Wages of Sin is death but God's free gift is Eternal life

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Good morning. My name is Pastor Mark and I am one of the lead pastors here at Rez. We are on week two of the Romans Road series. When we meet as a teaching team late last year and worked through what God wanted us to teach on this year. The Romans Road excited me the most. Not because evangelism is a passion of mine, but because God has given us all stories of how God has moved on our behalf. And I believe we should all be so excited about what God has done we would want to tell all of our friends and family.

I asked to teach this weeks lesson because this verse has a huge impact in my life.

Today we will focus mainly on three contrasts in Romans 6:23. “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” But before we go there, let’s remember the “Situation” Pastor Daniel taught us last week. Romans 3:23 “23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,[1]” Try as we might, we have all fallen short and don’t have the glory of God.

We learned that because of the original sin in the garden, we all fall short. Pastor Daniel showed us that in the garden we didn’t have the two commandments we only had the one. Don’t eat of the tree. Because we ate of the tree sin came into all of our lives.

So, keep Romans 3:23 in mind as we look at the last verse in Romans 6.

Let’s dig in and look at the three contrasts in this verse. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. [2] The three contrasts are:

· Sin vs. God

· Wages vs. Free Gift

· Death vs. Eternal Life

The contrast in verse 23 is between two masters, Sin and God. If you were to go back and read through chapter 6, you would see Paul developing this slavery image. Verse 22 says, 22 But 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.[3] Here you can see the contrast between sin as one slave master and God as another slave master. They are competing slave masters. “Freed from sin and enslaved to God.” Paul is painting this striking picture of two opposing slave masters.

>>>Let’s talk about slavery. When we hear slave and slave master, we don’t have the best picture. How many of you have seen the movie 12 Years a slave? It won an Academy Award for best picture in 2013. It was a story of a black man kidnapped in Washington DC, by a couple of con artists in 1841 and sold into slavery. Where the main character worked as a slave for 12 years before he was released, nothing about that story sounds good except he was released. Or maybe we think that in 2016 there were 40.3 million people in modern slavery, including 24.9 million people in forced labor and 15.4 million people in forced marriage. With those thoughts in mind, it is hard to think of any slavery as good, right?

Let me paint you a different picture. Coming home to God – being indentured to God as our master – is the true slavery for which we were created. It is the only true slavery in the universe because God really owns us. He made us; therefore, he owns us. He owes us no wages when we do what he tells us to do. Owners don’t pay their possessions wages in actual slavery. Only God owns his creations. So, to be enslaved to God is a homecoming to our true master.

But sin is another kind of master. He pays wages because he needs us. Sin was never meant to be the master of the creatures of God. He is an alien master. Humans were not meant to serve sin. They were meant to serve God. We were meant to be dependent on God’s grace, not debtors to sin’s wages.

Sin as a master is so deceptive and evil. His demands seem so pleasant. When we sin, we don’t sin out of duty. Sin exercises his power as a master through the pleasures he promises. Here is the deception. When we obey sin, it feels like freedom. It doesn’t feel like we are earning wages. It feels like we’re getting gifts of pleasure and freedom – to do what we want.

>>>I used to smoke cigarettes when I was younger. I enjoyed smoking. When I was stressed out, a smoke seemed like a gift. After a good meal, a cigarette hit the spot. I started smoking infrequently, and it was lovely. Then I started smoking more; I mean, if a little were nice more would be even better, right? A pack of cigarettes, starting, would last me four days. Eventually, a pack lasted me a day. But at least it was so enjoyable, right?

Let’s look at the second contrast, Wages vs. Free Gift.

I want to clarify one thing from the start. I feel that when most people hear the phrase “wages of sin” and think the meaning is something like “the wages you get when you sin.” So “wages of sin” they take to mean “wages of doing sin.” In this picture, “sin” is the action done to get the wage. I don’t think that is the picture Paul has in his mind. It doesn’t fit the context in verse 22. 22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God,[4] Here Paul tells us we have been set free from sin and are now slaves to God. So we have been freed from one master and are now a slave to another master, God.

If we take “wages of sin” as “wages of doing sin,” then we would have to take “Free gift of God” that way, “gifts of doing good.” I think we can see right away that it doesn’t work. “Free gift of God” means “free gift that God gives.” So the parallel would be “wages that sin pays.” Picture it this way. Sin is not what you do to earn wages. It is the master who pays you when you serve him as a slave. This is what Paul is trying to describe to us here.

Let’s look at how these two slave masters pay their slaves. A wage is something you earn. A gift is something you don’t earn and can’t earn it. A wage is a matter of debt and justice. A free gift is a matter of beneficence and grace. You can’t take someone to court for not giving you a free gift. You deserve your wages. You don’t earn a free gift. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be free.

We talked about our slavery to God as a good thing. What makes this so good is that the one true master and owner in the universe gives gifts, not wages. Why is that good news? Because earning wages depletes us, we hope the wage will make up for the depletion.

<<<My oldest Jonah just started a full-time job in the construction industry. He is also a full-time student at BC. This past week he got a couple of days off work because they are waiting for another crew to finish before they can continue their job. I asked Jonah what he thought of the break. He said it was nice because work can be exhausting. I laughed and said welcome to work.

But getting gifts depletes no one. Wages imply that the master needs our work and has to pay for it. Gifts indicate that the master does not need our work and does not have to pay for anything. The one true master in the universe has no needs. And that is why he pays no wages. To those who trust him, he only gives gifts. That is why his yoke is easy, and his burden is light. It is the sweetest slavery in the world.

Sin as a master is so deceptive and evil. His demands seem so pleasant. When we sin, we don’t sin out of duty. Sin exercises his power as a master through the pleasures he promises. Here is the deception. When we obey sin, it feels like freedom. It doesn’t feel like we are earning wages. It feels like we’re getting gifts of pleasure and freedom – to do what we want.

So why does sin pay wages if it feels like it is so good? Let’s talk about two reasons. Just like how work for wages depletes us. Sin’s demands do deplete us. We hope the wages will restore our drained time and energy, but sin does not restore. Sin takes, and takes and takes, and does not give back.

>>>Sin is like a vampire. Imagine sin as the vampire, and you’re its prey it needs to survive. The vampire’s trick to keep you coming back so it can consume your blood is that every time he takes your blood, he gets you high. Even if everyone you know were to tell you the vampire was terrible and was killing you. You would tell everyone the vampire isn’t hurting you. He is helping you. All the while, you are being sucked dry.

The other reason sin pays wages, even though it doesn’t feel like he is to his slaves, is because, by the end of our life, we will deserve what he pays. We can never earn eternal life; that is always a free gift from God. This is when we will see his true cruelty. When we add up all the wages he paid us, it will add to death. The wage he gives us for our lifetime of service is death, and he is sitting to the side laughing.

>>>While I was smoking, I knew I liked doing it. I didn’t think it was costing me anything. It was something I enjoyed. The reality was that smoking was harming my body. Nicotine was corrupting my body’s cells. The smoke and tar were collecting in my lungs and causing me to be sick. I was spending an arm and a leg buying cigarettes. And this thing that I thought was freedom addicted me, and I had to smoke.

<<< John Piper described what this looks like. He said, “Hell is the wage that sin pays in the same way that a prostitute’s venereal disease and a prison sentence is the wage that a pimp pays. They don’t pay the wage. They just lure and deceive, lie and drain and ruin, disappear, and leave their slaves sick and guilty before the courts – before the judgment of God.”

Christians. Let me ask you this question. Do you remember this part of your life? Do you remember when you were a slave to sin? Do you remember being in that downward spiral. Working and working and trying to gain traction but the only thing that was happening was you were descending deeper and deeper. Do you remembering the hole that was missing something in your life? Do you remember trying to fill it with every “good” thing you could find? Do you remember how nothing would fill it, it only drained you even more?

Now when you see your co-worker in that exact downward spiral how do you feel? When you see that person’s life imploding from Sin’s grip on them do you think man I need to tell them about my God. Or do you think, there sinning and getting what they deserve.

I believe too many of us forget the slavery we were once in and forget that the world is held tight by Sin’s oppression and we blame the slaves and not the slave master. Why do I think this? I think this because I see it in myself. I see it in other self proclaimed Christians. I follow so many Christians on twitter and other social media platforms and man it seems like we are out for blood all the while forgetting the blood we owe as sinners. That is why I like to remind myself that I am the chief sinner. Now I am a new person in Christ Jesus but man was I a sinner and I deserve to die.

Let’s look at the third contrasting pair, death vs. eternal life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. [5] Sin’s ultimate and summary wage is death. God’s ultimate and summary gift is eternal life. And since life is eternal, the death spoken here is eternal. All sin’s benefits are summed up in this: eternal death. All of God’s benefits are summed up in this: eternal life.

This is where the parallel between the two breaks down. Sin will have no say or hand in the gift of eternal life. But God will have a total say and a sovereign hand in the wage of eternal death.

Here is a reality. God really is fair. Earlier, I mentioned that you couldn’t take someone to court for not giving you a free gift. But you can bring someone to court for not paying your wages. It is only fair that you get paid for what you labored for. He ensures we get what we worked for when we go before God. God is fighting for our justice.

So, what is this payment of death? The ultimate meaning of death here is not just ceasing to exist but eternal conscious torment under God’s just and holy wrath. This is the final wage of sin. The slave master, Sin, seduces his slaves to disobey God and then disappears and leaves them to perish at the judgment of God.

What is eternal life? Eternity with God as the giver. That is what eternal life means. God remains the giver forever and ever. There will never be a time when God is not giving more new joys to his people. God will never run out of gifts. God is the giver. And he will never cease to be God.

If that doesn’t give you tingles about who God is and what eternity with him will be like, check this out. Ephesians 2:7 say this. “7 so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.[6]” Do you see what that means? It means that eternal life is what it will take for God to exhaust the riches of his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. The gifts he has for us in himself are infinite in number and perfection. Therefore, it will take an eternity to give them to us for our enjoyment. There will be a never-ending display of new and beautiful things about God and from God for us to enjoy.

Do you remember when you meet the love of your life? For me, every new thing that I found out about Chris was amazing. The sparkle in her eyes amazed me for weeks. The way she put the dishes away was amazing! I still love Chris more than anything on earth, but my initial feelings have dropped out. Why? Boredom maybe. Most likely, I let something else steal my attention away from her.

Well, in the new age, there will be no boredom, and there will be nothing to steal our attention away from God because his mercies will be new every morning. The river of blessings flowing will never run out because it is infinite. Do you know what infinite means? Something is infinite if it can give away forever and never get smaller. Eternal life will be the never-ending giving of God to make us ever increasingly happy in all that he is for us in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Last week we talked about the situation we are all in. We all sin. This week we dug a little deeper into the situation. We all have served a false master and our wages for sin is Death. But there is another Master, the true master that doesn’t give wages but gives gifts. His gift is eternal life. This week I’m asking who is your master.

>>>Let me tell you, my story. Many of you don’t know this about me. I was a drug baby. I was drug to church by my parents every time the church was open. From a young age, I knew my parents had a relationship with God. I also knew my parents loved my sisters and me. I did have a fantastic childhood. That said, I was a child and did everything that kids did. In second grade, I had a teacher Mrs. Rollins who loved me enough to hold me accountable for my actions with my parents. I had to have a signed note daily that said Mark was good or bad today. Let me tell you, as much as I tried, I don’t think I had two weeks in a row that I was good at school every day. I hated to bring that note home and wait to show my dad. Not just because I knew I would get a spanking but because I didn’t want to let my dad and mom down. It felt like hell to me.

In the third grade, I realized I wanted to trust Jesus as my Lord and savior, so I told my dad, and he walked me through what that meant. Throughout my life, I knew I had sinned. I also knew that no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t refrain from sinning. My dad told me the good news Jesus had already paid the price for me. That was when I knew I needed him as my Lord and savior.

Even though I served the wrong master God has a way out for all of us. John 5:24 says 24 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life[7] Even though Sin has us all tricked into thinking we are free, know that he has a grip on us. But if we trust in God our true master we are set free from Sin

[1] The Holy Bible: English Stan.d”ard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ro 3:23. [2] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ro 6:23. [3] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ro 6:22. [4] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ro 6:22. [5] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ro 6:23. [6] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Eph 2:7. [7] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Jn 5:24.