Studying His Word and His Works

Listen to the study here: Romans 6:12-23

Read here: Romans 6

Review

• Calvin on the theme of Romans: “Man’s only righteousness is the mercy of God in Christ, when it is offered by the Gospel and received by faith.” Romans 1:17 and elsewhere.
• IMPORTANT: Who did Paul write this letter to? To the saints (1:7). Evangelist Shane Pruitt: “We don’t pray to saints[like Catholics do], we are the saints.” Main thing though is this letter is written to believers, which is a reminder we need to preach the gospel to ourselves daily. We need to remember this gospel, because the world wants us to forget it.
• Luther: Simul iustus et peccator = At the same time, righteous and a sinner! Romans 3:23-25
• In Ch. 1-3 Paul shows us our unrighteousness, and God’s wrath against that, and then switches to Christ’s righteousness as our covering, the propitiation of our sins (Romans 3:25) as the final sacrifice for sin, fulfilling the promise to Abraham, who had faith before any works
• Faith being “counted” or “credited to our account” as righteousness is mentioned 11 times in Chapter 4! If “none are righteous” as Paul wrote in Romans 3:10, then this saving faith must be a gift from God.
• Ch. 5, We now have peace with God, access to God, and hope, because of what Christ did for us while we were weak(v. 6), sinners (v. 8), and enemies (v. 10). Christ did this “at the right time,” (v. 6), connecting Christ’s work on the cross and God’s plan of redemption to real history (not just a myth or legend).
• Atonement(5:6-11): Jesus satisfying God’s wrath through His sacrificial death on the cross.
  • The purpose of militaries is to save us from the temporary wrath of enemies. The purpose of Jesus and his death, burial and resurrection is to save us from the eternal wrath of God. 
• Ch. 5 and 6 describe federalism, this idea of one man making a difference, for righteousness (Jesus) or wickedness (Adam). As Romans 6:10 says, Jesus died “once for all.”  

Intro

• “Sanctification” used twice, a word describing the believer’s journey between now and Heaven.
  • Sanctification is about the fact that I am wearing down physically, but that doesn’t mean I have to stop growing in Christ.
  • As believers, we are going somewhere. Sanctification is about the growing strong in faith while giving God the glory of Romans 4:20. It’s about the “leads to righteousness” of Verse 16, the “leads to sanctification” of verse 19, and the leading to eternal life as the end goal of sanctification (verse 22).
• “Slaves” is used 8 times, so before you run off yelling “the Bible is pro slavery!”, READ these verses and others and pray for understanding.
• “Present” yourselves/your members, used 5 times. As born again believers, unchained from sin, you now have this Holy Spirit-led ability to humbly present yourself to a new Master, to leave the sinful, weak, enemy of God behind and pursue righteousness.
• “Leads to” used 5 times, we are going somewhere with this. That is what sanctification is about, being led by Christ. No better place to be!
• Verse 12
  • Unbelievers may sense a desire to let not sin therefore reign, but that is really more a response to things like cultural pressure. But now, as Christians, the Holy Spirit is in us, and it is His righteousness that overwhelms us and directs us to consider “not letting sin reign.”
  • Thinking of it another way, an atheist can overcome a porn addiction, gluttony, etc. They can turn from that and still hate God. The difference is the unbeliever’s action is a works-based saving of self, while the believer’s action is Holy Spirit led(or should be). You might even say, “well that Christian guy is still falling back into drunkenness, while the atheist has kicked the habit completely, so what’s wrong with the Christian?” A follow up question is “Well, how do you know if the Christian wouldn’t be even worse off if he were still an unbeliever?” And, all the atheist has done is buy himself some more time on earth, saved himself from temporary wrath. Self is his god. The true believer though will be influenced by God’s word here in Romans. The true believer is the “good soil” of Matthew 13:18-23, and his end game in kicking sinful habits is eternal life(v. 22). Christ will increase, he will decrease (John 3:30).
    • Verse 11 showed us how to consider ourselves, how to “reckon” ourselves, as dead to sin. Only through Christ’s righteousness imputed to us, are we able to think this way at all. Without Christ in us, we would just scoff at these words. But once saved, the Holy Spirit informs the believer that this is the trajectory to be on. We want to be on this trajectory of not letting sin reign, we want that trajectory because of what He did in us, not because of what we did. What we do is a “Holy Spirit now in us” response to grace. 
    • Sproul says what we are reading here with all the emphasis on slavery is related to the idea of free will. Some say free will is that, if we have a moral option in front of us, we have the power in ourselves to say yes or no, that we are basically indifferent. Sproul says this is unbiblical and that this idea of freedom is not found in the Bible. What the Bible DOES discuss is slavery, either slaves of sin or slaves of righteousness. We are serving one or the other, and the only way we become slaves to righteousness is through Christ’s righteousness imputed to us. 
      • Of course, we DO have the ability to choose, to decide on this way or that way. But, without salvation, our choices are all towards wickedness. Sproul says this is what Jesus is getting at in John 3 with Nicodemus, that unless a man is born again he cannot even see the kingdom of God, let alone take steps to enter it. 
      • What the “let not sin reign” of verse 12 is saying is that born again believers now have the ability to be a runaway slave. Through Christ alone, the chains of sin slavery are broken, the jailhouse doors are open. Of course, you can just sit there, or run out and run back in. I think a reality for all believers is that, this side of Heaven, none of us fully realize how free we actually are in Christ. Some realize more than others, but nobody fully gets it.
• Verse 13
  • Compare the do not present of verse 13 with the do not let of verse 12 and the consider yourselves of verse 11. ONLY because of Christ in us do we have any ability to move in a direction towards righteousness and away from wickedness, to “walk in newness of life” of verse 4. I think this is what Peter was getting at in Acts 2:38, when he said “repent and be baptized,” or in 3:19 when he said “repent therefore and turn back, that your sins may be blotted out.” And then Acts 4:4 says many of those who heard the word believed. But not everyone believed. Repent means to change one’s mind or purpose. That not everyone believed after Peter’s sermon is telling, and I think that is a sign of how the Holy Spirit leads this. That someone can repent at all means the gift of saving faith has been planted. Think about it, if we were all the same, designed to respond the same way, then everyone who heard Peter’s message would have believed. It would have been 100% success. But, there was something else going on that resulted in “many,” not “all” believing, and that I think was evidence of the work of the Holy Spirit. To “change one’s mind or purpose” away from wickedness and towards righteousness cannot be done without the Holy Spirit.
    • Sproul says “our regeneration, our rebirth was the work of one Person, God. It was not a joint venture; but from the moment we take our first breath of regenerated spiritual life, it  becomes a joint effort.”
      • In other words, we can present/let/consider in a direction towards righteousness, not because we are great decision makers, but because of Christ in us. And one way we know Christ is in us is this: as we walk this “Romans road” of sanctification, and hit a bump or fall into a ditch, we get back up and keep going. We don’t turn around or turn at the next intersection to head back to wickedness. No, we have that Holy Spirit led “want to” in us to get back up and keep going. We have that bondage to righteousness now that keeps driving us towards eternal life.
• Verse 14
  • Formerly, we were slaves to sin, but as Christians now it has no dominion over us. Only by God’s grace, not our own works, can we go from being slaves to sin to sin having no power over us. We are still tempted, we still fall, but for a saved person, we can now change our thinking and purpose, we can repent. Before Christ, we had no way to repent or even a desire, but now we can work together, now as Sproul says, “from the moment we take our first breath of regenerated spiritual life, it becomes a joint effort.” Take a moment to read Phil 2:12b-13. It describes this awesome “God in me now” aspect of salvation.
    • Sproul says “we bring a lot of baggage into the Christian life, sinful patterns of behavior, and they don’t disappear overnight. What disappears is the bondage.” Also, we can develop new, sinful habits while being a Christian. A mark of a true believer though is that sin will not and cannot, hold us down. The bonds are broken. We may have seasons that are darker than others, but we don’t stay there. 
    • We are not under law now but under grace and “we have a responsibility to cooperate with the grace God makes available to us.” Sproul reminds that grace is a gift. We didn’t choose it, it was given to us. We just need to open the box!
• Verses 15-16
  • Sproul says that Paul’s references to the law are often confusing to theologians, because some people take “ you are not under law” to be a license for sin, but he answers those objections to what he said in v. 14 immediately here in v. 15.
    • “By no means!” appears 10 times in Romans. It’s like “absolutely not!” Hawaiian Bible is “A’ole loa!” which translates Never! And also the “God forbid!” of the ASV.
    • Verse 15 also parallels verse 2. The “Are we to sin that grace may abound?” Of verse 2, with v. 15’s are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? And we can also compare to 3:31, “do we then overthrow the law by this faith?”
      • It is AMAZING that, repeatedly, Paul says God’s grace is not a license to sin. Yet, in Luther’s day-as we discussed recently, this was one of the Roman Catholic Church’s big objections to sola fide. 
        • Reviewing a bit from, the “by faith alone” of sola fide is shorthand for “by Christ alone and his righteousness.”
          • It is not saying our works as believers don’t matter.
          • We are not justified by good works, but UNTO good works (Eph 2:10).
          • We are not justified by our sanctification, but UNTO sanctification(see v. 19).
          • Paul is beginning to show us how true believers respond to the gospel.
            • Justification+works=faith, that is what the book of James is describing.
            • Justification=works+faith, that is RC church view, Mormon view, etc. 
      • Maybe part of this too is that, as Christians, we have been born again, we are walking in newness of life (6:4), walking on a different road, pulled off the road that leads to death and dropped onto the sanctification road that leads to eternal life.
        • Death road: the law exposes our sin, and since God is just, there is no mercy and the end of the road is death and Hell.
        • Grace road: Through Christ our sin is removed, we are shown mercy, showing that God is also the justifier and the end of the road is eternal life (3:26, just and the justifier).
        • So, one BIG reason for the “By no means” is because through Christ, we are on a completely different road now, so we aren’t really saved if we are thinking we should sin because we are not under the law. We aren’t really saved if we are thinking grace is a license to sin. 
    • Verse 16 begins the use of the slavery contrast, the “slaves to wickedness”  versus the “slaves to righteousness.”
      • Paul continues describing the marks of a true believer, one who, by Christ’s righteousness in him/her alone, has that “want to” to obey Christ.
        • Obedience to sin leads to death.
        • Obedience to God leads to righteousness, which leads to sanctification (v. 19), and its end, eternal life (v. 22).
        • This “leads to” is that road we are on, either the old death road or the new sanctification road.
      • Slavery: Sproul says something important here about the type of slavery this is, not the man-stealing type but the “doulos” type, the very first word Paul used to describe himself back in verse 1:1. “When someone had a debt he could not pay, he would offer his services to fulfill the debt.” Being enslaved to fulfill a debt is still not a great place to be, because whatever the master wants you to do, you have to do. If you are a slave to sin, obeying the master leads you to an ever-worsening condition. On the other hand, if you are a slave to Christ, obeying the master leads you to an ever-bettering condition. And by “better condition” I don’t mean a 100% guarantee of financial security or good health, but of a fuller realization of the peace, access and hope believers have, and which Paul wrote about in Romans 5:1-5.
        • On another note, consider how addictions always have a sin component. Whether it is drugs (which includes alcohol), porn, food, money, etc., an ever-worsening condition results from the slavery.
• Verses 17-18
  • Being born again is an inward change, the Holy Spirit entering the depths of our souls in a mysterious but very real and true way that results in outward change.
    • Sproul, “We are not going to make it on the basis of our righteousness, but only on the basis of faith. If faith is genuine, the fruit of that faith will be real righteousness.”
      • It will be Christ’s righteousness pouring out of us, not our own. Believers are slaves to His righteousness, freely given to us. 
      • Sproul comments on how we have to be careful about self-righteousness here, which is works-based. Jesus said a works-righteousness would have to exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees in order to get to heaven (Matt 5:20). And we might not think that is so hard since the Pharisees were the ones who killed Jesus and who Jesus called hypocrites (Matt 23:13, Luke 11:44). But actually, the Pharisees were the “conservatives” of the Jews, they wanted to run from secularism and pursue righteousness. Sproul says, although they didn’t care about justice or mercy, at least they tithed (Luke 11:42). They didn’t come to Jesus and so were spiritually dead, but at least they searched the Scriptures (John 5:39-40). He called them “children of hell”, but at least they were committed to evangelism and missions (Matt. 23:15). How about you, are you committed to tithing, to reading the Bible, to being on mission? The Pharisees were, but they were slaves to self-righteousness and not slaves of Christ and His righteousness. It’s a false version of righteousness that is more subtle than what we might think of when we think of sins like adultery and drunkenness, for example. But, what a great ploy of Satan to be a false version of something good! That’s probably why there are so many New Testament warnings about false teachers.
• Verses 19-22
  • Digressing into “math nerd” mode, this reminds me of vectors and the parallelogram law. Saints were once on a sin trajectory, with death at the end. But Jesus saved us, putting us on his righteousness trajectory, and through the Holy Spirit giving us that “want to”, that ability to “present ourselves”, or “consider ourselves” of verse 11. We now have the ability to relate to God properly, but we have to recognize that new ability, that our sin bonds have been broken. One man can make a difference, that’s what Chapter 5 and some of 6 were about. This still holds true in us, recognizing that with the Holy Spirit now, we still have decisions to make and that we CAN make those through His righteousness that is now in us. We have to relate to Him though, and we can because we now have access by faith (5:2). So, believers can work in Him to make that righteousness vector big and powerful, so much so that it diminishes the sin vector and the resultant points towards righteousness. That’s what sanctification is about, moving the resultant vector from sin to righteousness. Healing the scars of sin, over time.
  • Farming is probably a more relatable way to illustrate what Paul describes in v. 19-22. Weeds (sin) can choke out a fruit tree (Christ in us), depriving it of nutrients. So, you have to maintain the farm, preventing weeds from filling up the garden. With proper land management, your tree produces better fruit. For believers, with Christ in us, we have that “want to” to destroy the weeds, resulting in better fruit production. 
• Verse 23
  • This is a great memory verse. What does sin earn you? Death. And sin includes works righteousness, which is really self-righteousness and has nothing to do with Jesus. The wages we earn from sin produce death, while the free gift yields eternal life. For the believer, walking that sanctification road well means you are serving Christ for His sake, not for your sake and not with a mindset of self-preservation, but rather God-glorification.
    • Sproul: Wages are something we earn; a gift is something we cannot possibly earn.
• Coming soon: Romans 7:1-6