Romans 6:1–23

The Apostle's statement at the end of Romans 5 — that "where sin increased, grace abounded all the more" — raises the subject of death to sin. That statement at once leads the mind ruled by the flesh to ask the foolish, if not wicked, question, "Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound?" The Apostle rejects this unholy suggestion completely. He will not allow that the believer — who is true to the position in which God has set the Christian — can continue living in sin.

Shall we take advantage of the abundance of grace, and by our self-indulgence make a fresh occasion for its display? The more we sin, the more grace will bestow. Those who talk or think in this way, whether intentionally or not, are liable to turn, as we read, "the grace of our God into sensuality" (Jude 4). And history shows that many gross evils have arisen in Christendom from such abuses of God's abounding grace.

They show that they have no idea how hateful sin is. They assume that punishment is the only thing to fear. So the moment the fear of punishment is gone, all restraint is gone.

As we enter this branch of the Gospel of God, we find that sin, not sins, is the subject before us. Fruitfulness for God, not peace of conscience, is an end in view. It is the sinful nature, and not the acts — what we are, our condition, not what we have done — that has now to be considered. So attention goes to the death of Christ, not to His blood. His blood is not named once throughout this section of the letter.

In chapter 6 he goes on to notice that some will say, "Oh, if Christ has done all, it does not matter what I do. If it is righteousness without works, then we may walk as we like." The answer is not "That ought not to be," but "That cannot be." For we are speaking of death: I have part in righteousness by death. If the thing is real, I cannot live in what I am dead to, and that makes it impossible. If I live, being dead in this way, it is by being alive to God, in Jesus Christ our Lord.

The question in Romans 6 is the usual objection of the flesh, that sovereign grace seems to allow living in sin. The apostle answers this, not by asserting the law as the Christian's rule as if we were Jews. He answers by declaring that in our very baptism we died with Christ to sin. Buried with Him, we now have to walk in newness of life. He argues, not from a motive, but from the blessed fact of Christ's death and resurrection, in which the baptised profess to have a part.

Here, then, is that principle of deliverance from sin so greatly ridiculed — deliverance from sin by death. Nor shall we find any other deliverance from sin in the word of God. For centuries, many sincere people sought deliverance by fasting and by shutting themselves away in monasteries. Many sincere people now seek it by trying to reach a false perfection of the flesh. But here is the full truth of God — deliverance from sin by death.

Grace took us up at the start — grace is going to glorify us at the end; but we are not yet glorified. What are we going to do in between, since we are the recipients of such grace? Continue in sin? "By no means!"

May we continue in sin, so that His grace may be displayed more richly? Away with such a thought. Here the apostle deals with the wicked charge. He answers it not because the thought is appalling in itself, nor because it slanders the character of God, as in Romans 3:8, but because it contradicts the first principles of Christianity. He does not use a motive drawn from our sense of our Saviour's love. He is not asking here how we could so wound His heart or grieve the Holy Spirit of God.

Later in the chapter the apostle will show how the believer is dead to sin. But at the start he assumes that the only possible attitude for the believer to take towards sin is that he is "dead to sin." So he asks, "How can we who died to sin still live in it?" His question does not suggest that we ought not to live in it. It says that, having died to sin, we cannot live in it. The principle behind his words is plain: we cannot die to something and live in it at the same time.

The matter stands like this. He died FOR our sins, making atonement for them. He died TO sin. Taught by the Spirit, we recognise that we are identified with our great Representative, and faith takes His death as ours. We too, then, are "dead to sin," and cannot go on living in it without contradicting ourselves.

The desired translation is the result of misunderstanding the whole passage. It makes it a motive drawn from a previous evil result and nothing more; whereas it is perfectly certain that the passage is about our dying when we become Christians, not our dying by our sins... the doctrine of the chapter is dying out of our old man and living in newness of life — not our dying by our sin so as to be afraid of living in it now.

Scripture points to death itself as the barrier to sin's activity... Note carefully what the verse says, for people often misunderstand it. They misquote it or misread it. Paul does not say that sin itself is dead. He does not imply that the evil nature has disappeared altogether. It is we ourselves who have died to sin. How then can we go on living in sin? It is a dangerous deceit to think that believers no longer have sin within them.

This settles the matter at once against the so-called perfectionists. Paul is not saying that any believer has the experience of being dead to sin. He is certainly speaking of all Christians, and this is not the universal experience... His words later on are, "consider yourselves dead to sin" (older translations read "reckon"), and that reckoning rests on this: Christ "died to sin, once for all." So it is a reckoning of faith, not an experience.

Here, then, is that principle of deliverance from sin which is so much ridiculed — deliverance from sin by death. We shall not find any other deliverance from sin in the word of God. For centuries many sincere souls sought deliverance by fasting. Many shut themselves away in monasteries. Many sincere souls now seek it by striving after a false perfection of the flesh. But here is the full truth of God — deliverance from sin by death.

A dead man is free, or justified, from sin. I cannot charge a dead man with the evil of his past life. Death has taken him right out of it altogether... Death is the starting point for practice. We are set free as dead to sin, and so the apostle says, "Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions."... I can say to sin now: I am no longer your slave. I belong to someone else. God has set me free from sin and given me a life to yield to Him.

The apostle answers from the starting point of every person who confesses Christ. Not only did He die for our sins, laying us under an infinite obligation, but we died to sin: how then shall we go on living in it? This is the meaning of our baptism. Are you ignorant of so plain a truth? It is not a special blessing that only a few Christians enjoy; it is the common property of all the baptized.

The Greek preposition means "to" or "unto" as often as "into." Which one it is depends on the context, or on the nature of the case. It is impossible to think that the Israelites in 1 Corinthians 10:2 were baptized into Moses; there the word must be "unto."… Baptism is the symbol of profession. Reality depends on faith, and faith might or might not be true of the person baptized… To say "into" therefore goes beyond God's word. It claims for the act a life-giving power that Scripture does not grant and does not allow… Not everyone has faith, and baptism will no more save an unbeliever than a dead faith will.

In the figure of baptism we were identified with the death of Christ. This was so that we might share, here and now, in the position His death gives us in relation to sin and the world. Baptism is a figure of death and burial. It is clear that a dead man has finished with the life of self-will he once lived. And a buried man has passed out of the sight of the world he once lived in.

They were baptized to a Christ who had died to sin, and we are buried with Him by baptism to death. John baptized to a living Messiah on earth; Christian baptism is to a Christ who has died and risen again. This is why the disciples of John in Acts 19 had to be baptized again in the name of the Lord Jesus. He had died and risen, and God had made Him Lord and Christ.

Now baptism is, in one word, dissociation. It is only an outward ordinance, yet it has a meaning, and that is its meaning. It is based on the death and resurrection of Christ, for we are baptized to His death, and so we are "buried with Him." Nothing cuts our links with the world, and separates us from the present order of things, more effectively than death and burial.

Every passage of Scripture that speaks of baptism sets out death, not life. Baptism marks a definite separation from the whole world-system. From now on we count its aims, its pleasures, its politics, its honours and rewards among the "things that lie behind." But are we really prepared for such a clean sweep as this? This is what our baptism means — but do we mean it? It is easy to boast about a correct mode, while in the heart refusing all that baptism stands for.

The one baptism is Christian baptism. It commits us to all that is bound up in the truth of Christ Jesus. It announces our identification with the death of our Lord Jesus Christ in all its bearings, and implies our obligation to walk in newness of life. The water we pass under is a picture of death. Understanding our identification with Christ dead and risen again teaches us that we are no longer free to be under sin's dominion, no longer available for sin's control. He — Christ — lives to God. Every pulse, every movement of His risen manhood is Godward, to accomplish God's will and pleasure.

Is this the conclusion to draw from the gospel of God? May we continue in sin, so that His grace may be displayed more richly? Away with such a thought. The apostle answers this wicked inference, not by showing how evil it is in itself, but by showing that it flatly contradicts Christianity in its first principles. He replies from the starting point of every believer in Christ. Christ did not merely die for our sins, laying us under an infinite obligation; we died to sin. How then shall we go on living in it? This is the meaning of our baptism. It is not some special blessing that only a few Christians have. It is the common property of all the baptized.

He rejects the thought outright and puts it away with another question: "How can we who died to sin still live in it?" Asking it as a question shows how unanswerable he thinks it is. And unanswerable it is, if the premise is taken rightly. If we are dead to sin, then we cannot live in it. That consequence cannot be denied.

Notice, then, that deliverance from sin is not the improvement of self, or of an evil nature — the flesh. Instead, "We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death." We are not baptised to the work of the Spirit in us. We are baptised to His death, who died for us and rose again. So the death that delivers from sin is not a death to sin that we reach by ourselves. It is the death of Christ on the cross, and our identification with it — "buried with him." And notice, there is no thought that baptism gives life. Baptism is to death, and life in the risen Christ is beyond it.

A buried man has died to the scene where he once lived. Now suppose a man goes to his own funeral by his own choice. This is exactly what happens to the believer, and he surely believes he will gain by it. What a loss the believer suffers when he leaves the inner meaning of his baptism out of his daily life!

In relation to God, every attribute of His has been perfectly glorified by the atoning death of our blessed Lord. So the resurrection is said to be "by the glory of the Father." It is as though that glory, which the Son had vindicated and displayed so perfectly, waited for the very first moment at the tomb on the first day of the week. It waited to call the perfect obedient One out from death.

Let us notice the closing words of verse 4, "newness of life," for they give a brief answer to the question the chapter opened with. Instead of continuing in sin, which is in effect continuing to live the old life, we are to walk in a life which is new.

This suggests to me that there is a realm where everything matches the glory of the Father. That is the realm Christ is in. He has been raised from among the dead by the glory of the Father... It suggests to me that if I am walking in newness of life, the goal before me is the glory of the Father.

He does not say we are risen with Him. That would in itself assume full redemption, with life, and a place and condition before God. Here it is practical — a new character of life. We are to walk in newness of life.

What then does baptism mean? It means identification with Christ in His death. It means that we are buried with Him, and that we are put under obligation to walk in newness of life, just as He was raised into a new order of things. This is its meaning and this the obligation it lays on us, and we lose much if we do not know it.

"Identified" seems a loose translation. The word means, as a note on it says, "grown together," and the Revised Version's "united," which most commentators follow, seems better. There is no "Him" in the original, but it is clearly implied. Read that way, the passage argues this: if what baptism stands for is real in the soul, and in it — "the likeness of His death" — they were truly united with Him and not united in profession only, then the result would show in the practical "likeness of His resurrection," that "walk in newness of life" he had spoken of just before.

Where the head of the race stands in relation to sin is where everyone under that head stands. Christ has died to sin. Christians, therefore, have died to it. So we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, and now wait for the likeness of His resurrection.

The fifth verse looks on to the future. For, as surely as Christ Himself is raised, we shall be raised in fact, and fully delivered then, even as to our bodies.

The likeness of His death is baptism itself, and being united to Him in His death is what baptism represents. So if what baptism represents is fulfilled in us, then we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection. This may well go on to full realization in physical resurrection, yet it is surely meant to have a present, practical application as well, in keeping with the whole drift of the thought here. "We shall be" has to be future only when we look at it from the point of union with Him in His death, and its force as an argument for the present is weakened if we limit it to the body.

He does not go into the truth taught in Ephesians, but we find here what exactly fits the subject he is treating. He does not speak of being made alive together with Christ, or of being raised up and seated in Him in the heavenly places. Instead he says, "If we are planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection."

It is not always easy to grasp the thought behind "our old man." One way to explain it is this: the Apostle is personifying all that we are as the natural children of Adam. Imagine a person whose character held every ugly feature ever shown by anyone in Adam's race. That person could be described as "our old man."

Between person and nature there is a real and important difference. If we take the inspired words as a perfect guide — and we should — then "the old man" is person, not nature. This matters, because responsibility belongs to the person and not to the nature. The person is the one who acts.

There is no thought here of this being a state that belongs to some Christians and not to others. It is the very truth of our Christian position. Knowing this, that our old man has been crucified. When? In our experience? That is not the thought here, but "has been crucified with him." Surely that was on the cross. Not only did He, in infinite love, bear our sins on the cross, but our old man was fully judged there too.

This verse says nothing about our feeling it. But when faith learns the fact from God, it shapes our moral life, and we know its blessed power.

To convince us of the hopeless character of this man, God has fully tested the "old man" under every possible test. He has been tried without law, under law, under priesthood, under royalty, and finally by the presence of Christ in grace. Under every test man has broken down. This proves that the old man is completely evil, and that all hope of improving or reforming the "old man" is useless... Sins can be forgiven. But there can be no forgiveness for an evil nature. It can only be condemned and ended.

There are many forms of death. Crucifixion carries shame and disgrace, and under the law of Moses, a curse. The "old man," because of its evil tendencies, was worthy — in the language of the text — not only of death but of the death of the cross. Man's injustice and malice assigned the Son of Man to death by crucifixion. But it was the justice and grace of God that sentenced our "old man" to be crucified with Christ.

The "body of sin" is the whole of sin in its dominating energy. But "our old man is crucified with Him" (Christ) "that the body of sin" (that dominating energy) "might be annulled." "Destroyed" is a wholly incorrect translation. The end in view is "that we should not serve sin."

We tend to link sin with some particular failing we are prone to — the one where sin's rule over us is felt most. We might be quite content to be free from sin's rule in that one form. But God would have us free from sin's rule as a whole, not just in part... Sin, indeed, still exists, but can have no power over a corpse.

Sin is a master, a slave-owner, and we had fallen under its power. The point discussed in the chapter is not the presence of sin in us but the power of sin over us. We have got our discharge from sin.

So we have this rather abstract statement: "For he that has died is justified from sin" (New Translation). That is the real meaning of the word "freed".

Take note of the closing words of verse 6. They show us clearly how this chapter views sin. Sin is a master, a slave-owner, and we had fallen under its power. The point discussed in the chapter is not the presence of sin in us but the power of sin over us. We have got our discharge from sin. We are justified from it, as verse 7 states.

We have seen how God justifies His people from their sins by the blood of Jesus. Now we see how He justifies them from sin, the root, or nature. "For he that is dead is justified from sin" (margin). Sins are forgiven, and now sin cannot be charged to him who is dead; he is justified from sin.

Indeed we have a full salvation not only from sins but from sin, justified from the bad fruit (Rom. 5:1), justified from the bad tree (Rom. 6:7).

God counts us as having died with Christ, and that death has won us complete freedom from slavery to sin. The picture of death settles the matter, and it should silence every doubt about our deliverance. All a person's obligations stop binding him at his death. A purchased slave dies, and his owner can demand no more service from him. Death frees the slave from bondage.

Up to now Paul has said "we" and "our", and in verse 8 he returns to "we". But verse 7 says "he". That shows he is making a general statement. A dead man's condition is a complete answer to any charge of sin brought against him after his death. So let Christians who have died to sin live and walk as freed from its bondage. The justification here comes from the person's state — he is dead. So do not confuse it with the justification of ungodly people, which has such a prominent place in the Gospel of God. His state as dead blocks every charge of sin after his death. Of course, it says nothing about how he lived before he died. This justification is true of everyone who has died. The justification of Romans 3 is true only of believers.

Anyone who has done with sin must be dead to it. When a man is dead you cannot charge him with anything; his life has ceased to exist, he is out of the scene. You may say, "How can I be free from sin when I still find it in me?" The thing sin was attached to is gone. We are not told to die, for we are dead... You may ask, "How can that be, when I find I am not dead?" The answer is that you died in Christ. Christ took your place... The freedom we have is holy freedom from sin, not freedom to sin.

How can I realise that I am dead to sin? All my own experience, my own feelings, my own inner sense of myself seem to contradict this truth flatly. I cannot realise that I am dead; but God tells me I am... If I were sinless, if I had no sin in me, I should never be told to reckon myself dead to sin.

Having "died with Christ" is true only of real believers. It is not true of people who have only been baptized into His death and so are identified with Him on the outside. It is the reality of identification with Christ in His death, as also in verse 5. The argument moves from the form to the reality of being identified with His death. From there it moves to being identified with Him in His lasting life in resurrection. If our identification with His death is real — if we have indeed died with Him — faith gives us the assurance that we shall live with Him. It is faith about the future, certainly, but a principle of faith to be put into practice now.

He argues that "the one who has died has been justified from sin" — so the Greek [the ESV reads "set free from sin"] — and that "if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him." So he is speaking of atonement and what it does for us, not of any work in us... Our dying with Christ is not something accomplished by the energy of our own wills — even of our renewed wills... no one can pretend that Scripture anywhere tells us to die with Christ.

Death for the believer is the way into life. So, from speaking of death, the Apostle now passes on to speak of life... Looking into the future the Apostle sets before us the full and glorious result of having died with Christ... Who can grasp the blessedness that lies behind these words, "live with Him"? We know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that He became poor and lived with us, full of grace and truth. That, however, was only a means to an end; the glorious end being that we should live with Him.

Verse 8 repeats the conclusion as to the future which follows from the death and resurrection of Christ... Our condition when we are risen is once more looked forward to and set out.

In Romans the believer is dead with Christ to sin, dead to the law, but not risen. Romans 6 does not go so far as being risen with Christ... The nearest approach to it is the statement of Romans 6:8... and this verse leads us on towards Colossians. It presents this as a result of the doctrine unfolded there, forming the link with that letter.

Verses 8-10 make one thing very clear. The Spirit of God sets aside the natural ideas and guesses of the mind. In their place He gives the view from outside ourselves: what Christ has been and is — both His past sufferings and His eternal condition as the now re-established heir of liberty in resurrection. "We believe that we shall live with Him, knowing that He dies no more," and so on. The whole ground of confidence moves from self to Christ.

These two things are worth weighing. Resurrection and living with Him are both in view, and both look on to the future. What would be the use of giving up life in this world and walking in this path? None, if we did not know that the newness of life we have now really belongs to another sphere — the sphere we are going into at the appearing of Christ.

We know that our old self has been crucified with Christ only because we are taught it, as a truth outside us. Many would like to make this a matter of inner experience, but it is not. That would flatter the flesh in its religious moods and longings, instead of honouring the grace of God in the death of Christ. On the other hand, we have an inward, conscious knowledge that Christ, being raised, will never die again: death no longer has dominion over Him. This is not just an outward fact we are told. We feel in our soul that it is so, and must be so. Sin never had dominion over Him, but death did — so that God would be glorified, sin judged, Satan's power destroyed, and we set free.

So death had no dominion over Him except as He submitted to it. Having done so, He is finished with that responsible order of life which death applied to — the order that sin attached to in you and me. The Father raised Him from the dead by His glory, and He has left forever the condition that death's dominion belonged to — a condition He had once entered by His own choice.

The resurrection of God's people will match their Lord's in character. Lazarus died again — otherwise he would be on earth today. But Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over Him (Rom. 6:9). And Scripture says of God's people: "those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage, for they cannot die anymore" (Luke 20:35-36).

He came about sin, to take our place as sinners, and He died to sin. He died out of grace toward us, and He died with sin in view. He did it once, when, for our sakes, He needed to do it — and He did it once for all. It was a work He had to do about sin, and He has done it. He has nothing more to do with sin. He will judge sinners, no doubt, but He is finished with sin, finished with being occupied with it, once and for ever. Up to the cross He, the sinless One, had to deal with sin. On the cross sin was the whole question, though it was for the glory of God that He was made sin. But now He has done with it once and for ever.

"Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him." The life that has now begun is bound up with His life and depends on it, just as the death we have been considering is bound up with His death. So that life is changeless, eternal, beyond the power of death.

He no longer lives under sin's dominion. In grace He once came under it, but by dying and rising again He now lives in eternal deliverance from sin's power. As people who are under grace — as being in Him — we are in the same sphere of life He is in, where sin cannot enter. It is not simply that we have life in Him; we live with Him. And living with Him means living in practical deliverance from sin's dominion.

Once we know this, the reckoning commanded in verse 11 becomes perfectly plain to us. Our case is governed by Christ's, for we are identified with Him. Did He die to sin? Then we are dead to sin, and so we reckon it. Does He now live to God? Then we now live to God, and so we reckon it. Our reckoning is not make-believe. We are dead to sin and alive to God by His own acts, accomplished in the death and resurrection of Christ.

Now notice what follows. Everyone believes verse 10 is true of the blessed Lord. Nobody believes that He died to the love or the practice of sin, but to sin itself. But what does verse 11 say? "Likewise reckon" — that is, account. "Likewise" means "in the same way." It plainly means that the believer is to reckon himself dead to sin and alive to God in the same sense that Christ is.

I would not have to reckon if I were really dead, and the context makes that clear. "Reckon" is the estimate I form by faith of my condition and standing. It is the estimate of my faith, not a statement about the state I am in. The same is true of "alive": the statement here is not that I have life, but that I account myself so.

We reckon this so, we do not feel it to be so. It is an entire mistake to imagine that this being dead to sin is a feeling or an experience. That mistake carries serious consequences. We cannot feel Christ's death on the cross, and it was there He died to sin, and we because He died. If it were experience, it would have to be a perfect one — never an evil thought, feeling, or desire in the heart. And that would be true of all Christians always, not just the more advanced. This is contrary to everyone's experience. Trying to produce such a condition in oneself ends in the misery of utter failure, or, worse still, in self-satisfaction.

In the same way we are responsible to reckon for ourselves. As to sin — dead TO IT; as to God — alive IN CHRIST JESUS. It is not that sin is dead; it is that we reckon that in Christ's death we have died to it. It is not that we already have our resurrection bodies; it is that we reckon that in Christ Jesus we are alive to God.

An illustration may help. Suppose you had committed murder. Someone else was accepted as your substitute and hanged instead of you. The person who took your place would certainly be dead indeed to sin. And would you not clearly be entitled to take the same position? So it is with the believer. Christ has died on our behalf. The value of His death is all for us. Our connection with it is of the most vital kind. It is in Him that we can reckon ourselves "dead indeed to sin."

Note carefully the force of the apostle's word, "reckon." How very different it is from our word "realise"! We can realise natural or physical facts. But with a spiritual truth, it is not a question of realising but of reckoning. How can I realise that I am dead to sin? All my experience, my feelings and my inner sense of myself seem to contradict the truth flatly. I cannot realise that I am dead; but God tells me I am... If I were sinless, if I had no sin in me, I would never be told to reckon myself dead to sin. I would never need to hear the words, "Let not sin reign in your mortal body."

Our responsibility is bound up with what Christ has already accomplished... It is to "reckon" ourselves dead to sin. We must meet every evil suggestion, craving and impulse that rises within us by remembering that we have died with Christ. This act of faith is the secret of strength to overcome. Only in this way can believers obey the apostle's command: "Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body."

The flesh exists in the believer and will be there to the end... In Romans 6 we read, "Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body." Such an instruction would be pointless if the flesh were not in the believer... There is a great difference between dwelling and reigning. It dwells in a believer, but it reigns in an unbeliever.

Not, let it not be, but Let it not reign: a very small result if we were actually and experimentally dead to it.

Verse 12 has three things in view: the evil principle of sin, or self-will, the mortal body, and the lusts of the body. Sin is the determination to do one's own will by satisfying lust. The body is the instrument for satisfying the lust. We are still in these mortal bodies, and the principle of sin is still in us. But if we reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Jesus Christ, our mortal bodies will in practice be free from the rule of sin.

Paul calls the body our "mortal body," or body of death, because it is in our present body that sin seeks to reign to death (see Rom. 5:21).

The truth is then, not that sin is dead. Christ's death and resurrection entitle us to regard ourselves, in the reckoning of faith, as dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus... Sin is spoken of here as a person, as it sometimes is elsewhere, seeking the upper hand in our mortal body so as to subject us to its lusts. But through Christ it has no claim over us... As dead to sin we owe it no allegiance whatever.

The truth behind this command is that by nature the evil principle inside us rules us completely. Selfish pursuits and pleasures carry away the whole person. The gospel delivers us from this slavery and brings us under a new Master, even Jesus the Lord.

I cannot rid myself of the enemy. But God has judged it, and I have only to act on that judgment. I must keep it in the place of death where He has already put it. So we are not told to expel sin, to root it out, to cast it away from us, as moralists, and even clergy who do not know the Scriptures, sometimes urge us to do. We are told not to let it reign. That is, we must keep it under, in the place and under the sentence of death already passed on it... Indwelling sin is strong and active, yet He who tells us to reckon ourselves dead to it has supplied the power to obey. The Spirit of God is our strength in this warfare, the all-sufficient power He gives so that we can keep sin from reigning in our mortal body.

While sin is in our mortal body, it has no more right to reign there. However it will reign, if we yield to the desires of the old nature... Whenever temptation comes, the believer must take refuge in prayer, self-judgment and self-surrender. He must present his members afresh as instruments of righteousness to God... Therefore sin shall not have dominion over a believer because he is under grace. But we must take hold of this promise by faith.

"Free" has a double sense in English. People say, "that horse is free from vice," meaning he has none at all. But suppose a man had been a slave and he is now free: we are "free from sin" in that sense. He does not say to a person who has never turned to God, "Give yourself to God." He says, "Present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life." You have died in Christ. As those alive from the dead, what are you going to do with yourselves? Give yourselves to God, completely... God comes in. Grace cleanses us from guilt, then He says: "Now you are set free, and you have the privilege and title of giving yourselves."

The first occurrence of "yield" means, in the form of the word, the habit of yielding; the second, by its form, implies the surrender already made. This is not a gradual improvement of the nature or the will, as people speak of it. It is giving ourselves up to God in one complete act, as those alive from among the dead, and giving our members to God as instruments of righteousness.

In Romans 6:13 the Apostle had indicated that the way of deliverance from the service of sin was to yield ourselves to God, and our members as instruments of righteousness to God. We were to have the thing done, definitely and for ever, as a settled thing... Once each of us held his body as the vehicle in which his own will would be expressed. Once we each said in effect, "I am the captain of my body and it shall serve my pleasures."

Notice that in giving ourselves to God, it is not only the details of conduct that are mentioned, and not only our members. The order is first, "present yourselves to God," and afterwards "your members." What rich and profitable teaching this is!... It is one thing to try to make my conduct fit God's desires. It is another to give myself to Him. But once I have given myself fully and held nothing back, let my members become steady "instruments for righteousness."

This yielding is a very practical thing, as verse 13 makes plain. It affects all the members of our bodies. In the past, sin enlisted every member in its service, so each one became an instrument of unrighteousness. Is it not a wonderful thing that every member may now serve God? Our feet may run His errands. Our hands may do His work. Our tongues may speak His praise.

The Christian is called to put these members of the flesh to death... The members of which the Apostle speaks in that passage can hardly refer to the members of the body. Far from putting the parts of our bodies to death, Romans 6 tells us to give our members to God as instruments. The members here seem to be all the sinful things through which the flesh expresses itself, just as the actual parts of the body are the instruments it uses for its own service.

But note this well. The source of practical power — and that is the real question — is grace: "sin will have no dominion over you, SINCE you are not under law but under grace." If God and sin are in question, God is without doubt the strongest!

The very first page of the New Testament tells us there is something more than the forgiveness of our sins. It says, "You shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins." He saves not only from the penalty of our sins, but from our sins themselves. "Sin shall not have dominion over you." Literally this is, "Sin shall not lord it over you."

We speak of the power of sin, not of its presence. Let the reader carefully note this. On the question of sin, there is a real difference between a Christian now and a Christian in the life to come. Now he is set free only from the power of sin. Later he will be free from its presence. In his present condition sin lives in him, but it is not to reign. One day it will not even live in him. The reign of sin is over and gone. The reign of grace has begun.

There may be sudden temptation — yes, failure — but sin shall not have dominion — it shall not reign. But why shall sin not reign? "For you are not under law but under grace." … The more the free favour of God in Christ Jesus is known and enjoyed, the greater our deliverance from the slavery of sin, and the more we can live a holy life.

Being under law leaves me under the dominion of sin. What we want is a free life, free from bondage to sin; for he who commits sin, says the Lord, is the slave of sin. Law gives no life, no freedom, no strength, and not even an object to turn our hearts elsewhere. It rightly forbids sins, as it must, but it gives no life and no power. But under grace we have power. Life is given, strength is given, and an object is given; none of which, as we have seen, law gives. So, under grace, sin has no dominion over me. Under law it does.

"Under law" simply means a position where law has authority. Israel was in that position from Mount Sinai until the cross of Christ. "Under grace" means a position where grace rules. The contrast is drawn clearly and completely. The two things cannot be mixed. "Under grace" is our position, and it comes from the blessed cross of Christ. "Under law" was a position that supposed no cross and no salvation from bondage.

Sin, then, is not to have dominion over us, for the very reason that we are not under law but under grace. Some say that if we tell people they are no longer under the rule of law, they are sure to plunge into sin. Here is God's answer to them. The fact is that nothing so subdues the heart and promotes holiness as the grace of God.

In Christianity grace not only saves but teaches, and what an effective teacher it is! It does not fill our heads with cold rules and regulations. Instead it brings our hearts under the subduing influence of the love of God. We learn what pleases Him, as shown to us in Jesus. And because we have the Spirit, we begin to live the sober, righteous, and godly life.

Two questions in this chapter are worth noticing, for people often confuse the second with the first. The first is in verse 1: "Are we to continue in sin?" The second is in verse 15: "Are we to sin?" The first asks about the moral sphere a person lives in, and so the chapter contrasts being "in sin" with being "in Christ Jesus." The second asks about acts or practice, and so it contrasts yielding yourself to serve sin with becoming servants to God. These are two deeply important lines of thought: the first developed in verses 1-14, the last in verses 15-23.

This further truth of practical righteousness comes in with the question, "Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace?" Here the Apostle answers in advance the reasoning of the flesh. The flesh is always ready to abuse the goodness of God and pervert the word of God. If God says, "You are not under law but under grace", the flesh says, Then we are set free to do what we like.

Sin, then, is not to have dominion over us, for the very reason that we are not under the law but under grace. Some tell us that if we tell people they are no longer under the rule of law, they are sure to plunge into sin. Here is the divine answer to them. The fact is that nothing so subdues the heart and promotes holiness as the grace of God.

The law is the strength of sin; for by its restraint and prohibition it can only provoke the flesh. It never gives power for holiness, any more than it gives life. Grace, not law, gives life, saves, and strengthens. If believers could be under law, sin must have dominion over them.

He proves that the question shows entire ignorance of the terrible result of yielding to sin. "Do you not know", says the Apostle, "that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey?" Yield to sin and we become the slaves of sin. Every fresh act of sin forges another link in the chain that holds us in bondage. This is an intensely solemn thought, whether for a sinner living in sin or for a saint who turns aside to trifle with sin.

But grace uses this liberty to make us all the more His slaves, free from sin to serve the Lord Christ… The Christian's righteousness is never doing things because they are right — that is pride, independence, or making a god of self. We do them because they are God's will for us. We must obey to have practical righteousness.

No doubt, dear young believer, many will tell you that such teaching will lead you to sin as your old nature likes… Those who talk like that have never known what the grace of God is. They have never known what true liberty is — not liberty to sin, but liberty from sin… God has given you a new life, and that His free gift. He has now placed you in His own unchanging, boundless grace.

He appeals to that practical knowledge which is common to us all. We all know that if we obey anyone, we are their servant in practice, even if no one calls us their servant. That is the case also in spiritual things, whether it be serving sin or God. Judged by this standard, we were without question once the slaves of sin.

Any creature is wise to admit openly that he is under authority. Even the most rebellious, degraded wretch in the world is under authority. So is the most proud, respectable, reputable member of society, however independent and self-sufficient he thinks he is. Their natural characters may be very different. Yet both are without Christ, and both have yielded themselves to the authority of sin. A man may hate the word "yield." But it is in his very nature to yield. No creature can do anything else. If he does not yield to God, he is plainly yielding to sin.

Man is not enough for himself. He is only a creature, and so he must depend on God. If he seeks to be his own master, if he claims to be independent, he only falls further under Satan. Instead of obeying God, he becomes the slave of sin.

In this life people buy and sell slaves, and the slave gets no voice in the matter. The slavery spoken of here is not like that, whether it is slavery to sin or to righteousness… Men are sinners by birth through Adam's disobedience. They become slaves of sin by yielding to it. This declares and upholds man's responsibility. He is not responsible for being a sinner, or for having an evil nature. He is responsible for giving in to what that nature demands… He was born a sinner, a child of wrath by nature. He was not born the bondslave of sin. He became that by the exercise of his will — yielding himself to it.

Death was the natural and appointed wages of sin, and it came as the judgment of God. We could not say obedience leads to life. If we obey, we are already alive to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. But obedience bears the fruit of practical righteousness. And notice the character of what stands against sin here. It is not righteousness in itself — doing right as conscience or law knows it — but obedience. We are alive to God, and that is, and must always be, obedience. We cannot live to God in any other way than in obedience. So Christ lived. He was the obedient Man — He came to do God's will.

Grace uses this freedom to make him all the more Christ's slave, free from sin to serve the Lord Christ. It was exactly what He did here on earth, always the true and perfect servant… The Christian's righteousness is never doing things because they are right. That is pride, independence, or making a god of self. We do them because they are God's will for us. We must obey to have practical righteousness.

God has called us to freedom, and He equips us with power. That makes the service of sin now deeply solemn. On man's part it is clearly the choice of evil. It is man's will rejecting the grace of God.

Take note of the closing words of verse 6. They show us plainly how this chapter looks at sin. Sin is a master, a slave-owner, and we had fallen under its power. The chapter is not discussing the presence of sin in us but the power of sin over us. We have got our discharge from sin.

We know from God's word and bitter experience that as believers we are still able to sin. But Christian liberty means we no longer have to sin. This is a great liberty.

"Being now made free from sin." (Rom. 6:18, 22.) The apostle tells his readers that he speaks to them "after the manner of men, because of the weakness of their flesh." He uses the term "made free" in contrast to a state of slavery. To mark that contrast, he adds that they have become servants to God. It is a simple picture of slaves and freed slaves, and the apostle uses it to make himself better understood. Moreover, the condition spoken of is that of all Christians, without exception.

Yes, this is how you changed masters: through death, from sin to righteousness. And all this in perfect grace. Once you were under sin and free from righteousness. Now you are servants of righteousness and free from the slavery of sin. Yes, this chapter looks at sin and righteousness as two masters. The Christian is perfectly free from the old tyrant.

So every Christian is made free from sin: "Being then made free from sin, you became the servants of righteousness." (Ver. 18.) It does not say, You became the servants of righteousness, and then you were made free from sin. There can be no true fruit to holiness until we are made free from sin.

Man is not enough on his own. He is only a creature, and so he must depend on God. If he seeks to be his own master, if he chases independence, he only falls more completely under Satan. Instead of obeying God, he becomes the slave of sin. Redemption sets the believer free from this slavery. But it frees him only to bind him with all his heart to do as the Christian form of teaching instructs us — all the more because he is under grace, not law.

A Christian's righteousness is never doing things because they are right. That is pride, independence, or making a god of self. It is doing them because they are God's will for us. We must obey to reach practical righteousness.

Verse 18 deals with actual fact: verse 19 with practical character. This is easy to see, above all in the New Translation, which puts verse 18 more strongly: "Now, having got your freedom from sin, you have become bondmen to righteousness." Verse 19, by contrast, urges us to "now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness."

The words "slaves to righteousness" might be taken to mean a harsh yoke, with all freedom lost. So the Apostle is careful to explain that he is only speaking in human terms. Serving righteousness is not miserable slavery. It is happy freedom. But our flesh is weak, and that makes the truth hard for us to grasp. So he uses the words "slaves to righteousness" to set the happy result of living under practical righteousness against the terrible bondage sin holds over its slaves.

He says "made free" in contrast to slavery. To mark that contrast he adds that they had become servants to God (Romans 6:22). It is a simple comparison between a slave and a freed man, used to make the matter easier to understand. And please notice that this is not the condition of a perfect Christian only. It is the condition of all Christians without exception.

Their old condition showed its corruption and self-will more and more. Evil ripens and grows worse and worse. Willing service leads not only to a right sense of our place before God and other people, but to an ever deeper sense of being set apart for God.

Romans 6:19 lays down this principle of practice. A wicked person who practises lawlessness becomes more wicked — "lawlessness leading to more lawlessness". In the same way, he says, a good man who practises righteousness arrives at holiness. Everyone knows how this works. Knowing the theory of music does not by itself make a person a brilliant pianist. Only constant, long practice brings the touch of a master that no one can mistake... So just as a man becomes an expert in wickedness by practice, a man is adorned with every Christian virtue in the same way. For the simple reason, as someone has said, "our acts re-act upon ourselves."

To give the parts of our body to sin is to become the slaves of impurity in practice. It builds a character of lawlessness that grows into more lawlessness... But if we give those same parts to the service of practical righteousness, it will build a character and condition of holiness. Here, for the first time since the opening verses of the letter, the Apostle speaks of holiness... Righteousness has more to do with right acts toward other people. Holiness has to do with the new nature, and so with what is inside... We not only practise righteousness; we also hate what is unrighteous.

Holiness, or sanctification, is the end in view, and righteousness is the means to it.

All this assumes that the old master, sin, is still inside us, only waiting for a chance to assert itself. That makes the triumph of grace all the greater... We learn how to give the parts of our body as servants to righteousness, and so to holiness, even while sin lurks inside, eager to take control again. In serving righteousness we serve God, because doing the will of God is the first element of righteousness. And righteousness in all our dealings leads to holiness of life and character.

There seems to be a grave but cutting irony in this reference to their old condition. The only freedom they knew was freedom in regard to righteousness. They were slaves of sin and had nothing to do with righteousness. And what was the result? Nothing to boast of, certainly. There was so much to fill them with shame! And what is the end of those things? Death.

By nature man is a servant of sin. And as a servant of sin he is "free from righteousness" — terrible freedom to be "free from righteousness"! That is what the Apostle says the Romans were before their deliverance. They were not servants of righteousness, but servants of sin. No one can serve sin and righteousness at the same time. They needed deliverance from the power of sin.

"For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness." We recognised no claims of righteousness over us while in sin's bondage. Now, as servants of righteousness, we must refuse sin's claims just as completely.

He reminds them of their past: they were the servants, or slaves, of sin. They were not under the rule of righteousness. Righteousness is the will of God, and it was not ruling them. Sin was ruling them. Some say, "Oh, I do not think that I am. I will admit it in the case of the drunkard, but not me." There are plenty of things other than drink that enslave people. We can see it in the case of alcohol. But when it is a case of our manner and our temper, anger, words, lusts and passions, these are not so public. It is not so clear, but it is there all the same. We are all naturally enslaved by sin.

In Romans 6:20 there is an "end" but no fruits. The end is death.

When they were the servants of sin, they followed their own wills. They gave no thought to the claims of righteousness. Such a course produced no lasting and pleasant fruit, but only shame and, in the end, death. They wasted their lives and their bodies in self-will. It covered them with shame and ended in death.

The apostle has spoken of a change of masters. He will now contrast the result of serving the one with the result of serving the other. When the saints in Rome were the servants of sin they were free from righteousness. Such a service could not produce holiness… So this checks the tendency to treat grace as a licence. It silences any pleading for such practices, and leaves its advocates no ground to stand on. It is irrational, and thoroughly anti-Christian. Continuing in sin denies the Christian's condition, and undermines Christian profession.

Here then we stand on the ground of motives which test the heart. At the beginning of the chapter the ground was a great fact about the Christian: he has a part with Christ in His death, and so is dead to sin and lives to God. Here it is no longer that. It is an appeal to his appreciation of the grace of God which has freed him from his slavery to sin. So what use is he going to make of his freedom?

There seems to be a serious but cutting irony in this reference to their old condition. The only freedom they knew was freedom in respect to righteousness. They were slaves of sin and had nothing to do with righteousness. And what was the result? Certainly nothing to boast of — and how much there was to fill them with shame! And what is the end of those things? Death.

When they were the servants of sin, they followed their own wills without any thought of the claims of righteousness. Such a course produced no lasting and pleasant fruit. It was a fruitless wasting of their lives, and of the parts of their bodies, in self-will that covered them with shame and ended in death.

When I was in that old bondage, my behaviour was just as shameful. And then I had no thought of "fruit" for God, let alone bringing it forth. Now my former conduct can only make me ashamed. Christ has redeemed us by His precious blood. Let all who belong to Him learn to be more ashamed of that past part of their lives. In those days they walked in step with this world, with little sense of God's claims upon them. "The end of those things is death": the only direction they lead is toward death.

But now they were ashamed of the former fruitless works. Let us observe how wide the language is in this chapter. There is no specification. The contrast lies between nature and grace — God's glory and man's will. Anything that did not make for holiness was fruitless, even if it was not evil in itself. Such things did not fit the liberty of an obedient servant of God. A spiritual man judges himself. When he remembers hours wasted on trivial pursuits, shame brings a blush to his face — even though what he was doing might look quite harmless to other people.

What fruit did they have then in the things they were now ashamed of? It was a fruitless wasting of the parts of their bodies in lawlessness, and the end was death. But now we are free from sin — free in the sense of being out of bondage, no longer sin's slaves. We have become slaves to God, entirely given up to serve Him, and we have our fruit unto holiness. The end is everlasting life. Along the way we also grow in the knowledge of God, in likeness to Him, and in separation of heart to Him from all evil, according to what He is.

So the idea that a Christian may keep on sinning is checked. Any pleading for such practices is silenced, and those who argue for them have no ground to stand on. It is irrational, and thoroughly anti-Christian. Going on in sin denies what a Christian is, and it undermines any Christian profession. Allowing sin at all does not fit the change of masters that all saints in Christ claim to be under.

"Free from sin" does not mean free from the old nature, as many teach. It means free from the ruling power of the sin that still lives inside. Then comes the contrast: the old state in sin, and the place of deliverance grace has brought the believer into. In the former life, as unsaved slaves of sin, there was an awful fruit, and the end of it is death. But now they are servants of God, freed from sin's awful slavery. Their fruit is different: the fruit of holiness, and the end is eternal life.

Independence is not possible for a creature. He is a servant of good or of evil. But his natural condition was that of bondage to sin. Grace, then, has delivered him from that. He has gone out from the house of bondage; but it is to meet and to serve the God of his salvation. Redemption has made him His.

Christ sets free the soul that was once the slave of sin. He calls it to stand fast in His liberty and never wear a yoke of bondage again. For there is no middle ground or other alternative. But grace uses this liberty to be so much the more His bondman, free from sin to serve the Lord Christ.

But now we are free from sin — his great theme, as we have seen. Free here means out of bondage, no longer sin's slaves; that alone is the sense of the words here. We have become slaves to God, entirely given up to serve Him, and we have our fruit to holiness. The end is everlasting life. But along the way there is growing in the knowledge of God, and likeness to Him, and separation of heart to Him from all evil, according to what He is.

This checks the drift toward lawlessness. It silences any argument for such practices, and shows their advocates have no ground to stand on. It is irrational, and thoroughly anti-Christian. Continuing in sin is a denial of Christian standing, and destroys Christian profession. Allowing sin at all clashes with the change of masters that all saints in Christ claim as their own.

Everlasting life is here viewed as the end of the wonderful story. In the writings of the Apostle John we find it presented as a present possession of the believer. There is no conflict between these two views of it. What is ours now in its essence will be ours in its full extent when eternity is reached.

For Paul the end is everlasting life; for John, "Whoever has the Son has life." I do not mean a difference in doctrine, for there is none, but a difference of aspect and grasp in the Word — one is intrinsic life, the other is condition in result before God.

But someone may ask: is man, in his natural condition, a slave of sin? Can he never practise righteousness? Must he always obey this terrible master? This master pays death as wages for all the service his poor, degraded servants give him. Yes. Unless a power greater than his own sets him free, he must serve that merciless tyrant as long as he is in this world. That master's only payment brings him to the grave in disgrace.

"The wages of sin is death," a solemn sentence which Adam and countless others have proved in their own bodies. Death is the wages of sin, not the debt of nature. God did not make man to die, but by sin man forfeited his life.

Note carefully how the phrase is built. The Holy Spirit avoids saying that the wages of sin stop at death. Judgment remains, and God appoints it to man just as He appoints death. Together they are the full wages of sin. It would not be safe to say that even eternal life is the whole of God's free gift. As we shall find in Romans 8, and in many other Scriptures, He gives the Holy Spirit to be the believer's portion. Add to that the relationship of a son, and the inheritance that goes with it.

What a contrast between "wages" and "gift" — wages earned: death, the judgment of God in all its terror. Gift — what can you do with a gift? You cannot buy a gift — then it would be a sale. You cannot earn a gift, or it would be your due. All you can do with a gift is receive it and thank the giver. Sin has forfeited our natural life. But eternal life is God's gift. It cost the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Where was His truth, which had pronounced death on the offender? Where was His majesty, which had been trampled underfoot? Sin called the whole character of God into question. The Lord offers Himself for His Father's glory, according to the counsels of God. His truth is made good. The wages of sin is death. The cross is absolute proof of it. It was the wages of sin paid by the Son of God Himself. No one escaped except through His dying for them — and He was the Son of God.

This is not just life from another source. It is life of a completely new character and quality. It is not the old failed life restored, but a far higher life — a divine life. Only one life is eternal. The words "in Christ Jesus our Lord" show that its source is a divine Person who has now become man. The wording is "in," not "through," as the older translation has it. And it is "Christ Jesus," not "Jesus Christ." Such differences may look small, but in Scripture they always carry meaning.

The end is everlasting life, received in its full result in glory, as it is in God's purpose. But that is the gift of God. The path to it is the path of obedience and holiness, but the thing itself is the gift of God. Death we have earned — it is the wages of sin; but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. It is not merely that eternal life is the gift of God, but that the gift of God is nothing less than eternal life.