Why Do Good?

Romans 6:11–23 ESV

So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. 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. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace. What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! Do 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? But 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, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness. 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. For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. 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. 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. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Scripture: Romans 6:11-23

Sermon Title: Why Do Good?

I invite you to keep your Psalter Hymnals out, and turn to page 901, Lord’s Day 32. This afternoon we move into the third and final part of the Catechism. Here the authors seek to answer the question, “How am I to thank God for such deliverance?” Maybe it is so obvious and simple that it does not need to be said, maybe we, believers, hear it so often that the Catechism authors could assume it—but the gift of God for us, the free gift of salvation, should elicit a particular response from us. That response is one of gratitude and thanks. 

In Corsica this morning, we were looking at the grateful response of Mary to Jesus for raising her brother from the dead, and we also started to get at this point at the end. When we understand the magnitude of what Christ’s redemption means not just for our actions, thoughts, and words, but for our souls—something should happen in us. At some point in our walk of faith, every one of us should be brought to our knees or struck in our souls in such a way that we say, “Wow! That’s what grace is about. Thank you God for doing this for me!” A test of our faith’s genuineness is that we do not just accept forgiveness and salvation in the same way that we accept a reminder postcard that we have a dentist appointment coming up. When I get that card in the mail, I will probably say, “Ah, good, I need that,” and then not anything more. True faith, on the other hand, will exhibit real and overflowing gratitude to God. With the idea that this section will help show us how to live with gratitude, let’s look at Questions and Answers 86 and 87 together.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, when I was a seminary student and now as a pastor in Corsica, it feels like I have one foot in the CRC and one foot in the RCA. At times that presents some struggles for me because as much as we desire to follow God’s leading faithfully I know I am imperfect and that denominations are imperfect too. But for the most part, as I continue to learn the differences and similarities of the two, I have grown to love my Christian siblings from the RCA, the denomination that for most of my life, there has been a divide. That division has been based on tradition, and the distinctions that come from having unique influences. 

One of the parts of the liturgy coming from the tradition of the RCA that I have enjoyed is a question that gets asked of parents for baptism and of those making profession of faith. The question that the pastor asks is, “Do you renounce sin and the power of evil in your life and in the world.” And the response is: “I renounce them.” While I hate that we have to have that question because it means sin is in our world, I love that part of the church’s life is renouncing these things 

The word “renounce” is not a very common word in the vocabulary of the 21st century, but it is incredibly powerful. Google gives these definitions, “to formally declare one’s abandonment of, to refuse to recognize or abide by any longer, to declare that one will no longer engage in or support.”  Abandoning, refusing, no longer engaging in or supporting, that is the statement that we as believers make for our lives, for our families, and for our churches in regards to sin. It describes that we are cutting sin off and the power it has held. Who we are now is going to be different because we are no under the control of sin.

That is the commitment Paul was calling the church in Rome to dedicate themselves to in his letter. In those opening four verses, he writes, “count yourselves dead to sin…do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness…For sin shall not be your master.”  He was telling them and telling us, “If you have come to Christ, if you been united with him in his death, which he died to pay for sin, then get sin out of your life. It is time to change, it is time to do good.” While he was describing what not to do, he also informed them of what to do. What does life having renounced sin and the power of evil entail? “[Count yourselves] alive to God in Christ Jesus…offer yourselves to God…offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness.” 

For Paul there is a clear-cut distinction between being in Christ and being out, bring in sin. Either you fit into this category of being a slave of righteousness, which I hope each of us here is, or you are a slave of sin. When he sets up those categories, he is talking about what holds power in your life. If you can look at your actions, your thoughts, and truly get to the intentions behind them—what holds power, what holds mastery or dominion in your life? For us or anyone else to truly examine ourselves and consider if we are practicing what we preach, that is the question we have to ask—who is reigning in our lives?

A few theologians I read from picked up on something that is more visible in the Greek than in our translations. Verse 13, Paul talks about what we offer the parts of our bodies as instruments of. These theologians point out that the word for instruments is most commonly used in reference to military. That is not a strange idea for Paul, considering he talks about the armor of God in several letters, but Calvin points out that if this is what he intended, then that phrase “parts of your body” is talking about how each of us is a weapon. 

If we are to believe in Jesus, then God demands a total commitment from us. We do not get to choose if we are going to have one foot with him and one foot out in the world. Trying to live like that will pull us back into the world, it will pull our allegiances away from God. We have to make a choice, and our lives are weapons or tools that will reveal what side we are fighting for. Will we be people bringing the truth and hope of the gospel, the truth of God’s calling in our lives? Or will we be people that wage war against the church, desiring to pull people away from the truth? Just as Jesus said that we cannot serve both God and money, so too it is clear that we cannot serve Christ and the devil. We must have one Lord, and the policy of his reign will prevail in our lives. 

That is what question and answer 87 is getting at, those who do not turn to God from their ungrateful and impenitent ways. Last week we were looking at the subject of discipline, and we read from 1 Corinthians 5 where Paul rebuked the sexually immoral man and the Corinthian church that he was a part of. In that passage and in answer, hope is not completely withdrawn from those individuals to say they will absolutely never have a chance to choose Christ, but if they do not turn to God and seek forgiveness through Jesus, then truly they cannot be saved. Those who will continue to yield allegiance to sin and selfish pleasures rather than God’s grace and a life of righteousness will find death. If someone says they have come to Christ, and yet are not being transformed or see need for change—no need to be thankful for what Jesus did—then they must not be considered a Christian. They are still enslaved to the devil, still fighting for his power. 

There is a clear allegiance when we come to saving faith, not that we will never sin again, but we recognize the need to and practice repentance. We express real and vibrant gratitude for the sacrifice Jesus gave for us. That is the foundation for why we should do good. Let’s move now to what it looks like to live into that redeemed goodness. 

Verse 22 summarizes the whole idea of being slaves to righteousness that the church is encouraged to identify as.  “But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.” The first major concept here is that we have been set free from sin. Why do good now? Because you have been freed from the past, freed from the sin that has held you back! We can look at sinful actions people are involved in, and see the pain that comes from their behavior. Gossiping and lying about others does not breed faithful and compassionate friendship. Prideful living leads away from seeing the need for and practicing humility. Anger and bitterness leads to emptiness and being alone. 

All of that sounds really miserable, yet how easy is it to get trapped by those sins?  There are times when we do not even realize it, because it can seem like they are just part of life. This is part of why it is so important to be actively examining ourselves alongside the patterns of life and love that we find in God’s word. When we seek truth, we find that we do not have to be restrained by these, but also that we ought to put them aside. 

The devil tries and will continue to try again and again to put a rope around parts of our lives, especially those areas that have been familiar to us in the past. Living in sin feels like the easier road, but yet it is so damaging. We have been freed, brothers and sisters, from being enslaved to sin and now we have a new master. We are slaves to God and his righteousness. He does not run around with a whip as the image of a slave master might be in our minds. No, he is gracious, leading and teaching us. He is helping to show us what living in a new identity entails.  

If we will learn his ways, it becomes not a chore to follow God but rather a joy. This is the benefit of holiness that Paul refers to. Holiness could also be translated as sanctification—the ongoing, lifelong process of us being made more and more holy and perfect—a process that the Spirit is active in preserving and helping us. We may find hardship in following God, because he is a different master than what our sinful selves are used to, and at points along the way as the devil tries to bring us back under his power, but ultimately God will help us find delight in him

Why do good? Because the Holy Spirit is helping us to live in ways that are closer to how God intended for us to live. All of Scripture is useful in guiding us on this new path, but God also gives very direct lessons to inform us of holy living. We can look at the 10 Commandments, we can look at how Jesus called his followers to treat the poor and the oppressed, the widowed and the orphaned, children and those cast out by society. The Christian life, the slave to obedience life is not only about personal piety as we often think about, but it also involves how we live with those God has put on this earth around us. 

           We are not instantly going to do everything perfect, but the life we put on is one committed to growing in step with God’s desires. There are times in which we will look like the Israelites as they grumbled against God in the wilderness on the way to the Promised Land. The ways and practices and comfort of the literal old life in Egypt seemed more free to them than this life of following the Lord, yet following him would bring them the greatest benefit. 

           That has to be true for us as well today. We will find the greatest benefit, not that we have earned it, not that we have accredited ourselves with enough good actions and honest thoughts, but through Jesus Christ, we receive salvation. Holy living is a matter of thanking him for that gift. It is renouncing the power that sin has over us, and declaring our allegiance with the one true God. The Creator and Redeemer of all things.  

           Recognizing that God controls that gift of salvation by grace and not by works is an incredible mercy. Verse 23 states, “For the wages of sin is death,” so what following sin and the power of evil earns a person is death, is condemnation, is hellfire, weeping, and gnashing of teeth for eternity. “But the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Sin is the state of every human who exists after the fall, but if we will put our hope in true God, then we receive his gift of eternal life. Sin earns condemnation, but life forever with God is of his mercy.

           Brothers and sisters, the mercy of God that is poured out on us does not end at our baptism, it does not end at our conversion. It does not end when we can see the distinct difference between our old self and new self, that if we ever exhibit a trait, a sin of the old self, then we lose it. Rather the mercy of God is what enables us to live in such a way that God can and praised by you and me with the help of the Holy Spirit. His mercy is what frees us not only from the sin but from the chains of shame, enabling us to know his love. May we see doing good as our ever-increasing gift to God to thank him for what he has promised to us. Amen.