Romans 6:6-7 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin 7 because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.
Again for devotions I have started to read “The Pursuit of Holiness.” Talk about a book that makes you think. As so many of us desire to live the Holy life that models Christ even at the basic level to many of us have concluded that we cannot do it. Although we are not living in massive amounts of gross since we have settled in a life of moral mediocrity of which neither God nor ourselves are pleased.
The question that comes to mind was from my reading yesterday. Directly from the book, “Are we truly willing to scrutinize all our activities, all our goals and plans, and all of our impulsive actions in the light of this statement: “I am doing this to please God.””
At this point if we are truly living a life that is pleasing to God then we will not have this dilemma of living in moral mediocrity. But if any of you are like me…human. Then we can all have times like this of moral weakness and allow Satan to confuse us on the issue of what God has done for us and what we must do ourselves!
God has indeed made provision for us to live a holy life. Romans 6:12 says; “Therefore, do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires.” This is clearly a call to something that WE have to do. We are responsible for disciplining ourselves in holiness so that “sin does not reign!”
The key word in verse 12 is “therefore.” so we must conclude that something prior to vs.12 must give us some leading as to why we should not let sin reign.
Romans 6:1-11: 1 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. 5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin 7 because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.
8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. 11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.
Romans 6:1-11: 1 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. 5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin 7 because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.
8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. 11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.
A couple things to point out as we read in vs.2 “We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?” We can see first that our dying to sin is the result of our salvation in Christ! The second fact as stated in the book, “out dying to sin is a fact whether we realize it or not. Because Christ died to sin, all who are united with Him died to sin.” We have to come to the realizations that if we are one with Christ then our sins are gone, they have been forgiven and we are no longer under the kingdom of darkness as we once where. Paul said it best, “we followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air(the devil)” Eph. 2:2. We were under the power of Satan (Acts 26:18), and the dominion of darkness (Colossians 1:13)
BUT through our union with Christ through SALVATION in Christ we have died to this realm of sin, and we are delivered into the kingdom of God and the realm of righteousness! We have been set free from sin (Rom. 6:18, rescued from the dominion of darkness (Col 1:13), and turned from the power of Satan to the power of God (Acts 26:18).
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