sermon 7/5/26
Notes
Transcript
Free To…Obey
Free To…Obey
What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? By no means! Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.
I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
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We have to pick a master, we have to make a choice, or the world will choose for us and we won’t like the result.
Paul says, and I agree, that we are either a slave to sin or a salve to God, and he wasn’t the first one to make the connection between servants and masters.
Jesus said
“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.
The Apostle Paul uses the strong metaphor comparing our lifes to servants. To fully understand his analogy we need to put ourselves where few of us if any, have ever been, the place or a first century slave. A slave had ZERO atonomy. They could do nothing without the permission of their master. They had to control over their choices. They lived in blind obedience.
—> We are born in obedience/slavery to sin. Its who we are as human beings. However, unlike first century slaves who didn’t have a way out of their bondage we have a choice.
—> Romans 6:18
You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.
—> This isn’t going to sit well with some of us but we have to be slaves to something. We are either slaves to sin, bound by the shame and the guilt, and the hopelessness that it brings, or we are slaves to righteousness and servants of God.
Those are the only 2 choices.
—> Now here is the rub we have to serve God with the same enthusiasm and obedience that we served sin with. Otherwise we aren’t reeally serving God and we are deceiving ourselves.
—> But when we do free ourselves completely from sin and give ourselves fully to God.
But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
—> The world would have you believe that holiness holds you back. That seeking God is boring, lifeless, and dull. When in actuality its the opposite. Have you ever seen people that have given their lives to Christ they are more full of life than anyone I have ever met. Some of them I would say literally sparkle. On the flip side have you seen someone who has been ravaged by the world. They are hollowed out, dull, they literally almost turn grey.
—> True Freedom in Jesus Christ means that we have the ability to choose a new master. We no longer have to be a slave to sin but we can freely choose to submit to the authority of Christ in our lives.
—> Who would you rather serve, a master that only wants power for themselves and doesn’t care about you or a master that loves you? A master that had to give up the most valuable thing that He had to even give you the option to be with Him?
—> Think about that sin gets you for free. You are born into sin, but God gave HIs one and only son so that whosoever would believe in him would not parish but have eternal life.
—> As we enjoy the Lord’s Supper this morning I want you to really think about what it means. This isn’t bread and juice but this was the cost to buy your freedom. It was a high cost, the highest price that has ever been paid. Let that sink in, God thinks you are so valuable that He gave His son for you. To buy your freedom just for the possibility that you would love Him in return.
This morning by eating this bread and drinking this juice you are not only acknowledging and saying thank you for your freedom but it is your act of submission to God.
Just as the bread represents the physical body of Jesus, when we eat the bread this morning we are acknowledging that all that we say and all they we do will be done for the glory of God.
Just as the juice represents the new covenant that God made with us, as we take the juice this morning we are agreeing to our part in that covenant. To let God into our heart and soul completely. So that we may become true servants of God. Committed to obedience whatever that looks like.
