Sermon from January 26, 2003

Many Christians hold to a belief called perseverance of the saints. Its more popular name is once saved, always saved. It teaches that when a person comes to faith in Christ, God takes hold of that peson's life in such a way that nothing can separate that person from God for time and eternity. The Apostle Paul presents the foundations for that doctrine in Romans eight.

Human nature being what it is, a question very naturally arises in some quarters about that belief. If nothing can separate a believer from God for time and eternity, why can't believers live any way they please? If the safety net below is always going to catch you, enjoy the fall.

Plenty of people in the history of Christianity have had thoughts like that, giong right back to the days of the apostles. The Apostle Paul encountered it often enough in his ministry, and he brings it up in the letter to the Romans. In chapters one through give he had set forth the foundation of a right relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ.

The end of Romans five stated the magnificent conclusion of those first five chapters. But where sin increase, grace increased all the more. Whenever the evil power that mars human life reaches new depths in its degradation, the sheer generosity of God reaches new heights to counteract the degradation and replace it with holiness. That's the lesson about God the apostle learned from Jesus Christ.

It is a magnificent conclusion, but if the sheer generosity of God is going to counteract the degradation of sin and replace it with holiness, do we need to worry too much any more about how we live?

Romans 6:1 puts the question this way: What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? You can see the connection. Romans 5:20 had said, Where sin increased, grace increased all the more. So, what shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?

The apostle's first answer at the beginning of verse two is dismissive: By no means! He then proceeds in verses 2-10 to state three reasons why Christians cannot live anyway they please, why we do not sin in order for grace to increase. They are the meaning of Christian baptism, the change in the status of Christians, and the future destiny of Christians.

Three Answers to the Question
First, the meaning of Christian baptism ought to make a difference in our life now. Listen to verses 2-3. By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Baptism is the Christian way of publicly identifying with Christ. So, "how can you who identified with Christ live as though Christ never died?" (Dunn, Romans, 327) He died for sin. He died to sin. He died by the hand of sinful men. How can you ask if we should go on sinning so that grace may increase, as though what He did didn't matter?

At the very least we can hate sin because of what it did to Him. At our best, we can renounce it because He has permanently renounced it, and then we can learn a new way to live. Verse four puts it this way. We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. Baptism is the public act by which we renounce sin and declare our intention to live a new life as God gives us strength.

Paul's second answer says that those who believe in Christ have undergone a change in status. Verses 5-7 express this. If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. (Now, here it comes.) For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin - because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. Don't let the language intimidate you.

The key statement comes in verse six: our old self was crucified with him. Our old self simply means the way we were before Christ came into our life. Paul is saying, "When Christ came into your life, that was the end of your old life." Becoming a Christian is like emigrating to another country. It is like being moved to a different part of this country and given a new identity. It's like being under new management. Our new status means that we should no longer be slaves to sin. How can you ask if we should go on sinning so that grace may increase, as though what He did didn't matter?

Paul's third answer to the question has to do with the future destiny of those who believe in Christ. Verses 8-10 express this reality. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. That's what we confess in the Apostles' Creed when we say, "I believe in the resurrection of the dead." What happened to Christ is going to happen to us. His indestructible life, which is devoted entirely to God, is the model of the indestructible life God has in store for us at the resurrection of all mankind.

For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives (now that He has been raised from the dead), he lives to God.

"Christ died to sin because he died sinless (and) because he died rather than sin (by disobeying the Father)," (Barrett, Romans, 126). Also, death separated Him forever from the tug of sin. Now that God has raised Him from the dead, His indestructible life is devoted entirely to God.

What happened to Christ models what will happen to us some day. If Christ died to sin once for all and rose to an indestructible life devoted entirely to God, and if such a life is waiting for us at the resurrection, shouldn't that make a difference in the way we live now? How can you ask if we should go on sinning so that grace may increase, as though what He did didn't matter?

Holiness
Before we look at verses 11-13, I want to put Romans 6-8 and 12-15 under one large umbrella. In chapters one through five he had set forth the foundation of a right relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ. In chapters 6-8 and 12-15 he sets forth how that relationship works out in our lives. The one word that will serve as an umbrella for these chapters is holiness.

That is a word that has disappeared from our working vocabulary, because the only way people commonly use the word holy is in the phrase "holier-than-thou." We don't want people saying that about us, and we have become uncommonly shy about considering our honorable biblical calling to be holy.

The two biblical meanings of holy may help restore it to our experience. On one hand, being holy is a matter of belonging. Because the Church belongs to God in Christ, it is a holy community. We are His; therefore we are holy. On the other hand, being holy is a matter of behavior that is consistent with being the people of God.

All we talkeed aobut in verses 2-10 have to do with being God's people. Verses 11-13 have to do with behavior that is consistent with being the people of God.

A Strategy for Holy Living
In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness.

Verse eleven calls on us for a discipline of mind. In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. The action point revolves around those tow littler words count yourselves. What do they mean?

When Christ died, death separated Him forever from the tug of sin. Now that God has raised Him from the dead, His indestructible life is devoted entirely to God. Paul is saying, "Learn to think of yourselves as having made a break with the old, sinful way of living and now being completely at God's disposal.

This new picture of ourselves is caught most powerfully in those three words alive to God. Picture youself alive to God. What God wants now matters to you as it never mattered before. You are learning to say to God, "Not my will but Yours be done." Everything increasingly passes through the grid of asking, "How can I please God in this situation?" We begin to notice behavior that displeases God. We can't live to God and persist in that behavior. Old habits begin to change. We become like a tree in spring, when the sap rises and new buds begin to push last year's dead leaves off the tree.

People who engage in that discipline of mind are ready for the discipline of will that the apostle presents in verses 12-13. The strategy of verse twelve establishes an important goal. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires.

The apostle tells Christians not to let sin reign in our mortal body for the very simple reason that, if we aren't careful, sin will reign in our mortal body, and we will obey those evil desires that everyone of us has. We must not dismiss this piece of realism. We Christians are not immune to domination by evil desires. But we remember that we are alive to God now and destined to a future of unbroken devotion to God, and so we learn to say with the Apostle Paul, "Everything is permissible for me" - but I will not be mastered by anything that displeases God.

Now, if verse twelve establishes an important goal, verse thirteen establishes the strategy by which we will live to God in this world of unparalleled personal liberty. Do no offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness.

This verse brings me back to the challenge with which I began this series of sermons on Romans in September. Place your body at God's disposal. Both then and now we are right to ask, Why "body?" That sounds carnal, earthy, unspiritual. Why not say, "Offer your hearts and souls?" or "Offer your very selves?" Christians are sometimes embarrassed by the body with its imperial hormones, sheer necessities and irresistible mortality. Some Christians and non-Christians have viewed the body as the evil prison house of the beautiful human soul. The Christian Church has rejected that embarrassment and that view as heresy.

So, why does Scripture insist on talking about what we do with our bodies? The body is the instrument by which the world "out there" reaches our minds and spirits. It is also the instrument by which our thoughts and intentions influence the world "out there." So, isn't it important to place this unique and powerful instrument at God's disposal to serve God's purpose?

There is another reason why Paul uses the word body. Many years ago, a man in the Wilmintong community declined an invitation to come to BVBC this way: "I don't want to go there. They expect too much of you." I don't know hwo we earned that reputation with that man. It isn't because we hammer people with a lot of rules and demands. I think people who come here experience a remarkable freedom from arm-twisting and threatening innuendoes.

On the other hand, there is a discipline that works on anyone who stays around here for long. We experience it as a proposal of what life is all about. A person could resist the proposal without fear of reprisal, but he could not dodge the proposal. In many indirect ways and, occasionally, very directly, he will encounter the proposal, the conviction, that the practice of Christianity applies not only to family and church but also to business, politics, education, social life, and the arts.

That's another reason why the apostle's use of the word body is apt. Everywhere our body goes, its parts can be offered to God as instruments of righteousness. It's worth asking what offering the parts of our body as instruments of righteousness looks like.

Verse thirteen gives practical guidance on how to do that. It envisions the human body as a kind of tool chest: eyes, ears, tongue, hands, feet and the like being the instruments at our disposal. Then, it asks, "How are you going to use these tools?" If we have a picture of ourselves as alive to God, and if we are determined that sin will not master us, then we accept this verse's opening mandate. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness.

The apostle says, Rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. That is a rich summons to practical holiness. He doesn't say, "Be good." He says, "Be available to God with no strings attached."

We will have to go into spiritual training if you are going to live such a life. Without personal training we cannot offer the parts of our body to God as instruments of righteousness consistently or successfully anymore than you could walk over here to the YMCA and benchpress 100 pounds ten times without having trained your body.

In 1 Corinthians 15:30-31 the Apostle Paul said, Why do we endanger ourselves every hour? I die every day. I think he means us to understand that everyday of his life for the sake of Christ he beats back his fears and self-interests and at the risk of ridicule or worse he speaks and acts in a way that will bring honor to Christ.

How far are you willing to go to bring honor to Christ in your spheres of influence? What would happen if the adult population of this congregation walked out the door every morning determined at whatever the personal cost to offer themselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life and to offer to God the parts of their bodies as instruments of righteousness? Does Christ have any takers here?