Why Do Christians Still Sin?
Why is it that Christians still sin after baptism? This is the question Paul asks in today’s passage.
Today’s Scripture: Romans 6:1-12
Don’t forget I’m going to be teaching an in-person Bible study on Romans TOMORROW: Wednesday, October 20, 6-7 PM. More info here.
6:1 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?
Paul has hit this question previously in Romans. If God’s grace shows up wherever sin is present, and if the greater the sin means the greater the grace, then why don’t we just sin more so there is more grace?
2 By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptizedinto Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 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.
5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7 because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.
8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10 The death he died, he died to sinonce for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
Paul emphatically answers the question from the previous verse: NO WAY. We don’t sin to “increase” God’s grace because that would imply we are still under the slavery of sin. But, in fact, in a mystical way, we have been united with Christ through faith, and our old sinful self has been crucified with Christ. What this means is that there is no reason whatsoever that Christians must continue to sin. It’s like we’ve been let out of prison—there is no reason to walk back inside the prison walls.
11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. 13 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. 14 For sin shall no longer be your master,because you are not under the law, but under grace.
I find this passage really encouraging and convicting: there is no reason for me to be tolerant of sin in my life, because Christ has set me free from sin. This means there is nothing inevitable about my sin—through the work of the Holy Spirit, I can shut the door on past practices and live as a new man.
What do you need to walk away from today?