So also *ye*, reckon yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
Paul has just said that Christ died to sin once and now lives to God. Now he turns that fact on the believer with one command — so what does it ask of me, and how can I count myself dead to sin while sin still stirs inside me?
The ESV says "consider"; the writers quoted here use the older wording, "reckon." The command rests on facts already settled:
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.
The word "likewise" sets the believer's death to sin on the same footing as Christ's:
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.
It is an accounting word, not a report on my inner state:
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.
Turning this into a matter of experience leads to one of two bad ends:
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.
The verse has a negative side and a positive one, and neither stands alone:
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.
Where does the right to reckon come from? One writer answers with a picture:
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."
Reckoning is not the same as realising, and the command itself shows that sin has not left the believer:
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."
- Ground. Christ died to sin once and now lives to God. Your reckoning agrees with what God has already done in that death and resurrection.
- Gauge. "Reckon" is an accounting word — the estimate faith forms of my standing, not a report on how I feel.
- Guard. Treating this as experience ends in either the misery of failure or self-satisfaction.
- Grip. Hold both halves — dead to sin and alive to God — and hold them only "in Christ Jesus," where His death counts as mine.
- Goal. Sin still lives in the believer. That is exactly why God commands the reckoning — so sin does not reign.
Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body to obey its lusts.
Romans 6 has argued that the believer has died with Christ. Verse 12 turns that truth into a command. It raises a sharp question. If sin still needs forbidding, what has Christ's death changed?
The word that opens the verse ties it back to verse 11. Faith counts first; obedience follows.
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 command itself is evidence about the Christian's condition. You do not warn someone off a power that has already vanished.
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.
The precise wording carries the weight. Paul chose one verb and not another.
Not, let it not be, but Let it not reign: a very small result if we were actually and experimentally dead to it.
The command has three parts, and each needs defining.
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.
The description "mortal" is not a throwaway word either.
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).
Sin acts here like a king pressing for the throne.
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.
Refusing one ruler means serving another.
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.
Much religious effort aims at removing the sinful nature. Verse 12 asks for something else, and that saves the believer from a hopeless task.
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.
Sin regains the throne by one route only: our consent.
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.
- Reign, not reside. Sin still dwells in the believer; the command is that it must not rule. Dwelling and reigning are two different things.
- Reckon before you resist. The "therefore" points back. Faith counts itself dead with Christ first, and that counting gives the strength to obey.
- Dethroned, not destroyed. Christ's death has cancelled sin's title as master, so we owe it no allegiance.
- Refuse, don't uproot. Scripture never tells us to expel the sinful nature. We keep it in the place of death God has already assigned it.
- Consent is the only door. Sin reigns again only if we yield. Prayer, self-judgment and the Spirit's power keep the new Master on the throne.