Romans 6.18a-The Roman Christians Were Freed From The Sin Nature Through Obedience To The Gospel
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Sunday July 20, 2008
Romans: Romans 6:18a-The Roman Christians Were Freed From The Sin Nature Through Obedience To The Gospel
Lesson # 199
Please turn in your Bibles to Romans 6:15.
This morning we will study Romans 6:18a, in which the apostle Paul teaches the Christians in Rome that they were freed from the sin nature through their obedience to the gospel.
Romans 6:15-18, “What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? May it never be! Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness? But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed. And having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.”
In Romans 6:18, “and” is the “adjunctive” use of the conjunction de (deV) (deh), which not only connects Paul’s previous thought with the one to follow in this verse but it also introduces an additional reason why Paul thanked the Father.
As we noted in our study of Romans 6:17, Paul thanks the Father because the Roman believers were once perpetual slaves to the sin nature but then they obeyed the gospel, which Paul identifies as that “form of teaching.”
Now, in Romans 6:18, the conjunction de introduces an additional reason why Paul thanked the Father, namely, when they obeyed the gospel they were set free from the sin nature and became servants of righteousness instead.
In Romans 6:18, the phrase “having been freed” is the verb eleutheroo (e)leuqerovw) (el-yoo-ther-o-o), which means, “to be set free” from the dominion of the sin nature.
The verb is used in secular Greek of freeing slaves.
In the Roman Empire, a slave could purchase his own freedom, if he could collect sufficient funds or his master could sell him to someone who would pay the price and set him free.
Redemption was a precious thing in Paul’s day.
The image of slave being set free would appeal to Paul’s readers since they were Romans and slavery was a major institution in the Roman Empire in the first century A.D.
The treatment of slaves varied from society to society.
Some slaves as in the Roman Empire were treated as members of the family and were employed to bring up children and to teach them.
Nearly every society in the ancient world that practiced slavery wrote laws concerning the treatment of slaves.
The Roman law of slavery was extremely elaborate.
Some societies allowed slaves to be killed but in others that was not the case.
The Israelites, Athenians and Romans restricted the rights of slave owners to kill their human chattel.
In every ancient society, there was absolutely no sympathy or mercy extended to the slave who killed his master.
In fact, Roman law stated that all slaves who lived under the same roof were to be put to death along with the slave who had murdered his master.
In some societies, there were sexual relationships between master and slaves and some slave owners married their slaves.
Some societies gave the slaves the ability to purchase their freedom after a period of time.
Laws of manumission varied widely from society to society.
Some societies as in Israel freed their slaves after a prescribed number of years.
Some legal systems prescribed manumission of the slave who adopted the religion of his owner.
Also, birth could be a way to freedom.
As the treatment of slaves became more relaxed in the Roman Empire so did the laws of manumission.
The manumission of slaves occurred frequently during the days of the Emperors though Augustus did enact legislation to curb the liberality of many slave owners.
He fixed eighteen as the minimum age at which a master could exercise his right to free a slave, and thirty as the minimum age at which a slave could be manumitted.
So in Romans 6:17, the apostle Paul appeals once again to his readers’ frame of reference by employing verb eleutheroo, which means, “to be set free” from the dominion of the sin nature.
This verb describes the believer’s new status with the respect to his relationship to his indwelling old Adamic sin nature.
The word speaks of the believer’s deliverance from the tyranny of the sin nature from the “positional” sense meaning how God now views them and what He has done for them through the baptism of the Spirit.
It would encourage the Roman Christians to experience this new position in Christ and deliverance from the power of the sin nature.
At the moment the believer exercised faith alone in Christ alone, he was delivered “positionally” (God’s work and viewpoint of the believer) from the sin nature through identification with Christ in His crucifixion, death, burial, resurrection.
After being declared justified through faith in Christ, the believer can “experience” deliverance from the sin nature by appropriating by faith his union and identification with Christ in His crucifixion, death, burial, resurrection and session, which constitutes the believer’s spiritual life.
Lastly, at the resurrection the believer will be delivered “ultimately” and permanently from the sin nature when he receives his resurrection body at the rapture of the church, which is imminent.
The believer’s deliverance positionally sets up the “potential” for him to experience this deliverance in time since this deliverance can only be experienced after salvation through obedience to the teaching of the Word of God.
It also guarantees the believer’s ultimate deliverance at the rapture, which is based upon the sovereign decision of God rather than the volition of the believer.
The verb eleutheroo also implies that the Christian no longer is obligated to obey the desires of the sin nature, which wage war against the soul (Compare 1 Peter 2:11).
The fact that the believer through the baptism of the Spirit is considered by God as to have died with Christ two thousand years ago frees the believer from the tyranny of the sin nature so that he now has an alternative to obeying its desires.
This verb appears in other places in the Greek New Testament in relation to the sin nature.
Romans 6:22, “But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome, eternal life.”
Romans 8:1-2, “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.”
Galatians 5:1, “It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.”
John 8:31-36, “So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, ‘If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.’ They answered Him, ‘We are Abraham's descendants and have never yet been enslaved to anyone; how is it that You say, ‘You will become free’?’ Jesus answered them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son does remain forever. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.’”
In Romans 6:18, the verb is “personifying” the noun hamartia, which refers to the sin nature meaning that Paul is ascribing the human action of a slave being set free from a cruel master to the Christian being delivered from the tyranny of the sin nature.
The participle form of the verb eleutheroo functions as a “participle of cause” meaning that it indicates the cause or reason or ground of the action of the finite verb, which is douloo, “you became slaves.”
Therefore, as a “participle of cause,” the verb eleutheroo indicates that the believers in Rome became slaves of righteousness “because” they were freed from the dominion of the sin nature.
Romans 6:18, “And having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.”
“From sin” indicates that the Roman Christians were “totally and completely separated from” them from the tyranny of the sin nature in the viewpoint of God.
This freedom was the result of the Holy Spirit identifying them with Christ in His physical death and resurrection the moment they were declared justified by God through faith in Christ.