Romans 6:15-23
¹⁵What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means!¹⁶Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?¹⁷But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed,¹⁸and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.¹⁹ I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.
²⁰ For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.²¹ But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death.²²But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life.²³ For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Intro
We continue our conversation about God’s grace in relation to our day to day life. Last Sunday we explored that abundance of God’s grace is not a licence to sin. The fact that God’s grace can cover any multitude of sin does not mean that we allowed to sin as much as we wish. But, rather otherwise we should consider ourselves dead to sin, in order to raise for new life for God, in Jesus. We said that you cannot be resurrected if you haven’t died yet. And our baptism symbolized our death to sin. We walk in the newness of life which described in verse 14
Romans 6:14
¹⁴…For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.
I feel like this important statement is one of those that often being misused to justify the lifestyle that does not align with the scriptures.
Example
You ask a couple that claim to be devoted follower of Christ:
“Hey, why do you live together and do not get married?” And the response you get:“It’s OK. We’re not under the law, but under the grace”
Does God’s grace allow for sin?
Today we will seek for the answer to this. And as we do that we should remember that when taken out of the context scriptures can be misused to justify pretty much anything. People twist the bible to fit their view of life instead of letting God change their way of thinking. So, let’s consider the context of the scriptures as well as let’s open our heart for God to speak to us, encourage and even convict us as necessary. Because we know it’s not to hurt us, but to give us life.
Rewind
I like to approach studying the bible same as I approach painting - Every new coat should overlap previous one around 50%. It’s not like I’m doing it intentionally, it’s just happen. Let’s rewind a couple verses and start at the end of our previous scripture.
Romans 6:14(NIV)
For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.
Sin shall not be master over you
Last Sunday we talked that people are slaves to sin. That our brokenness is internal and it flows from Adam into every last human being. The only way to escape from sin is through death. Baptism symbolizes our death to sin, just like Christ died for sin once, for all. And then we rise for new life, just as Christ were reason by the power of the Father.
When we rise with Christ we rise free from the dominion of the sin. We are no longer slaves. And sin is no longer our master. We do not have to sin. Now we have a choice. In our previous life sin made us to obey it’s passions. But now we no longer can be forced to obey sin. And here is important part. We still can willingly return under control of the sin. We can give up control and let sin take over.
Verse 14 says that we should not let this happen.
Example
Imagine the lady who became a victim of the human trafficking. She end up a worker in the foreign county. No documents, no language. As much as she hates what she’s doing, she cannot escape. Her masters not gonna let her go free.
Then someone comes and buys her freedom. Get’s her out of the system. Gives her documents back and arranges the way to return home.
But then this lady if she not gonna be willing to move forward. She can end up going back to her old masters, and willingly work for them. They don’t have power over her anymore, but she gives them this power back.
Even imagining something like that is horrible. No one deserves that.
But this is exactly what we do if we chose to go back to sinful life, after we tasted God’s grace. And bible says it shell not happen. Sin shell no longer be your master.
Not under the law, but under the grace.
The era of the law is ended. We will talk about the law in the more details in following Sundays. Our new life in Jesus Christ is under the dominion of grace. Which means we are again have an ability to choice who we will serve. Who will be our master.