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(upbeat music) - How do we deal with the reality of sin in our lives as
believers? And welcome to our daily drive time devotions through Romans, Romans
chapter six, a chapter that answers that question that I just asked. How do we
deal with the reality of sin in our lives as believers?

By seeing ourselves through faith. Faith means that we see ourselves as God sees
us. And today we're going to look together at Romans chapter six, verses 15 to 23.

Let me just tell you from the very beginning, in these verses, God tells us
something a lot of us would rather not hear. God reminds us in these verses of a
truth about ourselves that most of us would rather not admit. He reminds us of
the truth that we are all slaves to something.

In Romans chapter six, verse 15, let's just walk through these verses 15 to 23.
In verse 15, he says, what then? Shall we sin because we're not under law but
under grace?

By no means. He begins this section by answering the question, if grace is
really grace, some people were asking, why not just go ahead and sin? And Paul's
answer is, the truth is, the truth is we are saved by God's grace.

Not to sin, but to be a slave to him. The answer to this question is in the
truth that we're all slaves to something spiritually. Now I know the term
slavery, at least for me, has a lot of negative pictures to it because I think
of historical slavery.

I think of one person enslaving another. But in these verses, that's not what
Paul is talking about. He's talking about spiritual slavery.

He's talking about what happens on the inside of us. In verse 16, he reminds us
that we are all slaves, spiritually, to the one that we obey. That verse says,
don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as a slave,
you are slaves to the one you obey.

Whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which
leads to righteousness. That's a powerful verse. It reminds us that we're all
slaves to something.

Now let me just take you one more verse in before we focus on that 'cause it's
so important to understand this concept. Verse 17 says, but thanks be to God.
Thanks be to God that though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly
obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted.

It's a very interesting verse when it says there at the end, you obeyed the form
of teaching to which you were entrusted. That term, the form of teaching, is the
idea of a mold, a form into which a molten metal might be poured so that it
could take on a beautiful shape. And this verse says we obeyed the form of
teaching to which we were entrusted.

It's not that the teaching was given to us, we were given to the teaching in
this verse. And as we're given to the teaching, it's like us being poured into a
mold and our life is formed and shaped by the teaching, the truth of God. It's
entrusted so that we can live and be the kind of people that God has made us to
be.

And because of that, the Bible tells us in verse 18 that we have become slaves
to righteousness. You have been set free from sin and you've become slaves to
righteousness. All right, let's dig into this.

Wait a minute, some of you might be thinking, I thought I was free. Now that I'm
a Christian, I thought I was free in Christ. The truth shall set you what?

Set you free. The truth of the matter is, none of us are totally free in one
sense. We're all going to be a slave to something.

We're all going to follow something. We've all gotta serve somebody. And so when
you and I think about who we are in Jesus Christ, we need to realize I can
either be a slave and decide to serve unrighteousness or I can decide to serve
God.

And so that's why in verse 19, the Bible says, I put this in human terms because
you are weak in your natural selves. Just as you used to offer the parts of your
body to slavery, to impurity, to ever increasing wickedness, so now offer them
in slavery to righteousness, leading to holiness. Verse 20 and 21, when you were
slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness.

You see, when you and I take a look at our lives, we're going to be a slave, a
servant to something, and we're going to be free from something. And Paul's
painting a picture here. He's saying, when you were a slave to sin, when you had
no control, no ability to really say no, now Satan likes to make us think we
have the ability to say no or else we'd all turn immediately to Christ.

So he fools us in our temptations. But before we come to Christ, we really don't
have the ability to say no to temptation. When you were slaves to sin, you are
free from something.

You're free from righteousness. You're free from God. He's not a part of your
life.

But when you become a slave to God, then you're free from sin. The Bible says in
verse 21 of Romans chapter six, what benefit did you reap at that time from the
things that you're now ashamed of? Now let's just be honest, he's saying.

Those things resulted in death, the verse ends. When I was a slave to sin, that
meant I had a certain freedom from righteousness. It didn't have any hold on my
life.

It didn't have any call on my life. I was called to do the things that I wanted
to do, not the things that God was wanting me to do. But to be a slave to God
means that I have a freedom from sin.

Verses 22 and 23 talk about that. But now you have been set free from sin and
you've become slaves to God. And the benefit that you reap leads to holiness.

And the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of
God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. In many ways, I would call this
the duh section of Romans chapter six.

It's saying here, you got two choices. Which will it be? Freedom.

You can have the freedom to sin. You can be a slave to sin, but look at what
happens when you're a slave to sin. First, sin makes you a slave.

Second, it makes you ashamed. And third, it spreads death throughout not only
your entire life, but also the entire existence of the universe. The wages of
sin is death.

You can choose that. Or how about grace? You can choose grace and through grace
you can have holiness, become more and more like God, and eternal life, live
with him forever.

It's the duh section. Hmm, what should I choose? Now I know people often think,
I'd like to have a third choice.

I don't want to be a slave to sin. I don't want to be a slave to God. I'd like
to run life my own way.

I'd like to be free. There is no third choice. You either serve sin or you serve
God.

You either love sin or you love God. No man can serve two masters. No woman can
serve two masters.

The point of these verses is that human nature is made to serve a master. Now
you can lie to yourself about that. You can pretend that's not true.

It does not change the truth about yourself. Now I know, I know we who are
Americans hate this truth. Freedom is one of our major values.

And we should have national freedom. We should have freedom of speech. We should
have freedom of the press.

We should have all of those things. But this verse is talking about our
spiritual nature. And in our spiritual nature, we are going to serve someone.

Bob Dylan was right. And if I'm going to serve someone, I'm going to choose to
serve God. Truth is, I can give in to temptation or I can give in to God.

And this day, I have to choose who is it that I'm going to serve. Romans chapter
six, verses 15 to 23. We sort of walk through those part by part.

Let me share those verses with you again and see if as we've talked about them
now, you can hear the truth in them as I share these verses with you again.
Beginning in verse 16. Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone
to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey, whether you're a
slave to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to
righteousness.

But thanks be to God, that though you used to be slaves to sin, you
wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. You have
been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. I put this in
human terms because you are weak in your natural selves.

Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to
ever increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness,
leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control
of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things that
you're now ashamed of?

Those things result in death. But now, now that you've been set free from sin
and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness and the
result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is
eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Next week, we're going to be looking together at Romans chapter seven as we
continue in this section about how you and I grow as Christians based on the
goodness and the greatness of God. Join us next week from Romans chapter seven.