{"id":22979,"date":"2022-09-07T22:00:18","date_gmt":"2022-09-08T05:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/romans-5_12-21-copy\/"},"modified":"2022-08-15T12:11:19","modified_gmt":"2022-08-15T19:11:19","slug":"romans-6_1-11","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/romans-6_1-11\/","title":{"rendered":"Why It\u2019s Foolish to Keep On Sinning While Thinking \u201cGod Will Forgive Me Anyway\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Romans 6:1-11 \u00a0Click here for Bible Verses<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Hi GAMErs!<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s passage is Romans 6:1-11.\u00a0 Let\u2019s go!<\/p>\n

Romans 6:1-4 (NIV)<\/strong>
\n1\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?
\n2\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?
\n3\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
\n4\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0We 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.<\/em><\/p>\n

On verses 1-4:\u00a0 Earlier in Romans 5:20-21, Paul explained that when our sin (or our awareness of our sin) increased with our understanding of God\u2019s law, God\u2019s grace increased all the more to cover all of our sins.\u00a0 So here in Romans 6:1-4 Paul addresses this question: \u201cShall we keep on sinning so that God can show us more of His grace?\u201d (v1) Put another way, if God\u2019s grace always outstretches my sin, why don\u2019t I just keep on sinning?\u00a0 In response, Paul mentions one reason why it is foolish to keep on sinning even if we know God\u2019s grace will be there to meet us in the end: it\u2019s because\u00a0our very reason for believing in Jesus and following Him is not so that we can keep on sinning but so that we can live a new life<\/strong>\u00a0(v4).<\/p>\n

By the way, notice that Paul assumes that all the Christians in Rome have been baptized (see verses 3-4).\u00a0 That\u2019s because believing in Jesus and getting baptized go together.\u00a0 Baptism is not something that a Christian does many years after they have trusted in Jesus, or after they feel like they\u2019ve gotten their act together and after they think they are\u00a0really\u00a0<\/em>committed.\u00a0 Baptism is a beginner step that shows that you believe that Jesus died on the cross for your sins.\u00a0 Have you been baptized?<\/p>\n

Assuming that all the Christians in Rome have already been baptized to express their faith in Christ, Paul uses baptism as an illustration.\u00a0 He says that when you as a Christian are baptized in the name of Jesus, you are identifying with Jesus\u2019 death and burial (symbolized by you going into the water) and you are also identifying with Jesus\u2019 resurrection and new life (symbolized by you coming out of the water).\u00a0 Baptism is a symbolic picture of the fact that as a Christian we have a new life in Christ and weren\u2019t made to go back to our old ways of sinning.\u00a0\u00a0To keep sinning on the assumption that \u201cGod in His grace will forgive me anyway\u201d is to forget your new life in Christ and why you trusted in Jesus in the first place.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Are there other reasons why it’s foolish to sin while thinking, “God will forgive me anyways”?\u00a0 Yes there are.\u00a0 When you do, you take Jesus’ sacrifice for granted, you risk hardening your heart, you give God a bad name, and you set the wrong example for other believers.\u00a0 But those are topics for another time.<\/p>\n

Romans 6:5-8 (NIV)<\/strong>
\n5\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection.
\n6\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0For 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–
\n7\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.
\n8\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.<\/em><\/p>\n

On verses 5-8:\u00a0 I find that Paul sometimes takes two or three points which are distinct but related and use them all to make a sandwich.\u00a0 The first point he uses as the bread for the sandwich.\u00a0 The second and third points he uses as the meat for the sandwich.\u00a0 In this case, the first point (the bread for Paul\u2019s sandwich) is in verse 5 and verse 8:\u00a0through our faith in Christ and through baptism, we are united with Christ in His death and in His resurrection<\/strong>.\u00a0 Then in between the bread that is verses 5 and 8, Paul inserts as the meat of his sandwich the following points from verses 6-7:
\n–\u00a0since death is the final weapon that sin uses against us, when we die we are no longer slaves to sin but we are free from sin\u2019s mastery (v7);
\n– our death and resulting freedom from sin\u2019s mastery happened when we first believed in Jesus and what He did on the cross, for in that moment our old self was crucified with Jesus (v6-7)<\/p>\n

Romans 6:9-11 (NIV)<\/strong>
\n9\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him.
\n10\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
\n11\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.<\/em><\/p>\n

On verses 9-11:\u00a0 Here Paul explains that when Jesus died, he died to sin once for all (v10), such that sin has no hold over him.\u00a0 After Jesus died, he was raised from the dead such that he cannot die again and is no longer subject to death\u2019s control (v9).\u00a0 In the same way, as believers in Jesus Christ, we can see ourselves as dead to sin and alive to God because of Jesus (v11).<\/p>\n

Father, thank You that because of Jesus I am no longer a slave to sin.\u00a0 Rather, I have a new life and freedom in Christ.\u00a0 I count myself dead to sin and alive to You, all because of what Jesus did for me.\u00a0 In Jesus\u2019 name, AMEN!<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi GAMErs!<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s passage is Romans 6:1-11.\u00a0 Let\u2019s go!<\/p>\n

Romans 6:1-4 (NIV)
\n1\u00a0\u00a0What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?
\n2\u00a0\u00a0By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?
\n3\u00a0\u00a0Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
\n4\u00a0\u00a0We 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.<\/p>\n

On verses 1-4:\u00a0 Earlier in Romans 5:20-21, Paul explained that when our sin (or our awareness of our sin) increased with our understanding of God\u2019s law, God\u2019s grace increased all the more to cover all of our sins.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22981,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22979","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gametime-sharing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22979","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22979"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22979\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22984,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22979\/revisions\/22984"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22979"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22979"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}