I honestly didn’t start out to do a sermon series on Romans, but it seems to be working out that way.
In fact this may just go on a while longer! I hope you like Paul’s teaching as much as I do.
Over the past several weeks we’ve been looking at what he has to tell us about some of the basics
of the Christian faith. We’ve heard about God’s unmerited grace and focused love in giving us the
gift of his Son so we could once again have God and have life. We heard the great news that this
salvation is ours for the price of belief and trust in Jesus. Then last week we heard that this gift of
grace came at a great price, and doesn’t give us the option to take it for granted and whoop it up
and sin all we want to just because grace was given to us freely. And we looked at this whole
phenomenon of human sin and talked about how to begin living a new life in which sin is gradually
being extinguished in our lives.
In this morning’s epistle reading Paul continues with his advice about how to be free from our slavery
to sin. But I’d like to start by pointing out just how much our perspective on things like this has
changed in recent years.
Let me start by asking you this: When you talk with unbelievers about sin, what feelings do you
experience? Is there just a little twinge of embarrassment, or fear that they’ll see you as some kind
of fundamentalist nut-case or something? I have to admit, part of me is vaguely uneasy when called
upon to talk about it. It’s become a strange and uncomfortable topic. Not that long ago it seemed
like most of us knew what “sin” meant, and one way or another, we had to deal with it. But we seem
to have gone into this collective denial in which we feel like the concept doesn’t apply to us any more
in this more “enlightened” day and age.
Last week we watched part of Ken Burns’ incredible PBS series on World War II. I have to say, there’
s nothing like a documentary on war to inoculate against this idea that evil and sin are passé
concepts. After viewing this program if you don’t clearly see evidence for sin I think a reality check
might be in order.
And all of this teaching Paul gives us is based upon the premise that sin is what separates us from
God and from each other. You might be interested to know that hamartia, the Greek word for sin,
may be translated as “missing the mark.” We take aim, fire the arrow of our often good intentions,
and quite often miss the target. Something is very wrong. Our aim may be good, but our follow
through isn’t.
One of my favorite literary images of how sin took root in the world is found in J.R.R. Tolkien’s book
The Silmarillion, which is the prequel to his masterpiece, The Lord of the Rings. Chapter One of the
Silmarillion is a mythological story about the creation, in which a group of beings called the ainur,
which look to be Tolkien’s counterpart to the angels, were the first intelligent beings to be created.
They expressed themselves through music, and sang beautifully to the Creator. In a relationship of
unhindered love, the Creator taught them of His wonders and mysteries. Tolkien writes they were
like a countless throng of choirs, all singing their praises in harmony with God. And the Creator
gave each the gift of free thought. But at one point the most powerful of the ainur decided to
enhance the glory of his own part, and began to improvise, thinking he could improve on the music
of the Creator. This led to disharmony which eventually spread to other ainur, and resulted in a
rebellious din of noise. The Creator was soon surrounded by a storm of rebellion and dissonance
that tore apart the beauty of the original theme. He eventually expelled the rebels from his
presence, and they went on to tempt and torment the Creator’s other intelligent creatures so they
too would be out of harmony.
I recommend that you read Tolkien’s original rather than settling for my inadequate retelling of it.
But I trust you can see the parallels with the biblical account of what we call “The Fall.” The
scriptures tell us that something catastrophic happened back in the mists of time that changed us
from being naturally in harmony with the Creator to being out of tune and in rebellion. That
something is what the scriptures call “sin.” Through the ages it’s been passed down to us. In fact
we’ve become so used to it that we may no longer even recognize it. There’s a shamelessness that
goes along with our cozy familiarity with sin. Jeremiah recognized this among the people he
prophesied to 2500 years ago. About them he says, “They acted shamefully, they committed
abominations; yet they were not ashamed, they didn’t know how to blush.” They didn’t know how to
blush. Does this not
describe the state of our culture in many ways?
Our scriptures tell us that thinking rightly, speaking rightly, and doing rightly are supremely important
to God. You see, in the Bible we don’t get a lot of language about things like evolving our Spirits or
recognizing the God within us. Instead we have a lot of talk about the hands on, nuts and bolts
thinking and behavior that misses the target God gave to his own human creation. Paul says, “All
have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” The word “sin” is used over 700 times in the Bible. It’
s no small matter.
This is the backdrop for what we talked about last week on being “dead to sin.” Remember that we
looked at that idea of responding to temptation just as a corpse would. I’d like to briefly follow up on
that, perhaps with a little more animation this week. I first need to say that the scriptures say there’s
a specific created being, an intelligent entity that the Bible identifies as a fallen angel, in fact
formerly God’s chief angel, as the leader of the rebellion. We know him as Satan. Many have tried
to reduce Satan to a metaphor for evil. Kind of a personification of something that really is
impersonal. I personally don’t buy this. I had a very real, spiritual encounter with one of Satan’s
servants about 25 years ago that decisively convinced me otherwise. I’ll have to tell you about it
some time.
But Satan, the Tempter, is depicted as a proud and vain being. He thrives on attention. So when
we’re dead to sin, in a sense we starve temptation by removing our attention from it. Rather than
tangling with the Tempter we leave him high and dry by simply not attending to him.
But I’d like to take this strategic maneuver of ours a step further this morning. We’ve talked about
what not to do; now let’s talk a little more about what to do. When we turn away from one thing, we
turn toward another. Last week we mentioned turning our attention to whatever is true, right, noble,
pure, admirable, excellent and praiseworthy. Does this sound like anybody you know? What if we
were to follow the advice of that old praise hymn that says, “Turn your eyes upon Jesus.” When
temptation knocks on the door, turn toward the ‘living’ room. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Would
you recognize him if you saw him? Are you familiar enough with his presence in your life that you’ll
know where he is and can turn to him with confidence? This is one decided advantage of daily
seeking his face.
The thing is, if you believe, the giver of grace is closer to you than you even know. Please let us all
take advantage of the blessed opportunity we have. Paul writes, “Sin will have no dominion over
you, since you are no longer under the law, but under grace.” When we were under the law, the
expectation of obedience required that we tangle with the tempter. The scriptures stand as a
witness to the fact that this was a battle that God’s people repeatedly lost. The story of God’s
people trying to obey is an ongoing saga of two steps forward, two steps back. This is the reason
God the Father sent Jesus to the rescue. The age of law didn’t work out very well for us. But the
hallmark of the age of grace is our victory in Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit. We’re freed from
the cycle of sin and guilt because Jesus paid the debt for our sin. We are now truly free. And we
have the Lord working beside us and within us to keep us moving forward.
Paul asks, “Should we sin because we’re not under the law, but under grace? By no means!” He
encourages us to be dead to sin, and alive to God through Jesus. As we starve temptation and turn
our eyes on Jesus, we’re given access to the power that encourages Paul to proclaim that we’re now
slaves to righteousness. Slaves to righteousness. Slaves to goodness. Now there’s a strange turn
of phrase. Slaves to righteousness? Isn’t that an oxymoron? But you see, the scriptures say that
we’re either slaves to sin or slaves to righteousness. There’s really no such thing as us being
entirely autonomous and perfectly in control of ourselves. Remember that great Bob Dylan song
that says, “It may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve somebody.” I’ll
be merciful at this point and spare you my Bob Dylan impression.
You see, before Jesus, even our free will was bent by sin. Our freedom was illusory. We thought we
had everything under control, and were in denial about our sin. That’s exactly where Satan wanted
us. But Paul says victory comes in our redemption through Jesus, by faith. We’re now under new
management. And our new manager has freed us from slavery to sin.
Paul lists two other great rewards for faith as well. The first is that slow, internal housecleaning that
Paul calls sanctification. Sanctification is the outworking of our obedience to Christ in the power of
the Holy Spirit. It’s a state of being set apart, and spiritually changing so that we become better
people, as God defines the word “better”. We’re all on the sanctification road, and that particular
journey won’t be completed until we see Jesus face to face. That’s when spring cleaning will be
completed. That’s when our voices will again be perfectly in tune with God.
The other great reward for faith is one we’ve talked about many times. Eternal life. It comes into
focus with those famous words Paul writes at the end of the chapter. This is one of those memory
verses from Sunday School, and it’s this with which I’ll close. “For the wages of sin is death, but the
free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” This verse summarizes Paul’s
teaching on the problem of sin, and its solution.
Notice the contrast between wages and the free gift. Wages, of course, are something we earn.
Paul says that, by sinning, we’ve earned death. We’ve cut ourselves off from the source of life, in
whom there is no darkness, and who by His nature can’t play host to any darkness. Loud, dissonant
voices can’t remain in the choir. The predictable consequence of sin, the wages we earn, is spiritual
death. And by contrast, for those who choose to receive it, the free gift of God is eternal life. We
didn’t earn it; it’s a gift! It’s a costly gift paid for by God himself. St. Bede commented on this verse
that “Eternal life is not given for good merits. Rather, merit is first given freely by a benevolent
Savior.”
And of course that’s the other contrast. Death vs. not just life, but eternal life. Once again that
Greek phrase zoe aionios, which means the new, permanent, vibrant God-life that starts for
believers right here and now, and extends in an ever-mounting crescendo of heavenly music past
the end of time itself. Beloved, thanks to Jesus the choir is back in tune, and it’s growing every day
with each person in every place around this world who places their faith in Him! I trust you’ve heard
of the new age? Well, you and I are living in it here and now. It’s called the age of grace. And the
main point, the resounding proclamation of today’s Romans passage is that the Lord of this new age
of grace gives us life and victory, and helps us to live in obedience and godliness. In God’s power
may we channel our gratitude for God’s free gift by doing exactly that. In the name of the Father,
and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
And of course there’s an added bonus. Please listen carefully. In today’s passage Paul says, “Sin
will have no dominion over you, since you are no longer under the law, but under grace.” What
does this mean? Well, when we were under the law, the expectation of obedience required that we
tangle with the tempter. The scriptures stand as a witness to the fact that this was a battle that God’
s people repeatedly lost. The story of God’s people trying to obey is an ongoing saga of two steps
forward, two steps back. This is the reason God the Father sent Jesus to the rescue.
The age of law didn’t work out very well for us. But the hallmark of the age of grace is our victory in
Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit. We’re freed from the cycle of sin and guilt because Jesus paid
the debt for our sin. We are now truly free. And we have the Lord working beside us and within us
to keep us moving forward. Paul asks, “Should we sin because we’re not under the law, but under
grace? By no means!” He encourages us to be dead to sin, and alive to God through Jesus. As we
starve temptation and turn our eyes on Jesus, we’re given access to the power that encourages
Paul to proclaim that we’re now slaves to righteousness.
Slaves to righteousness. Slaves to goodness. A strange turn of phrase. But you see, the
scriptures say that we’re either slaves to sin or slaves to righteousness. There’s really no such
thing as us being entirely autonomous and perfectly in control of ourselves. Remember that great
Bob Dylan song that says, “It may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve
somebody.” I’ll be merciful at this point and spare you my Bob Dylan impression. I don’t think that
this denies our free will, but in our fallen state our free will is radically influenced, even bent, by sin.
So if we think we’ve got everything under control, we’re in denial about our sin state and we’re
exactly where Satan wants us. But Paul says victory comes in our redemption through Jesus, by
faith. We’re now under new management. And our new manager has freed us from slavery to sin.
Paul lists two other great rewards for faith as well. The first is that slow, internal housecleaning that
Paul calls sanctification. Sanctification is the outworking of our obedience to Christ in the power of
the Holy Spirit. It’s a state of being set apart, and spiritually changing so that we become better
people, as God defines the word “better”. We’re all on the sanctification road, and that particular
journey won’t be completed until we see Jesus face to face. That’s when spring cleaning will be
completed. That’s when our voices will again be perfectly in tune with God.
The other great reward for faith is one we’ve talked about many times. Eternal life. It comes into
focus with those famous words Paul writes at the end of the chapter. This is one of those memory
verses from Sunday School. “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life
through Jesus Christ our Lord.” This verse really kind of summarizes Paul’s teaching on the
problem of sin and its solution. Throughout Paul’s Letters he’s meticulously precise with his words,
and this verse is no exception. He uses words that provide some unmistakable contrasts.
One of those contrasts is his comparison of wages with a free gift. Wages, of course, are something
we earn. Paul says that, by sinning, we’ve earned death. We’ve cut ourselves off from the source
of life, in whom there is no darkness at all, and who by His nature can’t play host to any darkness.
Loud, dissonant voices can’t remain in the choir. The predictable consequence of sin, the wages we
earn, is spiritual death.
And by contrast, for those who choose to accept it, the free gift of God is eternal life. We didn’t earn
it; it’s a gift! It’s a gift for which the supreme price was paid by God. That supreme price was the
sacrificial death of He who was fully God and fully man to rebalance the cosmic scales of justice and
offer us a way back to a loving, nurturing relationship with our Creator.
St. Bede commented on this verse that “Eternal life is not given for good merits. Rather, merit is first
given freely by a benevolent Savior.”
And of course that’s the second contrast, and the final point for this morning. Death vs. not just life,
but eternal life. Once again that Greek phrase zoe aionios, which means the new, permanent,
vibrant God-life that starts for believers right here and now and extends in an ever-mounting
crescendo of heavenly music past the end of time itself. The choir is back, and it’s growing every
day with each person in every place around this world who places their faith in Jesus!
I trust you’ve heard of the new age? Well, we’re living in the new age here and now! It’s called the
age of grace. And the main point, the big idea of today’s Romans passage is that this new age of
grace involves living an obedient and godly life. In God’s power may we channel our gratitude for
God’s free gift by doing exactly that. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
In fact this may just go on a while longer! I hope you like Paul’s teaching as much as I do.
Over the past several weeks we’ve been looking at what he has to tell us about some of the basics
of the Christian faith. We’ve heard about God’s unmerited grace and focused love in giving us the
gift of his Son so we could once again have God and have life. We heard the great news that this
salvation is ours for the price of belief and trust in Jesus. Then last week we heard that this gift of
grace came at a great price, and doesn’t give us the option to take it for granted and whoop it up
and sin all we want to just because grace was given to us freely. And we looked at this whole
phenomenon of human sin and talked about how to begin living a new life in which sin is gradually
being extinguished in our lives.
In this morning’s epistle reading Paul continues with his advice about how to be free from our slavery
to sin. But I’d like to start by pointing out just how much our perspective on things like this has
changed in recent years.
Let me start by asking you this: When you talk with unbelievers about sin, what feelings do you
experience? Is there just a little twinge of embarrassment, or fear that they’ll see you as some kind
of fundamentalist nut-case or something? I have to admit, part of me is vaguely uneasy when called
upon to talk about it. It’s become a strange and uncomfortable topic. Not that long ago it seemed
like most of us knew what “sin” meant, and one way or another, we had to deal with it. But we seem
to have gone into this collective denial in which we feel like the concept doesn’t apply to us any more
in this more “enlightened” day and age.
Last week we watched part of Ken Burns’ incredible PBS series on World War II. I have to say, there’
s nothing like a documentary on war to inoculate against this idea that evil and sin are passé
concepts. After viewing this program if you don’t clearly see evidence for sin I think a reality check
might be in order.
And all of this teaching Paul gives us is based upon the premise that sin is what separates us from
God and from each other. You might be interested to know that hamartia, the Greek word for sin,
may be translated as “missing the mark.” We take aim, fire the arrow of our often good intentions,
and quite often miss the target. Something is very wrong. Our aim may be good, but our follow
through isn’t.
One of my favorite literary images of how sin took root in the world is found in J.R.R. Tolkien’s book
The Silmarillion, which is the prequel to his masterpiece, The Lord of the Rings. Chapter One of the
Silmarillion is a mythological story about the creation, in which a group of beings called the ainur,
which look to be Tolkien’s counterpart to the angels, were the first intelligent beings to be created.
They expressed themselves through music, and sang beautifully to the Creator. In a relationship of
unhindered love, the Creator taught them of His wonders and mysteries. Tolkien writes they were
like a countless throng of choirs, all singing their praises in harmony with God. And the Creator
gave each the gift of free thought. But at one point the most powerful of the ainur decided to
enhance the glory of his own part, and began to improvise, thinking he could improve on the music
of the Creator. This led to disharmony which eventually spread to other ainur, and resulted in a
rebellious din of noise. The Creator was soon surrounded by a storm of rebellion and dissonance
that tore apart the beauty of the original theme. He eventually expelled the rebels from his
presence, and they went on to tempt and torment the Creator’s other intelligent creatures so they
too would be out of harmony.
I recommend that you read Tolkien’s original rather than settling for my inadequate retelling of it.
But I trust you can see the parallels with the biblical account of what we call “The Fall.” The
scriptures tell us that something catastrophic happened back in the mists of time that changed us
from being naturally in harmony with the Creator to being out of tune and in rebellion. That
something is what the scriptures call “sin.” Through the ages it’s been passed down to us. In fact
we’ve become so used to it that we may no longer even recognize it. There’s a shamelessness that
goes along with our cozy familiarity with sin. Jeremiah recognized this among the people he
prophesied to 2500 years ago. About them he says, “They acted shamefully, they committed
abominations; yet they were not ashamed, they didn’t know how to blush.” They didn’t know how to
blush. Does this not
describe the state of our culture in many ways?
Our scriptures tell us that thinking rightly, speaking rightly, and doing rightly are supremely important
to God. You see, in the Bible we don’t get a lot of language about things like evolving our Spirits or
recognizing the God within us. Instead we have a lot of talk about the hands on, nuts and bolts
thinking and behavior that misses the target God gave to his own human creation. Paul says, “All
have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” The word “sin” is used over 700 times in the Bible. It’
s no small matter.
This is the backdrop for what we talked about last week on being “dead to sin.” Remember that we
looked at that idea of responding to temptation just as a corpse would. I’d like to briefly follow up on
that, perhaps with a little more animation this week. I first need to say that the scriptures say there’s
a specific created being, an intelligent entity that the Bible identifies as a fallen angel, in fact
formerly God’s chief angel, as the leader of the rebellion. We know him as Satan. Many have tried
to reduce Satan to a metaphor for evil. Kind of a personification of something that really is
impersonal. I personally don’t buy this. I had a very real, spiritual encounter with one of Satan’s
servants about 25 years ago that decisively convinced me otherwise. I’ll have to tell you about it
some time.
But Satan, the Tempter, is depicted as a proud and vain being. He thrives on attention. So when
we’re dead to sin, in a sense we starve temptation by removing our attention from it. Rather than
tangling with the Tempter we leave him high and dry by simply not attending to him.
But I’d like to take this strategic maneuver of ours a step further this morning. We’ve talked about
what not to do; now let’s talk a little more about what to do. When we turn away from one thing, we
turn toward another. Last week we mentioned turning our attention to whatever is true, right, noble,
pure, admirable, excellent and praiseworthy. Does this sound like anybody you know? What if we
were to follow the advice of that old praise hymn that says, “Turn your eyes upon Jesus.” When
temptation knocks on the door, turn toward the ‘living’ room. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Would
you recognize him if you saw him? Are you familiar enough with his presence in your life that you’ll
know where he is and can turn to him with confidence? This is one decided advantage of daily
seeking his face.
The thing is, if you believe, the giver of grace is closer to you than you even know. Please let us all
take advantage of the blessed opportunity we have. Paul writes, “Sin will have no dominion over
you, since you are no longer under the law, but under grace.” When we were under the law, the
expectation of obedience required that we tangle with the tempter. The scriptures stand as a
witness to the fact that this was a battle that God’s people repeatedly lost. The story of God’s
people trying to obey is an ongoing saga of two steps forward, two steps back. This is the reason
God the Father sent Jesus to the rescue. The age of law didn’t work out very well for us. But the
hallmark of the age of grace is our victory in Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit. We’re freed from
the cycle of sin and guilt because Jesus paid the debt for our sin. We are now truly free. And we
have the Lord working beside us and within us to keep us moving forward.
Paul asks, “Should we sin because we’re not under the law, but under grace? By no means!” He
encourages us to be dead to sin, and alive to God through Jesus. As we starve temptation and turn
our eyes on Jesus, we’re given access to the power that encourages Paul to proclaim that we’re now
slaves to righteousness. Slaves to righteousness. Slaves to goodness. Now there’s a strange turn
of phrase. Slaves to righteousness? Isn’t that an oxymoron? But you see, the scriptures say that
we’re either slaves to sin or slaves to righteousness. There’s really no such thing as us being
entirely autonomous and perfectly in control of ourselves. Remember that great Bob Dylan song
that says, “It may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve somebody.” I’ll
be merciful at this point and spare you my Bob Dylan impression.
You see, before Jesus, even our free will was bent by sin. Our freedom was illusory. We thought we
had everything under control, and were in denial about our sin. That’s exactly where Satan wanted
us. But Paul says victory comes in our redemption through Jesus, by faith. We’re now under new
management. And our new manager has freed us from slavery to sin.
Paul lists two other great rewards for faith as well. The first is that slow, internal housecleaning that
Paul calls sanctification. Sanctification is the outworking of our obedience to Christ in the power of
the Holy Spirit. It’s a state of being set apart, and spiritually changing so that we become better
people, as God defines the word “better”. We’re all on the sanctification road, and that particular
journey won’t be completed until we see Jesus face to face. That’s when spring cleaning will be
completed. That’s when our voices will again be perfectly in tune with God.
The other great reward for faith is one we’ve talked about many times. Eternal life. It comes into
focus with those famous words Paul writes at the end of the chapter. This is one of those memory
verses from Sunday School, and it’s this with which I’ll close. “For the wages of sin is death, but the
free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” This verse summarizes Paul’s
teaching on the problem of sin, and its solution.
Notice the contrast between wages and the free gift. Wages, of course, are something we earn.
Paul says that, by sinning, we’ve earned death. We’ve cut ourselves off from the source of life, in
whom there is no darkness, and who by His nature can’t play host to any darkness. Loud, dissonant
voices can’t remain in the choir. The predictable consequence of sin, the wages we earn, is spiritual
death. And by contrast, for those who choose to receive it, the free gift of God is eternal life. We
didn’t earn it; it’s a gift! It’s a costly gift paid for by God himself. St. Bede commented on this verse
that “Eternal life is not given for good merits. Rather, merit is first given freely by a benevolent
Savior.”
And of course that’s the other contrast. Death vs. not just life, but eternal life. Once again that
Greek phrase zoe aionios, which means the new, permanent, vibrant God-life that starts for
believers right here and now, and extends in an ever-mounting crescendo of heavenly music past
the end of time itself. Beloved, thanks to Jesus the choir is back in tune, and it’s growing every day
with each person in every place around this world who places their faith in Him! I trust you’ve heard
of the new age? Well, you and I are living in it here and now. It’s called the age of grace. And the
main point, the resounding proclamation of today’s Romans passage is that the Lord of this new age
of grace gives us life and victory, and helps us to live in obedience and godliness. In God’s power
may we channel our gratitude for God’s free gift by doing exactly that. In the name of the Father,
and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
And of course there’s an added bonus. Please listen carefully. In today’s passage Paul says, “Sin
will have no dominion over you, since you are no longer under the law, but under grace.” What
does this mean? Well, when we were under the law, the expectation of obedience required that we
tangle with the tempter. The scriptures stand as a witness to the fact that this was a battle that God’
s people repeatedly lost. The story of God’s people trying to obey is an ongoing saga of two steps
forward, two steps back. This is the reason God the Father sent Jesus to the rescue.
The age of law didn’t work out very well for us. But the hallmark of the age of grace is our victory in
Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit. We’re freed from the cycle of sin and guilt because Jesus paid
the debt for our sin. We are now truly free. And we have the Lord working beside us and within us
to keep us moving forward. Paul asks, “Should we sin because we’re not under the law, but under
grace? By no means!” He encourages us to be dead to sin, and alive to God through Jesus. As we
starve temptation and turn our eyes on Jesus, we’re given access to the power that encourages
Paul to proclaim that we’re now slaves to righteousness.
Slaves to righteousness. Slaves to goodness. A strange turn of phrase. But you see, the
scriptures say that we’re either slaves to sin or slaves to righteousness. There’s really no such
thing as us being entirely autonomous and perfectly in control of ourselves. Remember that great
Bob Dylan song that says, “It may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve
somebody.” I’ll be merciful at this point and spare you my Bob Dylan impression. I don’t think that
this denies our free will, but in our fallen state our free will is radically influenced, even bent, by sin.
So if we think we’ve got everything under control, we’re in denial about our sin state and we’re
exactly where Satan wants us. But Paul says victory comes in our redemption through Jesus, by
faith. We’re now under new management. And our new manager has freed us from slavery to sin.
Paul lists two other great rewards for faith as well. The first is that slow, internal housecleaning that
Paul calls sanctification. Sanctification is the outworking of our obedience to Christ in the power of
the Holy Spirit. It’s a state of being set apart, and spiritually changing so that we become better
people, as God defines the word “better”. We’re all on the sanctification road, and that particular
journey won’t be completed until we see Jesus face to face. That’s when spring cleaning will be
completed. That’s when our voices will again be perfectly in tune with God.
The other great reward for faith is one we’ve talked about many times. Eternal life. It comes into
focus with those famous words Paul writes at the end of the chapter. This is one of those memory
verses from Sunday School. “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life
through Jesus Christ our Lord.” This verse really kind of summarizes Paul’s teaching on the
problem of sin and its solution. Throughout Paul’s Letters he’s meticulously precise with his words,
and this verse is no exception. He uses words that provide some unmistakable contrasts.
One of those contrasts is his comparison of wages with a free gift. Wages, of course, are something
we earn. Paul says that, by sinning, we’ve earned death. We’ve cut ourselves off from the source
of life, in whom there is no darkness at all, and who by His nature can’t play host to any darkness.
Loud, dissonant voices can’t remain in the choir. The predictable consequence of sin, the wages we
earn, is spiritual death.
And by contrast, for those who choose to accept it, the free gift of God is eternal life. We didn’t earn
it; it’s a gift! It’s a gift for which the supreme price was paid by God. That supreme price was the
sacrificial death of He who was fully God and fully man to rebalance the cosmic scales of justice and
offer us a way back to a loving, nurturing relationship with our Creator.
St. Bede commented on this verse that “Eternal life is not given for good merits. Rather, merit is first
given freely by a benevolent Savior.”
And of course that’s the second contrast, and the final point for this morning. Death vs. not just life,
but eternal life. Once again that Greek phrase zoe aionios, which means the new, permanent,
vibrant God-life that starts for believers right here and now and extends in an ever-mounting
crescendo of heavenly music past the end of time itself. The choir is back, and it’s growing every
day with each person in every place around this world who places their faith in Jesus!
I trust you’ve heard of the new age? Well, we’re living in the new age here and now! It’s called the
age of grace. And the main point, the big idea of today’s Romans passage is that this new age of
grace involves living an obedient and godly life. In God’s power may we channel our gratitude for
God’s free gift by doing exactly that. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
Beyond Forgiveness (Part 2)
Romans 6:12-23
Romans 6:12-23
June 29, 2008
Fr. Dan Tuton
Fr. Dan Tuton
