicked and hid the bird in the woodpile, only to look up and se his sister watching. After lunch that day, Grandma told Sally to help with the dishes. Sally responded, “Johnny told me he wanted to help in the kitchen today. Didn’t you Johnny?” And she whispered to him, “Remember the duck!” So, Johnny did the dishes. What choice did he have? For the next several weeks he was at the sink often. Sometimes for his duty, sometimes for his sin. “Remember the duck,” Sally’d whisper when he objected. So weary of the chore, he decided that any punishment would be better than washing more dishes, so he confessed to killing duck. "I know, Johnny," his Grandma said, giving him a hug. "I was standing at the window and saw the whole thing. Because I love you, I forgave you. I wondered how long you would let Sally make a slave out of you.” He’d been pardoned, but he thought he was guilty. Why? He had listened to the words of his accuser. (Contributed by: David Yarbrough)
• In Christ, you are free! Do you want to experience freedom?
