Romans 6.1-2a-Living Under the Dominion of the Sin Nature Does Not Accentuate the Grace of God
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Wednesday May 28, 2008
Romans: Romans 6:1-2a- Living Under The Dominion Of The Sin Nature Does Not Accentuate The Grace Of God
Lesson # 176
Please turn in your Bibles to Romans 6:1.
Last evening, we began a study of the fourth major section in the book of Romans that appears in Romans 6:1-8:39, which teaches the believer how to experience the righteousness of God after being declared justified by God, which he identifies as “sanctification.”
This evening we will study Romans 6:1-2a, in which the apostle Paul emphatically rejects the idea that a Christian living under the dominion of the sin nature accentuates the grace of God.
Let’s read Romans 6:1-14 and then concentrate on Romans 6:1-2a.
Romans 6:1, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase?”
Romans 6:2, “May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?”
Romans 6:3, “Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?”
Romans 6:4, “Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”
Romans 6:5-7, “For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin for he who has died is freed from sin.”
Romans 6:8, “Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him.”
Romans 6:9, “knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him.”
Romans 6:10, “For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.”
Romans 6:11, “Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
Romans 6:12-13, “Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.”
Romans 6:14, “For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace.”
Let’s now concentrate on verse 1.
Romans 6:1, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase?”
Paul asks these two rhetorical questions of his readership since his statements in Romans 5:20-21 could be misconstrued or distorted so as to give license to committing sin.
In these verses, Paul teaches us that where personal sin increased the grace of God infinitely abounded in order that the grace of God would reign as king through righteousness resulting in eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
The two rhetorical questions in Romans 6:1 are addressing the false inference that his readers could draw from Paul’s teaching in Romans 5:20 that where sin increased, God’s grace infinitely abounded.
“What” is the interrogative pronoun tis (tiv$) (tis), which is used with the verb ereo, “shall we say” in order to ask a debater’s rhetorical question.
The first person plural form of the verb ereo is an “inclusive we” referring to Paul and his readers, who like himself, are sinners who have been declared justified by God through faith in Jesus Christ.
In Romans 6:1, Paul is addressing his fellow Christian who read this epistle in the city of Rome, anticipating any misconceptions or erroneous conclusions that they might have regarding his teaching in Romans 5:20-21 in which he taught that where personal increased, God’s grace infinitely abounded.
By posing this rhetorical question to his fellow Christian readers in Rome, at the same time, Paul would be indirectly addressing the charges of antinomianism that were leveled against him by the Judaizers.
Romans 6:1, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase?”
“Then” is the “inferential” use of the post-positive conjunction oun (ou@n) (oon), which denotes that what is introduced at this point is the result of an inference from Paul’s teaching contained in Romans 5:20-21.
“Are we to continue” is the verb epimeno (e)pimevnw) (ep-ee-men-o), which is used in a figurative sense of persisting in an activity or state, which is identified by the articular dative form of the noun hamartia, which refers to the sin nature.
The idea that Paul is trying to convey to his readers with this verb is that how can a believer “persist in living” under the domain of the sin nature since Christ died to free him from the bondage of the sin nature?
In Romans 6:1, the question emphasizes that it is absolutely unacceptable that the believer persist in living under the domain of the sin nature since they died to the sin nature when they were identified with Christ in His death.
Romans 6:1, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase?”
“In sin” is the articular dative feminine singular form of the noun hamartia (a(martiva) (ham-ar-tee-ah), which refers to the sin nature as indicated by the articular construction of the word, which indicates that it was used in a previous context and that the word’s meaning in the previous context is being used again.
In Romans 5:21, the noun was used with reference to the sin nature.
In Romans 5:21, “sin” is the noun hamartia (a(martiva) (ham-ar-tee-ah), which refers to the sin nature since the word is being personified by the verb basileuo, “to reign as a king or tyrant.”
The inferential use of the conjunction oun, “then” in this passage connects Romans 6 with Romans 5:20-21, which means that Paul is continuing his thought from Romans 5:20-21 and that what he is about to say in Romans 6:1-2 is directly related to his previous statements.
The locative case of hamartia denotes the believer living “under the dominion of” or “in the realm of” the sin nature.
Romans 6:1, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase?”
“So that” is the conjunction hina (i%na), which introduces a purpose clause since the rhetorical question emphasizes the possible intent of his readers as a result of erroneously concluding that grace gives them a license to sin.
“Grace” is the noun charis (xavri$) (khar-ece), which is all that God is free to do in imparting unmerited blessings to those who trust in Jesus Christ as Savior based upon the merits of Christ and His death on the Cross.
“May increase” is the verb pleonazo (pleonavzw) (pleh-on-ad-zo), which means, “to increase” in the sense that persisting to live under the dominion of the sin nature, gives God a greater opportunity or more opportunities to manifest His grace in the form of forgiveness of sins.
Romans 6:2, “May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?”
“May it never be!” is the strongest negative Greek expression emphatically denying any possibility or thought of Christians persisting to live under the dominion of the sin nature in order to give God more opportunities to manifest His grace in the form of forgiving their sins.
God didn’t give the Christian grace in order that he might continue to persist in living under the dominion of the sin nature through the committing acts of personal sin but rather, grace gives the Christian a license to love and serve Him.
Throughout the New Testament, the apostles prohibited believers from making it a habit to live under the dominion of their old sin natures (1 Corinthians 6:12-20; 2 Corinthians 5:14-15; Galatians 5:13-26; Ephesians 4:17-5:2; 1 Peter 1:14-16; 4:1-5).
1 Peter 4:1-5, “Therefore, since Christ has suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same purpose, because he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for the lusts of men, but for the will of God. For the time already past is sufficient for you to have carried out the desire of the Gentiles, having pursued a course of sensuality, lusts, drunkenness, carousing, drinking parties and abominable idolatries. In all this, they are surprised that you do not run with them into the same excesses of dissipation, and they malign you; but they will give account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.”
1 Peter 1:14-16, “As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, ‘YOU SHALL BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY.’”