Romans 6:11-14
“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 any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.”
Romans 6:11-14 NIV
God's word is not telling us some airy-fairy, unable to comprehend fantastic fantasy. This is truth, but many Christians do not take to heart the truth of Scripture and live a defeated life, through unbelief. But God wants us to believe His Word, to trust His Word, to reckon His Word as fact and then to act upon His Word.
Because of the imparted righteousness of Christ that we are given, we are now united to Him. We are literally, as believers, alive with Christ. The law of sin no longer has any dominion over us unless we allow it to. So we live now in the reign of grace, in a totally new realm.
But we have also learned that although we have died to sin, we are not dead to sin. Every Christian continues to battle with this enemy. While the old man no longer reigns, he nevertheless still remains as we are all very aware.
We are still influenced by remaining sin, by our unredeemed humanness, by our flesh, this physical body that will someday be done away with.
Think about your own sin for a moment. It is easy for it to come to mind if you listen to your conscience. And if you don’t, just look at some major problem in your life and then go backwards and it will point to your sin.
All we need to do is look at our calendars and our checkbooks to get a good understanding about your life. So how can we gain victory over indwelling sin that still remains? That is the question.
Paul is going to tell us that we must do three things, given the truth about our radically new nature. Number one, we have got to know it in our mind. Number two, we have got to affirm it in our heart and, number three, we have got to live it by our will. And I pray the Spirit of God will enlighten each of our minds to these great truths.
In baptism, we are united with Christ in his death. Our old sinful selves are crucified with Christ. We are no longer slaves to sin. We are freed from sin, death, and evil powers that could separate us from God.
We are alive in Christ, the one whom sin could not master and death could not conquer. His life is now our life. His victory is our victory. His future is our future.
Let's set our hearts to live based on this certainty, realizing that we are dead to our past failures and sins and now alive to Jesus future for us.
If we have been cleansed from perversity, if we have died with Christ in baptism and have been cleansed thoroughly and completely by the Holy Spirit, then let's live for God.
Let's resist sin, and our inclination to sin, with all our might, knowing that as we do, the Holy Spirit will empower us to a much greater righteousness than we could ever live on our own.
Let's begin each day with a conscious decision to be dead to our sinful past and alive to the goal of the Holy character of God!!!
Father thank You for this day and that You identified with our sinfulness through Your Son Jesus so that we might be identified with Your righteousness. Lord pour out Your abundant blessings over my friend and family today. Lord thank You that You not only died for our sin but You died unto sin so that we might be empowered to live our lives in spirit and truth. Lord as we abide in You and You in us we pray that we would not only hear this truth but act upon it and reckon our old sinful self’s to be dead to sin. Lord us my friend to be someone’s blessing today. Be a blessing. Love ya
Father, we love You. Amen !
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