(Part 1 of 2)
“What shall we say then? Shall we go
on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we
live in it any longer?”
Romans
6:1-2
This week I
want to address the misguided idea that believers (those who have committed
their lives to Christ) can continue to sin and yet still remain secure in
Christ because of God’s grace. It is bad enough that many churches today do not
address the topic of sin at all, but this approach to sin makes a mockery of
grace.
Grace is the
unmerited favor of God secured for us through Christ’s sacrificial death. If we
continue to sin, once we are saved by grace, we in essence deny the work of His
death and burial.
“Or do you not know that all of us who were
baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His 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.”
Romans
6:3-4
In order for
us to live a new life (resurrected life) the old life has to get buried! Too
often, we want to live the new life without burying our old way of living.
Water baptism for the believer proclaims our identification with Jesus’ death,
His burial and His resurrection. Our church chooses to baptize by immersion. By
doing this we get the full visual effect of watching the individual submit
their life to Christ (crucifying the old man), then we bury them in the water
(burying the old man), and then bring them up into the new life they have in
Christ.
“If we have been united with Him like this in
His death, we will certainly also be united in His resurrection. For we know
that our old self was crucified with Him so that the body of sin might be might
be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin because anyone who
has died has been freed from sin.”
Romans
6:5-7
They key to
living this new life in which we have been freed from sin, is not found in
simply acknowledging and putting our faith in Christ’s sacrificial death.
Neither is it found in merely trusting and rejoicing over His resurrection. It
is found in our obedience to bury the old man.
“Therefore 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, but rather offer yourselves to God,
as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to Him as instruments of
righteousness.”
Romans
6:12-13
You cannot
live your “old life” and a “new life” at the same time! You cannot give
yourselves fully to God and still sin!
Pastor Scott
Burr
http://faithandworshipseries.blogspot.com/
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