Romans Week 21, January 22, 2023
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Introduction
Introduction
Romans 1: Everyone needs the Gospel
Romans 2: The Jews need the Gospel.
Romans 3: The Gospel gives the gift of righteousness, which we all need.
Romans 4: All the Gospel asks is faith out of us.
Romans 5: The Gospel produces peace in us.
Romans 6: The ways the Gospel delivers us from sin.
1-4—Because of Baptism, we are changed and sin should be a past thing for us.
6-10—Our sin nature has lost it’s power freeing us to chose to live for God.
So therefore we start our time today with:
11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
So today we will continue racing through Romans chapter 6.
One thing we need to challenge ourselves to grow in as people of God’s word and followers of Jesus is our understanding of theological terms.
For example
3 Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
Jesus said that we need to be “born again” in order to see the Kingdom of God. And as Nicodemus found, it isn’t that we go back into our mothers’ wombs. It is a change that God works in us.
Or another term:
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
Here Paul makes the point that we are (if we are in Christ) a “new creation.” God has made us something new.
Or in another place:
20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
In joining with the death of Christ.....Christ now lives in us.
Born again....
Born again....
New creation....
New creation....
Christ living in us....
Christ living in us....
These are all references that are foreign to many believers but as we study Romans 6 they will come into greater clarity.
Each of these phrases describe with a word picture a reality that isn’t literally true but points to a something real.
Remember Nicodemus asked Jesus about how literally Jesus meant what He said:
4 Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”
Jesus answered no of course but word pictures throughout the Bible and in our own lives help point to realities that are concrete.
We are a Born Again…as a New Creation…and now Christ Lives in us.
We are a Born Again…as a New Creation…and now Christ Lives in us.
OK these phrases detail the change that has happened to us but the question still is how do we experience the freedom from sin that Paul is talking about here? How do we really know what it is to live out the reality of being born again created anew with Jesus living in us? We're going to unpack a little bit more of what we need to do in order to experience the change that Jesus offers in these next few verses.
11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions.
13 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.
14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.
The first step of living in freedom from sin: Count yourself dead to sin.
The first step of living in freedom from sin: Count yourself dead to sin.
So this word that Paul uses for consider or to count yourself is a word with a massive variety of translations. Has a wide semantic range to use a grammatical term period meaning it can mean a lot of things and it's used in a lot of Pauls letters. There's an important word for Paul. Much in the same way that for example Eskimos have like 20 different words to describe snow. Whereas you or I just think of snow as well snow. Snow is very important to Eskimos and therefore they have a wide variety of words used to describe snow in its various states. In the same way this word to consider is used throughout the New Testament to make a point.
3 Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God?
26 So, if a man who is uncircumcised keeps the precepts of the law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision?
28 For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.
11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.
11 Let such a person understand that what we say by letter when absent, we do when present.
16 At my first defense no one came to stand by me, but all deserted me. May it not be charged against them!
11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
This is a significant word to describe the reality that we need to hold firmly to a new understanding of who we are. And this new understanding changes everything. Is like the Declaration of Independence in the United states that declaration did not fundamentally change our status but it emboldened our resolve. It did not free the United states but it declared a change in reality that was a catalyst for the Revolutionary War leading to our independence.
Romans D. Christ’s Death and Resurrection Are Imputed to the Believer (6:11–14)
Logizomai is from logos, an idea embodied in a word (or, in the case of Christ, a person
Words have powerful meaning. And the words of God had the power to affect fundamental change. When you and I get to heaven we will see Abraham standing there not because of works that he did but because in faith he believed and God considered him righteous there's that same word that we've been looking at in all the verses I've just shown you.
3 For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.”
God considered him righteous and that consideration changed everything for Abraham
in the same way if God considers you and I dead to sin we should consider this a fundamental change in our reality.
And moving think of this word changing us it's not a matter of positive thinking it's not a matter of us thinking something into being This Is Us trusting in the power of the God who spoke the world into existence to speak a change in our lives
And in a more active sense it's a matter of us conforming our minds to God's reality
2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
What's more this change in us requires us to believe the reality that God's words Produce change. This is why scripture memory is so valuable because simply memorizing the text of God's word has the power to affect change in our lives
11 so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
Remember when Jesus spoke to the sea!
39 And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.
So many of the greatest acts of power that God demonstrated were through the vehicle of the simple spoken word. By speaking Jesus stilled watchers did miracles and more through words through words God brought the universe into existence.
If we are to experience greater freedom from sin then we need to exercise faith in the power of God's words.
If we are to experience greater freedom from sin then we need to exercise faith in the power of God's words.
We need to believe that God said it and therefore it has actual practical truth in our lives.
We are dead to sin and alive towards God in Christ Jesus.
12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions.
Next step in living free from sin:
Cut sin loose from your life.
Cut sin loose from your life.
Sin is like the worst possible version of the coronavirus. If we allow it to be present it will exercise its great capacity to take control. Therefore we need to be diligent in removing sin from our lives. Sin wants to take control. God hasn't called us to be people that live isolated legalistic lives. He calls us to be people that live a life with Jesus. He calls us to be people that live celebrating the goodness of his words. Relishing in the love of God and the real live community of believers. Sin wants us to isolate and to serve only ourselves.
What TV shows do you need to remove from your schedule? How do you need to limit your access to Facebook if it's making you struggle? Where does sin have a foothold in your life?
13 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.
Present the members of your body to God as instruments of righteousness.
Present the members of your body to God as instruments of righteousness.
I love how Paul switches from negative to positive in this verse. He challenges us to stop from presenting ourselves and the members of our body as instruments of wickedness.
My hand has the power to strike someone or to lift someone up. My hand has the power to pat someone on the back and encourage them or to flip them off or dismiss them.
My legs have the power to take me to places where I can help other people or carry me in the work I need to do every day to serve others. Or they're the power to take me away from people who need help.
My tongue has the power to encourage others and lift them up or to criticize and express jealousy.
Our eyes have the power to see the needs of others to appreciate the beauty of God's world or to look at things that we want but cannot have and make the rest of ourselves suffer.
In short the members of our body or the parts of our body have capacity for great evil or profound good. In reality every human being has great power. And so every human being should be able to relate to what peter's uncle told him all those years ago in the spider verse.
“With great power comes great responsibility.”
“With great power comes great responsibility.”
And so Paul reminds us later
1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.
Paul then concludes this section with
14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.
Remember, You have a new master!
Remember, You have a new master!
When law is your master you're constantly reminded of your failures. when grace is your master you're constantly reminded of the love of God.
I love how one commentator puts it.
Romans D. Christ’s Death and Resurrection Are Imputed to the Believer (6:11–14)
. Law does an excellent job of pointing out failure, but it cannot empower one to keep from failing.
When we are thinking about this idea of how on earth do I live free from sin? The answer is God's grace. God intends his grace to be that which equips us to grow and learn to be free from sin.
11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people,
12 training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age,
God's grace trains us to renounce ungodliness God's grace trains us to renounce worldly passions God's grace trains us to live self controlled upright and godly lives in the present age.
Conclusion
Conclusion
OK we're going to wrap up here today but I want to encourage you if you want to live free from sin then be diligent in cutting it out of your life because it has a viral tendency to sneak in and take control. And don't just clean house, fill your body and mind with how you can serve God. Don't present the members of your body to live in sinfully but get busy living for God. Look for ways to love others and care for and serve others.
And finally remember you have a new master. You and I do not live under the constant reminders of our failure that the law offers. But we live under the teaching and edifying and encouraging grace of God!