02.12. IV. Gospel-Righteousness Does Not Produce a Sinful Life (ch. 6).
IV. Gospel-Righteousness Does Not Produce a Sinful Life (Rom 6:1-23).
Rom 6:1-23 brings up and answers a question which naturally grows out of the fifth. In Rom 5:1-21, the eternal security of the believer is dealt with, and it is there shown that a saved man is safe. The argument of the chapter is summed up in the statement with which it closes: Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. The question now very naturally presents itself: will not this teaching as to gospel-righteousness encourage and promote a life of sin? If a man is assured that since he is born again he is beyond all possibility of condemnation and cannot fail of final salvation, will this not result in careless living? The answer is that in his new birth the believer has come into possession of a new nature, which is created in righteousness and true holiness, and that therefore he has new desires; and not only new desires, but new power to live according to those desires. The matter is beautifully worked out in the chapter before us.
I. What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? (Rom 6:1). Grace abounding is a thing greatly to be desired. If it is produced by abounding sin, must we not then conclude that we are to persist in sin, in order that it may result in more and more grace? The answer to the question raised in Rom 6:1-14.
(1) “God forbid! (Rom 6:2). This is the language of every Christian heart. The name of God does not really occur in the Greek text here, which would be more literally rendered, Far be it! But, as Dean Alford suggests, after following the King James Version,
God forbid is the only adequate rendering of the expression in the original, Let it not be: for it implies a reference to an averting Power; and the occasion is solemn enough to justify, in our language, the mention of that Power. The phrase is used of some inference in itself abhorrent from reverence or piety, or precluded by some acknowledged fact inconsistent therewith. The latter is here the ground of rejection. An acknowledged fact in the Christian life follows, which precludes our persisting in our sin.
(2) We who died to sin, how shall we any longer live therein? (Rom 6:2, R. V.). This is the force of this verse, literally translated. It is not that we are dead, for we are not dead. We died, but we have risen from the dead. Both of these great and wonderful facts—our death and our resurrection—are dealt with in this paragraph.
(3) Are ye ignorant that all we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? (Rom 6:3, R. V.). To understand this reference, we must go to 1Co 12:12-13, where we learn that all who are born again—and when they are born again—are made members of the body of Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit: For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one body. The same subject is discussed also in
Gal 3:26-28 : For ye are all sons of God, through faith, in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ did put on Christ. There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither bond nor free, there can be no male and female; for ye all are one man in Christ Jesus (R. V.). Now, here, in Rom 6:3, we are taught not only that we have been baptized into Christ, but that through this baptism into Him we have been baptized into His death. The death referred to is of Christ’s death on the cross of Calvary. Our baptism into His death took place when we, having believed, were born again and joined to Him by the Holy Spirit. We were then made members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones (Eph 5:30), and from that time we have been reckoned as partakers in whatever the Lord Jesus Christ ever did for us. He died for us, and according to God’s reckoning, we died in that death. He was also buried for us, and He rose again for us, and our baptism into Him includes all these things. We were baptized into His burial and into His resurrection. But the great fact which must first be grasped and apprehended is the fact of our death in Him. For we thus reckon, that if one died for all, then all died (2Co 5:14). Of course there is a sense in which all this was accomplished in the reckoning of God before we believed and even before we were born. In the sight of Him Who sees the end from the beginning, we were chosen in Christ from before the foundation of the world, and in God’s book all Christ’s members were written, when as yet there was none of them (Psa 136:16); but viewed from our present human standpoint, we may say that this was actualized for us when we believed on Christ and were joined to Him, being baptized into Him by the Holy Spirit.
(4) Therefore (Rom 6:4). In this verse the symbol of water baptism is taken up, and its warrant pointed out. Because we have been joined to Christ by the baptism with the Holy Spirit, thus being baptized into His death, therefore we submit ourselves to the rite of water baptism, in which are symbolized the death and burial and resurrection of the Lord Jesus in our room and stead, and our death and burial and resurrection in Him. And in water baptism the believer not. only looks backward to what has been done for him in Christ, and to what, in God’s reckoning, he himself is accounted to have done in Christ, but he also looks forward to a walk in newness of life. Baptism in water is indeed a form, but it is also more than a form. When rightly entered into and intelligently apprehended, it signifies the believer’s faith, not only in what God hath wrought for him in the person of His divine Substitute, but also in what God will do for him, and in him, and through him in newness of life.
(5) For if we are become identified with Him in the likeness of His death, so also we shall be of His resurrection (Rom 6:5, Darby). This verse tells why there may be a new walk in pointing out the power of that walk. The reason is that, as we are one with Him in His death, so are we also in His resurrection, being endowed in the latter with the same life which He received in rising from the tomb. The reference is not to our future bodily resurrection. ‘For if (or “as) a graft in a tree (John 15:1-27), we became (not planted, but) grown together (with him) in the likeness of his death (viz: our baptism), so shall we be also still grown together (with Him) in the likeness of His resurrection (viz: our emergence from the watery grave).’ To state this idea of union Paul has not abandoned his figure of baptism. Grafting, to be sure, is not done in water, but the union in baptism is as vital as that between the graft and the tree. It must be noted that none can share in Christ’s resurrection life except by first dying. We are buried in order to be raised (John 12:24). Now for the first time Paul has clearly asserted union with Christ. For the thought is, if we went into the baptism in union, why should we not come out in union? The oneness in the immersion is proof of the oneness in the emersion” (Stifler).
(6) Our old man was crucified with Him (Rom 6:6, R. V.). This definite assertion is repeated in Gal 2:20, I have been crucified with Christ; and the reason for this crucifixion is given in the verse before us, that the body of sin might be done away, that so we should no longer be in bondage to sin. The emphasis here is on the so. Before our regeneration, we were in slavery—”sold under sin.” God’s way of delivering us from this slavery was to cause us to pay the penalty, and this we did in the person of our Substitute; and so we are no longer in bondage to sin.
(7) For he that hath died is released from sin (Rom 6:7, R. V. margin). The believer is here pictured as the criminal who has paid the penalty for his crime. He was guilty, he was sentenced to death, he was executed, and now there is nothing against him, he is freed from sin. If he apprehends this, he may sing from a full heart:
I do believe, I now believe,
That Jesus died for me;
And through His blood, His precious blood,
I am from sin set free.
(8) But if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him (Rom 6:8-10, R. V.). The reason for this wonderful statement, based upon the full assurance of faith, is given in Rom 6:9-10. Christ Who died, has been raised from the dead, and dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over Him; and this being true for Him, it is also true for those who died in Him. For them, as well as for Him, the death that took place on Calvary accomplished the fullest vindication of the law, and answered all the demands of righteousness. It was once for all (see R. V. margin; compare Heb 7:27). As to the life unto which we are raised, it is not a life unto sin, for sin has no claim upon it. It is to be lived unto God (Rom 6:10). One died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto Him Who for their sakes died and rose again (2Co 5:14-15, R. V.).
(9) Even so reckon ye also yourselves to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God in Christ Jesus (Rom 6:11, R. V.). This is an exhortation to adopt for ourselves the reckoning of God. He reckons us to have died to sin: let us also reckon it. He reckons us to have been brought again from the dead and into a life which is to be unto Him. And there is more than reckoning here, for by His grace and power we have been born again, and are really and actually in possession of a new life, and this new life is unto God, because it is God’s own life. We have become partakers of the divine nature. We are God’s beloved children. Having heard the words of Jesus and believed Him that sent Him, we have eternal life and shall not come into judgment, but have passed out of death into life (John 5:24).
(10) Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey its desires (Rom 6:12, 1911 Bible). Dr. Weymouth translates here:
Let not sin therefore reign as king in your mortal bodies, causing you to be in subjection to their cravings; and no longer lend your faculties as unrighteous weapons for sin to use; on the contrary surrender your very selves to God as living men who have risen from the dead, and surrender your several faculties to God, to be used as weapons to maintain the right (Rom 6:12-13).
(11) For sin shall not be lord over you, since you are subjects not of law but of grace (Rom 6:14, Weymouth). Here is a statement which confuses the legalist, for he would put it exactly the other way about. He would say, Sin shall have dominion over us unless we see ourselves to be under law and not under grace. He reasons that Christians are to be kept from sinning through the terror of the law; and thus he would make the law to be a ministration, not of condemnation and death, but of justification and life (compare 2Co 3:1-18). The statement of Rom 6:14 can be apprehended only by the believer who sees that in Christ there is an absolute end of the law (Rom 10:4). The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin—the thing that empowers sin to sting unto death—”is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1Co 15:56-57). This victory is brought about by the utter abolition of the law, which is done away in Christ (2Co 3:14). The gospel in its power and beauty can never be fully seen until this point is settled. For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse The law is not of faith Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions, till the Seed should come to Whom the promise was made But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster (Gal 3:10-25).
Free from the law, oh, happy condition,
Jesus hath bled, and there is remission;
Curs’d by the law and bruised by the fall,
Grace hath redeemed us once for all.
“Now we are free—there’s no condemnation,
Jesus provides a perfect salvation;
‘Come unto Me’ or, hear His sweet call,
Come, and He saves us once for all.
“‘Children of God,’ oh, glorious calling,
Surely His grace will keep us from falling;
Passing from death to life at His call,
Blessed salvation free for all!
2. What then? shall we sin, because we are not under law, but under grace? (Rom 6:15, R. V.). The argument of Rom 6:1-14, is that the believer is not led into a sinful life by the consideration of his eternal security in Christ. Having received a new nature by regeneration, he is now actuated by new desires, and not only by desires, but by new power. It would be indeed pitiful if the new-born child of God, with his new desires toward God, should be left without power to accomplish these desires. God has not left him thus. Having died to sin, he is alive unto God, and God is working in him both to will His good pleasure and to do it (Php 2:13). The concluding statement of the section is that sin has no dominion over the believer because he is freed from law, and is under grace. Sin cannot inflict its deadly sting, for the strength of sin, which is the law (1Co 15:56), is done away (2Co 3:11-14). In Rom 7:1-25 this freedom from law is taken up in detail. But a new question confronts us here, growing naturally out of this statement of the believer’s freedom from law: What then? shall we sin, because we are not under law, but under grace? The believer’s response to this question is identical with the response of Rom 6:2, God forbid, and the remainder of the chapter is occupied with a fuller answer to the question raised.
(1) Do you not know that you are the slaves of him whom you obey, to whom you present yourselves as obedient slaves, be it of sin for death or of obedience for uprightness? But, thank God, though you were slaves of sin you became cordially obedient to that type of teaching to which you were handed over. Freed from sin you became slaves to uprightness. (I am speaking from a human, standpoint, owing to the weakness of your flesh) (Rom 6:16-19, Moffatt’s translation). The apostle is here addressing himself to the question raised in Rom 6:15. This question, says Dr. Stifler, was sure to arise, because human societies and governments know of no way to restrain sin but by law and its penalty. The state’s ruler is ‘the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil’ (Rom 13:4) in breaking the law. The assertion ‘ye are not under law’ was made to turn the justified man’s gaze from Moses to Christ, from law to grace. It is natural to suppose that God’s method in the gospel would follow the method of human government, but the principle of fear is not strong enough to keep men in the path of duty. Union with Christ is God’s method of giving man victory over sin. Says Mr. Grant:
“Everything here will be questioned, however, by the soul ignorant of itself and of God, and such questions, because of their importance, must have careful answer. Again, therefore, we have the objection of the mere moralist taken up to be indignantly set aside: ‘What then? Are we to sin, because we are not under law, but under grace? Far be the thought.’ Yet the heart of man is in fact capable of such abuse of divine goodness; yes, but what would such an argument mean? A soul set free willingly yielding itself to that from which God has delivered it? Is this deliverance when the heart is still deliberately seeking that from which it assumes to be delivered? Well, says the apostle, if I am addressing any in such a condition, let me remind them that here the whole nature of God is in question. Does not then the way of sin, deliberately pursued, end in death? Does the gospel change this relation of sin to death? Does it not manifest God, and in all His attributes? His holiness being more shown indeed in the agony of the cross, than even the uttermost punishment of the sinner could have shown it. Thus then, if one freely yields himself to obey a master, he cannot but be reckoned as belonging to the master he has chosen, whether on the one hand to sin with its terrible wages, or of obedience to God for righteousness. In all this there rules a fundamental necessity, which the gospel could not subvert and be still a gospel (Numerical Bible). In Rom 6:17 the apostle gives thanks concerning the Roman believers for their escape from the former bondage of sin. This escape had been by means of their obedience to that mold of teaching into which they had been delivered. The Revision is to be preferred here, as the King James Version reverses the figure. It does seem natural, as Stifler points out, to say a form of doctrine which was delivered you. But that is not what Paul says here. If it were, one shining point would be lost, that both they and God conjoined in the act of their salvation. They obeyed from the heart the type of teaching—the gospel—into whose power His grace delivered them. The statement of Rom 6:7 is repeated in Rom 6:18, namely, that the believer is free from sin, and in the latter passage the reverse of the proposition is also set forth. In becoming free from sin the Christian has become the bondservant of righteousness, that is to say, he has, by the wondrous change wrought in him in regeneration, come into the place where righteousness becomes his master instead of sin. And this not through fear of law, but by the power of the indwelling Christ; not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life (Heb 7:16).
(2) I speak after the manner of men (Rom 6:19-22). The chapter closes with a practical exhortation growing out of all this. The believer is pointed to the new life with its new possibilities. The paragraph is paraphrased thus by Dr. George Barker Stevens:
I am applying to these high spiritual truths terms derived from human relations so as to make the contrast between the characteristic of the old life and that of the new plain to the most undiscerning. And I apply this truth thus: just as you used to allow your bodily powers to be dominated by sin, so you should now, as Christians, make them the means of serving and promoting holiness of life. For (to repeat my distinction between the two kinds of life) in your old life you were freemen in respect of righteousness, and bondmen in respect of sin; the opposite is now true; you are now free from sin and bound to righteousness. But looking away from the principle to the consequences of the old sinful life, what reward did it bring? Only a fruitage of which you are ashamed, for all its results are in the line of that final issue, moral death. But the opposite of all this is your case now. Being freemen in relation to sin and bondmen in relation to God, you have holiness and everlasting life as your portion.
(3) For the wages of sin is death; but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom 6:23, R. V.). Our eternal life is not only through Jesus Christ our Lord, as in the King James Version. It is in Christ Himself and is never separated from Him. It is in us of course, but that is because we are in Him. This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life (1Jn 5:11-12). This cannot be too strongly insisted upon. There is no such thing as eternal life apart from Christ. The gospel does not offer to man a life detached from Christ. In the gospel God has provided a place in Christ and a share in His life to all who come unto Him. The gospel finds man dead as the wages of sin; it brings him out of death into life (John 5:24); and from the moment of his regeneration the believer has Christ in him as his life (Col 3:4).
Buried with Christ, and raised with Him too;
What is there left for me to do?
Simply to cease from struggling and strife,
Simply to ‘walk in newness of life.’
“‘Risen with Christ,’ my glorious Head,
Holiness now the pathway I tread;
Beautiful thought, while walking therein:
‘He that is dead is freed from sin.’
“Living with Christ, Who ‘dieth no more,’
Following Christ, Who goeth before;
I am from bondage utterly freed,
Reckoning self as ‘dead indeed.’
“Living for Christ, my members I yield,
Servants to God, for evermore sealed;
‘Not under law,’ I’m now ‘under grace,’
Sin is dethroned, and Christ takes its place.
“Growing in Christ: no more shall be named
Things of which now I’m truly ashamed;
‘Fruit unto holiness’ will I bear,
Life evermore, the end I shall share.