Well, I invite you to turn to Romans chapter 6 tonight, Romans chapter 6, and we are continuing our reflections and study in the book of Romans, and our text tonight is verses 5 through 11, 5 through 11 of chapter 6. I will read beginning at verse 1 to set the context all the way through to verse 14 tonight. Verse 14 verses 5 through 11 is our text tonight. Let's give our attention to the word of the Lord. This is Romans chapter 6.
"What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means. How can we who died to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in the newness of life.
Now our text. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him, in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Now, if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again. Death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died, he died to sin once for all, but the life he lives, he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Let not sin, therefore, reign in your mortal body to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law, but under grace."
And there will end the reading of God's Word tonight.
Well, maybe you've heard us, the Christians emphasize so much as pastors, the doctrine of the Resurrection And we, of course, celebrate Easter Resurrection Day. And it's such an important doctrine for Christians to think about. I remember my dear mentor and friend, Dr. John Rainbow, his wife, telling me years ago. He was a teacher at Central Valley Christian High School, and when he had brain cancer, she said before John died, all he could think about was the resurrection. And I often thought that's just wonderful to think about: the resurrection.
Paul is aiming in this passage to speak about the power of the resurrection for the Christian. That's really important for us. We don't give enough attention to what the resurrection means for us, that Jesus is risen from the dead. Our Heidelberg makes a great attention, gives great attention to this: that it is a pledge of our glorious resurrection, but that by his resurrection he has overcome death so that he might make us share in the righteousness he won for us by his death, and that by his power we too are raised to a new life. a new life. That's what I want to think about by the power of the resurrection tonight with you, which Paul's aim is in these verses in chapter 6. He's really using the doctrine of the resurrection as the great answer for the Christian in how he is looking at life and how he's still addressing the problem the ongoing problem of sin in his life.
You know this is a big issue for you. You know this is one of the most confusing aspects of the Christian life. And he wants to apply this first to how we think about our lives. He wants us to, first, before he's going to deal with the real struggle that's coming in Romans chapter 7, you know, he'll get to the nitty-gritty of that struggle against sin, and later in this chapter, how to fight against sin, and Romans 8, putting to death sin by the Spirit. That's the sort of practical dimensions of the struggle. But he's first dealing with, in these early sections of Romans, how we think about this. It's really important for us in how we think. He wants to change the thought process. He wants us to understand in verse 11: I want you to learn now to reckon to yourself what God has already reckoned to you. You'll notice there that sin should not have dominion over you. That's a crucial distinction. Sin has dominion over people in the world. People are enslaved to sin, but not so for you. And it first begins in how you think, is what the apostle says. Learn to think a certain way. And that's what he's addressing here in this passage.
We got to the beginning of that last time in Romans 6, these first verses, where he began and dealt with what he knew would be the single great objection to the Christian gospel. And what is the single great objection to the Christian gospel when it comes to the law?
Well, in chapter 5, he said something stunning. Sometimes when you have all these verses so jam-packed, you kind of miss some of the implications of certain statements. And there was a certain statement Paul made in chapter 5 he knew would be troublesome for some people, and it's this: "Where sin abounded, grace abounded all the more." That's wonderful. No religion has ever said such things. All of them had their laws, all of them have their ways, all of them have their efforts to try to appease their god. And Paul has really not talked too much about us yet doing anything in the book of Romans, has he? He hasn't really got to the "therefore" of chapter 12, how we present our bodies as living sacrifices. We haven't got to really to the practical aspects of now the response to the gospel. We're not even close there yet. He still has a lot to say, but he knows what some are going to say at this point in protest to what he's been saying about grace and the work of Jesus and justification by grace through faith alone.
Paul dealt with the single great problem he knew he would be in charge with throughout his ministry. And it's the problem of what we call antinomianism. He knew some would come along. And this has been the great charge throughout the history of the church. People would come along and say, "Paul, if you preach that where grace abounded where sin abounded, grace abounded. all the more, if you preach that, you are going to throw out the law. If you went around telling people that grace prevails in their lives, that our sin is serving the greater purpose, people are going to hear it that way. Why are they not going to come to the conclusion? We should just sin then because it's working out something good. Does it even matter? All of this is proving grace, isn't it? All of this is proving something, isn't it? So you can't avoid landing and saying, up, what does it even matter about the law? What does it even matter if we just continue in sin? Grace keeps abounding in people's lives, You see.
And we saw last time how Paul dealt with this. One of you said to me, "I never saw in Romans 6 that what Paul essentially answers and says here is that that's absolutely impossible to draw that conclusion. You can't even get to that conclusion with what I'm presenting in Romans 5 and 6," is what Paul's saying. It's an utter impossibility to come to that conclusion. "I'm not saying that. That would be impossible for the true believer." That's exactly right. We can't go on sinning that grace may abound. Why? Did you notice what he said? How's that? It's not even possible because we died. We died. It's a profound little statement in verse 2, isn't it? "How can we who died to sin still live in it?"
You died to it. Now, we just scratched the surface on that last time. Verse 2 is one of the most important verses for the Christian life. It really is. "How can we who died to sin live in it?" So in the first four verses, he said, "Now listen, you died, you were buried, you were baptized into his death," and today, tonight, he's going to say, "and you were raised with him."
Now, what makes all those verses important and those descriptions that are important is that really, remarkable, none of those things he described, in a sense, actually happened to us. In other words, I wasn't, when what he's talking about, how did I die? How did I was buried? How was I raised? Sure, it happened to me, but what is he talking about here? I wasn't there in what he's talking about, and you'll notice it's so important here because he's using aorist tenses, and if you miss this, I think you missed the whole point of what he did in chapter 5.
What is he thinking of? Well, what the apostle's been doing in since chapter 5 is looking at the life of Jesus Christ. And he's essentially been saying, "What has happened to him happened to you by federal representation." He's been working with this principle since Romans 5, verse 12, that since the sin of Adam was the sin of all the people, Adam's sin was itself the sin of all the people in Adam, in Adam, in that head of the human race. So Jesus Christ's righteous act, he represented his people. And whatever happened to him in their place happened to all his people by union with him, by faith. When we believe, we are joined to him.
So this is how he speaks of us. When Christ died, that was an action that was for all of his people. It's wonderful. When he was buried, that was an action for all of his people. When he, think about it, I have a baptism to undergo." That was a baptism he partook for all of his people. And Paul says, "I want you to look at your life that way." As we talk about sin, I want to first address this concept here of union. I want you to think of what it means to be joined to Jesus Christ. And what are the implications of that? Before we talk about the nitty-gritty of fighting sin, I want to first work on your minds. Your life is hidden in him.
The apostle knows that's a hard concept for us. That's why he's saying it, I think, in so many various ways here. keeps hitting it over and over and over. And yeah, it's hard to wrap our minds around a little bit dealing with what we call union, the mystery of that: "I'm joined to him." I can't get over that basic question, then. Does that mean that what does it mean then that I'm dead to sin? Maybe this is a better question to think about: How does this all work? That I died with Christ, I was buried with him, how does that tie together with this struggle against sin? is what he's dealing with.
Maybe if you've ever felt like the struggle against sin and the hypocrisy of sin, this may at first glance trouble you a little bit because it doesn't feel like I really died. It just doesn't feel that way. Whatever I feel doesn't feel like that. Especially, you know, if you've had some perennial sin in your life, some continued sin, maybe besetting sin, and you fought it and you fought it and you fought it, and you felt discouraged, and you wonder, "How could I beat this thing? It's really troubling me." And here Paul's saying, "You've died to sin." That doesn't really help me right now, does it?
Paul says, "Oh yeah, it helps you. Oh yes, it helps you."
We seem to make little progress. We confess in the Heidelberg that even the holiest in this life make a small beginning in this sanctification. I've always said, "What about the least holy? What about the least holy?" It sounds pretty triumphant: "You died to sin." When the fact is, in the trenches, you're going to go out tomorrow, and you were super energized today, right? And tomorrow you're amazed at how all the struggles just seem to come back the moment you put your foot out of bed. Well, I don't know how much of that is set in. You begin to see just how overwhelming the truth is that Paul's presenting here for the Christian.
Because, now, first and foremost, he's not speaking of your personal experience with sin. And that's really important, I think. He's first speaking of what happened to you as a person. Now, think about this. What happened to you as a person? This is why I said last night: it's challenging to preach this carefully. You might walk away from this and say, "I don't even think I'm a Christian because I don't feel like I've, whatever's described here has really happened to me," and that's not where he wants to leave you. That's not the effect this should have. It's been confusing.
I would say that this is one of the most confusing aspects to the Christian life, the seeming little progress, and in Romans 6 and 7 (not so much 7, but in 6) what seems to be triumphal. And I think Paul knows everyone would feel this tension and this struggle. And so he's, in verses 5 through 10, unpacking and explaining this dilemma for you and helping you first to stop and move away from just so much personal experience to objective realities.
So, what happened to you? What happened to you?
In Romans 7, he'll talk about the ongoing battle with sin. But in verse 5, he explains something that's fundamentally different between the believer and the unbeliever. That's happened. Notice it. Notice what he says here. "We died," and he summarizes this: "for if we have been united together there's union with Jesus. if we've been united together in the likeness of his death, certainly we shall be united in the likeness, now here it is tonight, of his resurrection."
The word here, "united," means to grow together with, to become one with. So the apostle says, "This is what has happened to you in Christ. You've been brought into him. You've been united to him. And that applies in the likeness of his death, his burial, and his resurrection."
Paul looked at Christ and said, "So that means that when he died, you died." I want you to think like this: he's describing the consequences of union. Think of Ephesians 2: "Maybe this has confused you. And we have been seated in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. And you say, well, I'm here. Here's Pastor Gordon right now. What in the world is that?
He sees you as so united to Jesus that where his body is, that's true of you in principle. You belong there. You are seated there because he's there. You can't separate the head from the body. So that's how he's applying his work on earth for you. And that helps us with regarding the struggle with sin.
Verse 6: "Knowing 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."
So the word "crucified" in verse 6 is aorist again, and what that means is it's a completed action of the past that has all this benefit in the present. So when he died, our old man was crucified with him. Now the ESV here, you'll notice in verse 6, uses "old self." I wish I could just translate it with what he's been doing the whole time in Romans 5. Wouldn't this help if I just said "the old Adam?" "That our knowing this, that the old Adam was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin."
In chapter five, that's what he proved, remember? That when the old Adam sinned, I was united to Adam in that sin, so that the sin of Adam was the sin of everyone. And so essentially what Paul said is is that since you have come to Christ by faith, do you know what the death of Christ and the resurrection of Christ means? God took you out of the old Adam, killed the old Adam, the old man, crucified him, put him to death, and makes you a new man in him. in the last adam brought You into him you see, this is how he's dealing with the problem of sin first and foremost. You died because he died. That's how tight the union is, if you will.
And the scriptures speak like this everywhere. Think of Galatians 5: "All those who are Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires." It speaks so encouragingly to us about this, to help us. Think of Colossians 2, when it talks about all of our sins being nailed to the cross and the legal demands of the law taken away from us. And then he says, "Having forgiven all your trespasses, all of them, because when he died, it was all nailed to the cross." Or you might take 2 Corinthians 5: "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, joined to him, he's a new creation. Old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new."
There is no progress in the Christian life until we first begin with understanding we've been brought out of the old Adam and into the new. We're brand new creatures in the new. And that's why the notion of verse 1 is so important. The idea that we would just go on sinning and living in sin as if it doesn't matter, Paul could say, "That's not, that's not, it's totally impossible that anyone could even do that. You died. You see? You died. How can we who have died, heiress tense, live in the old Adam anymore? It's impossible if you've been brought into the new Adam, the last Adam."
So notice Paul didn't say, "You died to sin that you won't have a problem with sin anymore." That would be the idea of perfectionism. When we get to glory, that's when it's finally put away for good, okay? That's not what he said. He said, "When Christ died, you were taken out of the old Adam and put into him. And when he was crucified, you were crucified, resulting in you becoming a new creature."
"There's no condemnation for somebody who's in Christ, right? There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are what? In Jesus Christ. You're brought into him."
And that's why the contrast of verse 6 is so important. "Knowing this, that the old Adam, the old man, the old self was crucified with him so that now the body of sin, now listen to this, might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin."
Notice the distinction. The old man, the ongoing problem is now what we have is still the sinful nature that's present. That's what we're struggling against now. The old man is dead. The old Adam, you're set free. That dominion has been broken. You're no longer under its mastery so that death reigns in you. The dominion in that old way of life is done, so that those who are in the old Adam, you know this.
Now, just think. if I can, Maybe just think practically now for a minute. You don't pat yourselves on the back about this. You know what grace has done for you. But there's a fundamental difference that's happened with you, between you and the world. You will get up tomorrow and you're sensitive to sin. You're in the struggle against sin. Even if you stumble, 1 John, you come and confess it and he's faithful. The world lives under its dominion. Slavery. It doesn't see it. It lives in it with no with thinking there's no consequence. That's not who you are. You know that. You don't live that way. You don't run around that way saying that. It's a fundamental difference, isn't it? The dominion's been shattered by Christ. He shattered its dominion in your life. That's what he says here in verse 14: "For sin will no longer have dominion over you since you're not under law but under grace."
We'll come back to that more next time. But the dominion's been shattered.
So there's two things that have happened for you tonight. Number one is what he's going to explain: is because of that, there is now, because of the resurrection, a power for you to put to death sin in your life. Real power that he makes available to you in the struggle, in the fight. It's a hard fight. No one denies it's a hard fight. If you want to know the struggle of the fight and how difficult the fight is, you can read chapter seven or you can go to the book of Hebrews, and says sin easily ensnares people. But that he wants you to know that sin no longer reigns in you. You're no longer a slave to it. You're no longer serving it as your master. Christ is your master because he rose victorious from the dead, over the dead, over the grave for you and that's the great blessing we end with tonight.
So look at verse 8 now. "If we've died with Christ, there it is, we know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again, he doesn't have to go through that again He already paid for sin He already conquered sin and death, right? Death no longer has dominion over him."
So you know what that means for you? Death no longer has dominion over you. This is what he's saying, right? "We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again. Death no longer has dominion. For the death he died, he died to sin once for all, but the life he lives, he lives to God, so you also. That's how I want you to think of yourselves: as dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord."
I have often thought when we we make a mistake by downplaying the ascension. But the ascension is a wonderful truth of the Christian faith. When Christ ascended on high, he poured out gifts, didn't he? And the gifts that he poured out to us were the Holy Spirit and his help, his comforting help, his aid. That's one of the benefits of Christ's ascension so that we would know he's always with us and always helping his people.
But the beauty of the ascension, if you read Ephesians 1, he says something that has marveled me. I really can never get over it every time I read it in Ephesians 1. That he wants you to know that there is immeasurable power toward us who believe. Now listen, the very power that raised him from the dead. That's the power that is given to you now as a believer. You have real power. And that's why Paul would say in Philippians, "I want to know him in the power of his resurrection. So important that I may lay hold of what Christ Jesus has laid hold of for me."
This is a struggle, and this is the reality of the new creature in Christ. I am no longer in the old Adam. I am in the new, and I at times may fight to go back, but I never will because I have been raised with Christ. I have been united to him, and you can't break that. This is why the perseverance of the saints has to be, by the way. We're not taken back out of the last Adam and put back into the old Adam. That is utterly impossible.
Now, sometimes you might feel like giving up because the struggle against sin is fears. But let me say this tonight to think about closing this out. Isn't the very fact that you're here tonight and the very fact that you're not giving up evidence that you're no longer in the old Adam? The very fact of it. You keep coming to Christ. You keep coming back to Him.
I always said, "It's really remarkable when Peter comes up and says, how often do we have to forgive? 70 times 7, And seven times up to seven, he says 70 times 7. It's indefinite. Why is it indefinite? That's what He does for you. Constantly forgives your sins." And you come to him, broken record. "My son, I forgive you." Every Sunday, you know. This is why reading the law, confessing our sins as God's people, is so special. He's doing that. He's announcing forgiveness help to you.
The key to sanctification, you might say really um for the first time in Romans, we're told to do something Here's the first thing you're told to do in Romans. I, as I'm seeing it, maybe I've missed it, but anything that really now applies to sanctification, here's the first thing.
First thing. Number one in the book of Romans, verse 11: "Likewise, you also must consider yourselves."
That word means "reckon." So think: when God reckoned to you the righteousness of Christ, now you do the same. Here's what I want you to reckon: "You must reckon to yourselves to be dead to sin and alive to God in Christ. Right here."
This is where it starts. I want you always to think of yourself. Reckon to you what's already been reckoned to you in Christ. Reckon to yourselves what Christ has done for you. God has already reckoned it to you. That's done. You have peace with him. You need to now learn to reckon it to yourselves. You see? You need to learn to think about this yourselves.
There's no progress until you reckon this to yourself and believe that this has been reckoned to you. I think that's a crucial key to the Christian life to begin with, in living it. Sanctification. Learn to think of yourselves as being dead to sin because you were died, and you were buried with Christ, and you were raised with him. That's how we begin to think about now how to go on living in the freedom that's been won for us.
That's the beauty of what's outlined for us here tonight. I'm told to reckon myself to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus my Lord.
So, beloved, we are new creatures. The old has passed away. All things have become new for you as a person. That's how much he's loved you. Believe that. May we live in the joy of this comfort this week as we go out into the same struggles, awaiting the future resurrection of the body, and we shall be with our Lord forever.
Let's pray.
Gracious Lord, thank you for helping us tonight in this struggle against sin, but to understand positionally who we are in Christ, how to think first, to understand that we are united to Christ in his death, burial, and resurrection, and that that has vast implications now for who we are. We are made brand new, hidden in Christ, joined to him. So let us think this way, O Lord, and then learn now to recognize that the dominion and slavery into sin that this world lives in every day has been shattered in our lives. Help us to be like that man out of prison who's truly been set free and who's able to now go out and walk in the newness of life by the power of the Holy Spirit. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.