Romans 6
6
1 So what shall we say? Should we remain in sin, so that grace may abound?
2 Let it not be so! For how can we who have died to sin still live in sin?
3 Do you not know that those of us who have been baptized in Christ Jesus have been baptized into his death?
4 For through baptism we have been buried with him into death, so that, in the manner that Christ rose from the dead, by the glory of the Father, so may we also walk in the newness of life.
5 For if we have been planted together, in the likeness of his death, so shall we also be, in the likeness of his resurrection.
6 For we know this: that our former selves have been crucified together with him, so that the body which is of sin may be destroyed, and moreover, so that we may no longer serve sin.
7 For he who has died has been justified from sin.
8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live together with Christ.
9 For we know that Christ, in rising up from the dead, can no longer die: death no longer has dominion over him.
10 For in as much as he died for sin, he died once. But in as much as he lives, he lives for God.
11 And so, you should consider yourselves to be certainly dead to sin, and to be living for God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
12 Therefore, let not sin reign in your mortal body, such that you would obey its desires.
13 Nor should you offer the parts of your body as instruments of iniquity for sin. Instead, offer yourselves to God, as if you were living after death, and offer the parts of your body as instruments of justice for God.
14 For sin should not have dominion over you. For you are not under the law, but under grace.
15 What is next? Should we sin because we are not under the law, but under grace? Let it not be so!
16 Do you not know to whom you are offering yourselves as servants under obedience? You are the servants of whomever you obey: whether of sin, unto death, or of obedience, unto justice.
17 But thanks be to God that, though you used to be the servants of sin, now you have been obedient from the heart to the very form of the doctrine into which you have been received.
18 And having been freed from sin, we have become servants of justice.
19 I am speaking in human terms because of the infirmity of your flesh. For just as you offered the parts of your body to serve impurity and iniquity, for the sake of iniquity, so also have you now yielded the parts of your body to serve justice, for the sake of sanctification.
20 For though you were once the servants of sin, you have become the children of justice.
21 But what fruit did you hold at that time, in those things about which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death.
22 Yet truly, having been freed now from sin, and having been made servants of God, you hold your fruit in sanctification, and truly its end is eternal life.
23 For the wages of sin is death. But the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
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Romans 6
6
When Death Becomes Life
1-3a So what do we do? Keep on sinning so God can keep on forgiving? I should hope not! If we’ve left the country where sin is sovereign, how can we still live in our old house there? Or didn’t you realize we packed up and left there for good? That is what happened in baptism. When we went under the water, we left the old country of sin behind; when we came up out of the water, we entered into the new country of grace—a new life in a new land!
3b-5 That’s what baptism into the life of Jesus means. When we are lowered into the water, it is like the burial of Jesus; when we are raised up out of the water, it is like the resurrection of Jesus. Each of us is raised into a light-filled world by our Father so that we can see where we’re going in our new grace-sovereign country.
6-11Could it be any clearer? Our old way of life was nailed to the cross with Christ, a decisive end to that sin-miserable life—no longer captive to sin’s demands! What we believe is this: If we get included in Christ’s sin-conquering death, we also get included in his life-saving resurrection. We know that when Jesus was raised from the dead it was a signal of the end of death-as-the-end. Never again will death have the last word. When Jesus died, he took sin down with him, but alive he brings God down to us. From now on, think of it this way: Sin speaks a dead language that means nothing to you; God speaks your mother tongue, and you hang on every word. You are dead to sin and alive to God. That’s what Jesus did.
12-14That means you must not give sin a vote in the way you conduct your lives. Don’t give it the time of day. Don’t even run little errands that are connected with that old way of life. Throw yourselves wholeheartedly and full-time—remember, you’ve been raised from the dead!—into God’s way of doing things. Sin can’t tell you how to live. After all, you’re not living under that old tyranny any longer. You’re living in the freedom of God.
What Is True Freedom?
15-18So, since we’re out from under the old tyranny, does that mean we can live any old way we want? Since we’re free in the freedom of God, can we do anything that comes to mind? Hardly. You know well enough from your own experience that there are some acts of so-called freedom that destroy freedom. Offer yourselves to sin, for instance, and it’s your last free act. But offer yourselves to the ways of God and the freedom never quits. All your lives you’ve let sin tell you what to do. But thank God you’ve started listening to a new master, one whose commands set you free to live openly in his freedom!
19I’m using this freedom language because it’s easy to picture. You can readily recall, can’t you, how at one time the more you did just what you felt like doing—not caring about others, not caring about God—the worse your life became and the less freedom you had? And how much different is it now as you live in God’s freedom, your lives healed and expansive in holiness?
20-21As long as you did what you felt like doing, ignoring God, you didn’t have to bother with right thinking or right living, or right anything for that matter. But do you call that a free life? What did you get out of it? Nothing you’re proud of now. Where did it get you? A dead end.
22-23But now that you’ve found you don’t have to listen to sin tell you what to do, and have discovered the delight of listening to God telling you, what a surprise! A whole, healed, put-together life right now, with more and more of life on the way! Work hard for sin your whole life and your pension is death. But God’s gift is real life, eternal life, delivered by Jesus, our Master.
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.