Romans 6:5-11

5For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. 7For one who has died has been set free from sin. 8Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. 10For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. 11So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.

Transcript

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Hello, this is Dr. Bill Branks, author of Love the Word. Our text today is Romans six, verses five through eleven. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again. Death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died, he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Conceptually, many people struggle to understand this text. How is it that we can be united with Christ in death, as well as being united with him in resurrection? Our old self was dominated by sin, so was crucified with him in order that everything we were before redemption might be brought to nothing. Last summer, my wife wanted to plant some flowers around the barn we just had placed in the back part of our property. We really didn't know what had been there before we had the land leveled. We got ready to place the barn and then do some landscaping. So, when it came time to dig holes for each plant, twelve of them, we soon found that the ground we wanted to plant and was lousy with stumps and large roots. For the next couple of days, I used a hatchet, an axe, a chainsaw, a hammer, a chisel, and a large drill to bore deep into the roots and stumps. The work became so hard and tedious that explosives seemed like a good idea. I wanted to get every root, every bit of this old growth out of the ground to prevent any of it from growing up and choking out my wife's plants and flowers. I knew that we would not be rid of this until I destroyed every part of it that might find new life and take over our new work. Christ's work on the cross was similar. It was his intention to absolutely destroy our old flesh and do it thoroughly. Every root, seed, and fiber of sin had to be eradicated. He is holy, and we must be as well. We needed to die along with Christ as he needed to die for our sins. It is helpful to picture Christ embracing us as he entered into death's grip. In order for us to be truly born again, we needed to truly die spiritually. Our body of sin had to be completely destroyed with no possibility of it finding life again. When Christ was raised from the dead, we were raised as well, but our old self remained on the cross hanging there, sin weighing heavily on our lifeless remains. The chains of sin bondage were shattered and left behind. We are free, yes, free indeed. Born again, new heart, new life in Christ. There are many more facets to our death and resurrection with Christ. When we say Jesus died for our sins, we are correct, but there is much more. We have been completely set free from sin. He died to sin for us once and for all. The old self and sin bondage are left behind. We are permanently unchained from the debilitating effects of sin. We will also, in a real sense, live with him. There is no greater joy, comfort, security, fulfillment, or sense of belonging than we will have to live as family with Christ eternally. We can truly and always consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. This is a promise and guarantee on which we can build our assurance in Christ. Hallelujah.