What Does It Mean to Be Dead to Sin? - Romans 6

 

Dead to Sin, Alive in Christ

6 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

Paul now makes the critical transition from teaching that we are saved by grace through faith, to what it means to live out our faith in every day life.  There were some who were perverting the doctrine of grace and saying, "Well if my sin results in me receiving more of God's grace then I will sin more so I will get more grace."  You can see how backwards that is.  Paul instead uses the language of "dying to sin so that we might live for Him".  

Since we are dead to sin it no longer has its power over us. What does that mean?  Part of the power of sin was the guilt and shame that it brought us which condemned us before God.  When we sinned we had guilt before God and then sinned more because we felt hopeless.  It was a downward spiral.  But once we are justified by faith and realize we can't do it on our own, it actually frees us to live the life we've always wanted.  

Paul uses the metaphor of baptism to illustrate his point.  This is where full water immersion baptism is helpful in demonstrating the theology of baptism.  If you have seen an adult baptism often the adult is immersed into the water.  In that action sin has been buried and covered in Jesus' sacrifice. When the person comes up from the water their sin has been duried and he has been raised up in new life.  It is the same imagery of Jesus being raised from the dead.  Sin has been conquered and we are born again to live a new life.  

5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with,[a] that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7 because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.

Paul continues this line of thinking saying that our old self has been crucified so that we might not be ruled by sin.  Paul uses the language of being set free from bondage to sin.  In our Lutheran confessions we say, "I am in bondage to sin and cannot free myself."  We can't free ourselves in our own power but now a power greater than ourselves has delivered us.  In A.A. they call this a "higher power". As Christians we know the only higher power is God.  If there was a higher power than God than that power would be God.  God's penultimate power was shown when God raised Jesus from the dead. Paul says it is the power of the resurrection which lives in us.  We have been united with it by being in Christ.  Think about this! The same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in you.  This is the power you need to tap into to live a new, transformed life.  

8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. 11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. 13 Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. 14 For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.

Again Paul says some really important things about how receiving grace by faith relates to the Christian life.  First, because Christ was raised from the dead, he lives in and through you. Yes that's right the resurrected Christ lives in and through you!  Then, Paul makes a very important application of this truth for us.  He says, "In the same way count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus."  The real important emphasis here is the words, "Count yourselves dead to sin."  When Paul uses the word "count" here it is not a "feeling" word but a "fact" word.  Meaning you don't have to feel like you are dead to sin, you are.  But you have to claim it, believe in it, and live it out in your everyday life.  

Next, Paul then implores them to not "offer any part of your body to sin and don't let it reign in your mortal body."  Though we are saved by grace through faith, we still have free will.  With that in mind we can still offer ourselves to sin, or we might say choose sin.  Though we are dead to sin in a technical sense, we make ourselves open to its power by inviting itself back into our lives.  We still live in a sinful, mortal body subject to the desires of the flesh.  We will battle our sinful nature until we die.  But the fact is that we are forgiven, and we can live in Christ's power and we "don't have to sin!" 

Where are you challenged in your life by giving in to your sinful nature?  Do you have a life group, or another brother or sister in Christ you can confess your sins to and be accountable to for this behavior?  This is why being in a life group is so important! How can you remind yourselves on a daily basis that you are dead to sin and don't have to be enslaved to its power?  Commit being dead to sin this week and living in the power of the resurrected Christ, free to live the life you've always wanted.