[0:00] Chapters 1-5 of Romans has made it clear to us that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, apart from works.
[0:13] ! Grace alone, 100% by God's grace. Salvation is His work on the sinner, for the sinner, and not the other way around. We receive what we do not deserve by God's grace.
[0:27] By faith alone, it is 100% by faith alone. We cannot earn or work towards salvation. No religious activity, no number of prayers during the day, no good deeds.
[0:42] It is by faith alone in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins. And in Christ alone, Christ, only Jesus Christ, paid the price with His sinless life that we should have paid so that we can be made righteous.
[0:57] Nothing else can accomplish what He accomplished on the cross for us. Meaning, that this salvation, the title that we carry with us, Christian, is all because of Christ and nothing that we have done.
[1:12] There's nothing that you and I have done to deserve or earn this title. It's a big deal. There's nothing in us that made us desirable.
[1:26] There's nothing in us that screamed to the world or to God, look at me, look how deserving I am of grace and mercy. See, God's grace is shown to the undeserving and to the dead.
[1:39] Grace founded in Christ because of Christ and His obedience. See, God's grace is huge. We truly cannot grasp this grace.
[1:52] We can't grasp what He has done for us. We have words to help. Words like, dead, the dead made alive. Or words like, a child of wrath, now at peace with God.
[2:05] But when we really try to wrap our heads around the grace of God, we just can't. And that's why you'll hear some of us say, in a situation, we'll say, well, that's God's grace or God's given me grace or God's grace this.
[2:19] Because it is just so huge. God's grace is wonderful. To be the recipient of such love and such care is wonderful.
[2:32] So to the person in here who does not feel loved, cling to Christ for He loves you. Cling to Him. The Father cares for you as His child because you have been adopted.
[2:47] God's grace is magnificent. It is truly beyond our comprehension. The God whose breath put the stars in the sky and the mountains to their specific heights is the same God who loves you and is for you.
[3:03] God's grace is real. God's grace has a taste. It has a feel to it. It's not just an idea thought up by some apostle 2,000 years ago or even me or some author of a book that you've read here recently.
[3:22] It's real. You know it's real because His grace has a real effect on your life. Even when you might not understand. God's grace is everlasting.
[3:36] The impact that God has is everlasting. It's final from now until forever. It was started before the foundation of the world and it goes to eternity.
[3:48] God's grace is personal. You have been created in His own image. You were created by Him, for Him, and it brings Him great glory. And us great joy to bring Him glory.
[4:03] We can cry Abba Father. We can cry Daddy to Him because we have been adopted as sons of the King. Romans 8 verse 15 says, For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received the spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry Abba Father.
[4:24] Listen to this. The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. And if children, then heirs. Heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ. Provided we suffer with Him in order that we also be glorified with Him.
[4:38] The Spirit Himself bears witness that we are His. It is personal. Jesus died bearing the sin of you and me. For you and me.
[4:52] And God's grace is radical. And this is where our text is this morning. This is kind of where we sit. It is radical enough to kill us. And it is radical enough to give us life.
[5:04] We are going to look at these two truths and their implications. So as a quick review, I kind of need to do this because Paul is making an argument throughout this letter.
[5:16] Romans chapter 1 basically starts off with the depravity of man. That we are all sinners. That we are in need of a Savior. He even touches on the person in a jungle far away who has never heard the gospel.
[5:31] And he says that they are without excuse because even creation speaks of the glory of God. We come to chapter 2. Chapter 2 is about the Jewish people are depraved.
[5:44] The Jewish people are sinners. There is no religion, no activity that saves you. Chapter 3 kind of sums up 1 and 2.
[5:54] We are all sinners in need of a Savior. That no one is righteous. No, not one. For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Chapter 4.
[6:05] Okay, we've got to establish. Here's our problem. Chapter 4 is the solution. We are justified by faith alone. Not by works. So, as I've said already, no religious activity, no good deed, no prayer, no nothing can earn your salvation.
[6:23] It is by faith alone in Christ alone. And that is a gift from God. Chapter 5 is kind of the result or starts in the result of being saved by faith alone.
[6:38] We are given peace with God. We are given peace with God. That our standing with God is right and at peace because of the work of Christ. And then at the end, last week, we talked about either belonging to Adam or belonging to Jesus Christ.
[6:54] Adam brought sin into the world. Jesus brought life into the world by living a sinless life and dying for our sins. So, here's where we kind of step.
[7:08] So, as we gather this morning, the majority in this room bear the title Christian. I think it's safe to say. But there may be some who have never tasted it.
[7:20] You've never heard of Jesus or never even considered this Christian thing. And if that's the case, then I'm glad you're here. Because my prayer is that you would see that Jesus is all you need.
[7:33] No matter the situation in which you're living. No matter the bad thing that you think you've done that will not be taken care of, will not be forgiven.
[7:45] No matter the baggage you brought with you this morning, He is all you need. He will take that baggage from you because He loves you and He cares for you.
[7:56] God's grace leads to a certain type of living. And this, I hope and I pray, is what we will all see, be convicted of and commit to live. So, let's dig in.
[8:08] I'm going to start reading in verse 20 of chapter 5 and then read through 11 in chapter 6. Verse 20. Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.
[8:26] So that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign throughout righteousness, leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. So stop for a second.
[8:37] Our salvation is Jesus Christ alone. On what He has done, not what we have done. So that's kind of, okay, so we're all on the same page. Verse 1. What shall we say then?
[8:48] Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means. How can we who died to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?
[9:02] We were buried, therefore, with Him by baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
[9:14] 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.
[9:33] 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.
[9:46] Death no longer has dominion over Him. For the death He died, He died to sin once for all. For the life He lives, He lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
[10:03] God's grace is radical. One point this morning, two sub-points, and then some other things mixed in there. God's grace is radical. And it's radical enough to kill us.
[10:16] See, all Christians, no matter what maturity, nominal Christian, immature Christian, mature Christian, growing Christian, all would agree that Jesus died for our sins.
[10:29] All Christians acknowledge that Jesus is what Christianity is all about. You'll see bumper stickers and signs and coffee mugs that say, Jesus is the reason for the season.
[10:41] We're getting into that season. You'll see, Jesus is my co-pilot, or Jesus is my pilot. Or the heretical version, Jesus is my co-pilot. You'll find it's all about Jesus on t-shirts and church signs and mugs, and you name it.
[10:57] But I wonder, I wonder if you'll find in your bookstore or in your local church parking lot, I died so that I will live. I wonder if you'll find I crucified my life, or I killed myself for life, or my own life is dead and it is a good thing.
[11:17] You're not going to find it. You're not going to find it because these things aren't nice. They're not uplifting. But that's exactly what our text is saying this morning.
[11:28] And it's not just here in Romans. Jesus Himself spoke of dying to yourself, picking up your cross. Luke chapter 9, Mark chapter 8, Matthew chapter 8, Matthew chapter 16, all speak to having to die yourself.
[11:50] It's not something new. This isn't some new idea. It's not something abusive or callous or carnal. It is truth. The reason it doesn't get taught, though, is because we, mankind, think we know best.
[12:08] We think that it will cause more harm than good to speak about dying, especially ourselves dying while living.
[12:18] That might even confuse somebody. But I would rather confuse a little than condemn a lot. Adam and Eve thought that they knew better.
[12:31] They thought that I'm going to eat of this fruit and it's going to be okay. God is just trying to keep us, keep something from us. So just so there's no misunderstanding, no confusion, we're not talking about a physical death, but a spiritual death.
[12:49] So how does this affect us? How and why does this matter to us? Well, it begins with God's grace is radical enough to kill us. Look at some of the language in our text this morning.
[13:02] Chapter 6, verse 3. We have words into Christ Jesus or into His death. Verse 4, we have buried with Him.
[13:14] Verse 5 says we have been united with Him in a death like His. Verse 6 says we are crucified with Him. Verse 8, died with Christ.
[13:26] See, Paul, as he does often in his letters, is repeating a theme over and over. He's repeating himself so that the audience, us, the readers of this letter, the early church in Rome, would grasp what he's trying to communicate.
[13:43] They would understand what he's trying to say. And he repeats two things in our text this morning. One being that we're united with Christ. Somehow, someway, we are united with Christ.
[13:55] The other thing is that we have died with Christ. Somehow, someway. 115 times in the New Testament, when describing or talking about Christians, it is described as in Christ, with Christ, united with Christ.
[14:19] And we see it here in our text. The Christian life is not a certain way to act. It's not a certain thing to do, although there is a bit of that.
[14:31] It's not presenting yourself in a certain way, although there is a little bit of that. Both of these, though, acting and presenting, come out of being united with Christ.
[14:43] So, we may do good deeds, but those good deeds are out of being united with Christ and bearing His righteousness.
[14:55] So, get the idea out of your head that you have to act a certain way or abstain from certain things in life because none of that makes you a good Christian.
[15:06] In fact, there's no such thing as a good Christian. You are united with Him. His righteousness you bear. Your sin removed.
[15:19] Christ has done it all. See, the life of a Christian is based on what Christ has done and not what you do or how you act.
[15:29] We're also united with Jesus in His death on the cross. Look at verse 5 and 6 in chapter 6 of Romans. It says, 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.
[15:47] We know that our old self, our old man, was crucified with Him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing. See, we died with Jesus.
[15:57] Our old self died with Jesus on the cross. If you are a Christian, your old self died with Jesus on the cross. So someone may ask you, When were you born again?
[16:08] This came up a couple of weeks ago at our Q&A on Thursday night. When were you born again? Is it important to know the date? Now you can say 2,000 years ago is when I was born again.
[16:20] When Christ died on the cross and bore my sin. We are united with Him on the cross and that killed us, our sinful nature, our old self.
[16:31] Look at these verses again. In chapter 6, verse 2, We died to sin. Verse 3, Baptized into His death. Verse 4, Buried by baptism into death.
[16:46] Verse 5, United with Him in a death like His. Verse 6, Crucified with Him. Verse 7, For one who has died.
[16:58] Verse 8, Died with Christ. Verse 11, Dead to sin. See, God's grace is radical enough to kill us.
[17:09] And that's good news. That's good news. Here's why it's good news. The last part of verse 6 that I did not read says, So that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.
[17:22] We have died to sin. On the cross, we have died to that sin. We are no longer enslaved to sin. It is no longer our master. Now, this idea of dying to sin doesn't mean that sin no longer exists.
[17:39] Bad news. It still exists. It's still there. Sin didn't die. It will die. It will end. But it hasn't died. The believer died.
[17:51] Sin remains, but does not reign. Sin remains, but does not master you if you are a Christian, if you are a child of God. Our sinful nature is no longer alive.
[18:04] It is powerless to the Christian. So, for the Christian to continue in sin like verse 1 says, what shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound?
[18:17] So, for the Christian to continue in sin, in verse 2 it says, how can we who died to sin still live in it? For the Christian to continue in sin and to live in sin is not possible.
[18:29] It's impossible for the Christian. That part of you is dead. And dead people can't sin. Paul is telling us that if you are truly born again, if you have tasted the freedom from the tyranny of sin, you will not and cannot continue in sin.
[18:48] You cannot live a life of sin. Your life will not be ruled by temporary pleasures. Your life will not be consumed by pornography.
[18:59] Your life will not be consumed by material possessions that you don't have. Your life will not be consumed by pleasing and or fearing people. your life will not be consumed by your addictions to drugs, alcohol, sex, food.
[19:16] Your life will not be consumed by selfishness. Your life will not be consumed by always being the victim. And your life will not be consumed by conforming to what others are doing, saying, or buying.
[19:33] To the radical grace of God changes your being. And out of your being, being changed, your behavior then changes. God's radical grace gives you a new heart, a new life, and is no longer mastered by sin.
[19:48] So here are three implications of being dead to sin. The first one, first implication is that sin is voluntary. Sin is voluntary.
[20:00] So, before you were a Christian, if you're not a Christian, then this applies to you. There was no decision for you to make regarding whether or not you were going to sin.
[20:13] There wasn't a choice to be made in your head, in your life. You were going to sin. That's what you did. It was like breathing for us. We just breathe. We don't think about breathing.
[20:24] We just do it. And for the non-Christian, we just sin. We just live sinful lives. See, as a non-Christian, you were ruled by sin, which means everything you did was under the rule and reign of sin.
[20:39] You were a slave to it. You had one master and its name was sin. There's a saying out there that I sin because I'm a sinner or I'm a sinner because I sin.
[20:56] Which one is it? Well, you sin because you are a sinner, not the other way around as an unbeliever. As a Christian whose sin nature has died, all sin committed is voluntary on your part, on my part.
[21:14] All sin is voluntary because it no longer has power. It no longer has master. It masters over you. You volunteer to sin and in so doing cause yourself to be consumed by that sin.
[21:28] that in all reality is powerless. So not only is sin voluntary, but implication number two, sin is temporary.
[21:42] See, when we're faced with a temptation, when we're in that moment, when we're seconds or minutes before volunteering to sin, the lies we choose to believe or are faced with are something like this.
[21:57] God is not worth it. God is not real. God is busy. God is holding certain things from you.
[22:08] God is cruel and He doesn't care about your life. God wants you to celebrate and take pleasure in His creation, whatever that may be. God is not and it does not bring God glory and it certainly does not bring us joy.
[22:31] See, sin is enjoyable. I'm not telling you anything you don't know. There's a time for a moment. It might be a second. It might be a minute. But in the end, that enjoyable feeling ends and you are faced with the reality of being enslaved to sin.
[22:52] Which is what Jesus died to remove. You've been set free from sin, not temporarily, not as long as you're good, not as long as you read your Bible every day.
[23:06] You've been set free from sin forever. We have died to sin forever. It no longer will have power to defeat you because 1 John says He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.
[23:27] So, implication number three. And this goes without saying because our text says it, but sin is weak. Sin no longer has reign over us, but it still exists.
[23:40] It's still there. We must look to the cross and find our strength there to overcome. There are going to be struggles.
[23:51] There are going to be moments of weakness in our lives. But we have got to remember that sin has no power over us. Jesus has defeated death and sin.
[24:04] Look at verse 6 of chapter 6. We know that our old self was crucified with Him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing.
[24:15] Our old self has been brought to nothing. No power. No dominion. No strength. And yet, we give it power. And yet, we give it strength.
[24:27] We give it dominion over us when we choose to sin. let your life be a celebration of God's grace.
[24:39] Let your life be rejoicing in God's radical grace that He has shown you. That His radical grace kills you instead of what verse 1 is alluding to, abusing God's grace.
[24:57] His radical grace. So not only is God's grace radical enough to kill us, it is also radical enough to give life.
[25:10] Follow me through these verses. Verse 4 says, we too might walk in newness of life. Verse 5 Be united with Him in a resurrection like His.
[25:23] A new life. Verse 6 A new life looks like no longer being enslaved to sin. Verse 8 We believe that we also live with Him.
[25:36] Verse 11 Alive to God in Christ Jesus. Galatians 2 20 says, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.
[25:50] We have been crucified with Christ and that sin no longer exists. But the second part of that verse, it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.
[26:02] This is a reality. This is real. Christ lives in us and gives us a new life. Back to Romans 6 verse 2 We have the question in verse 1 It says, What shall we say then?
[26:19] Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? His answer of course is by no means. May it not be so. No. Impossible. Then he answers with a rhetorical question.
[26:33] How can we who died to sin still live in it? In other words, it is impossible to do so. It is impossible. You can't because you have been given a new life.
[26:45] And that new life cannot be dead again. It doesn't happen. See, once you've been made alive by God, you cannot continue in sin. It is impossible.
[26:57] We have been given a new life. It is impossible to live in sin. Impossible to live without conviction, without repentance, without confession.
[27:09] I'm repeating myself because I want to make sure we understand. It is impossible to be a Christian and to live in sin. Now, it's possible to be a Christian and sin, but not to live in sin.
[27:21] Not to have a life consumed and mastered by sin. So the question is, right here, right now, is your life mastered by sin or not?
[27:35] Are you living in sin or not? You guys seen the guy who spins plates, you'll know what I'm talking about?
[27:47] He spins plates on a stick and on his other hand and on his knees and on his head. I don't know how many plates, but there's just tons of plates. He starts stacking them and they're spinning and spinning.
[27:58] Eventually, at some point, he's going to run out of being able to spin plates and then they all come crashing down. Whether that's the Guinness Book of World Record, who cares really?
[28:09] But it gets to a point where he can't spin any more plates. We make the Christian life out to be spinning plates.
[28:21] If I do this, if I read my Bible and I say a prayer before bed and after meals or before meals, I share my faith with somebody, if I talk about Jesus, if I listen to Christian music and wear Christian t-shirts, and if I do this, and if I do that, and if I do these things, if I go to Bible study, if I go to Thursday night Bible study, and I'm at community group on Wednesday, and I'm Sunday night Bible study, and I sit down on Sunday morning at a church, and we try to do all these things, and eventually, if that's what our Christian life is, if that's what we think it is in our head, eventually, we're going to run out of the ability to spin plates.
[29:09] Our Christianity, our life, our religion will be based in self-effort and not in grace. Here's the problem. If this happens, if your Christian life is based not on grace, not on God's radical grace, but based on your self-effort, when you fail, however many times that is, eventually, you're going to quit.
[29:37] Eventually, you're going to say, it's too hard. And it happens because we fail to understand God's radical grace. We fail to understand what He has done for us.
[29:50] So, living in sin is not possible to avoid on your own merit. sin. It's not possible to say, I am not going to live in sin.
[30:04] It's impossible. No matter how good you strive to be, you cannot avoid living in sin outside of Christ, outside of His grace, His saving grace.
[30:20] But since you have a new life, since you are born again, you've been reborn, you've been resurrected, as verse 5 says, because of Jesus and His grace, you don't just avoid living in sin, it becomes an impossibility.
[30:38] And you can stop trying to spin plates. We receive life through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and we are given a completely secured new life in Him.
[30:50] And we no longer are enslaved to sin, we are no longer hindered by chains of sin, but free, free to be sinless, free to live perfect lives.
[31:05] Look at verse 10. It says, for the death He died, He died to sin, once for all He being Jesus, for the life He lives, He lives to God.
[31:18] Jesus is our friend, He is our advocate, and He is our example. Jesus lives for the glory of God. He, from His own words in the book of John, says, I live for the glory of the Father.
[31:36] I do what I see the Father doing repeated over and over. If Jesus is our example, then our lives live for the glory of God.
[31:47] In other words, we bring glory to God when we don't give in to temptation. We bring glory to God when we choose to cling to the cross. We bring glory to God when we turn the TV off when that show comes on.
[32:02] We bring glory to God when we don't visit that website. We bring glory to God when we are content in our situation. We bring glory to God when we lay our burdens at His feet.
[32:16] We bring glory to God when the gossip stops. We bring glory to God when we love our wives as Christ loved the church. We bring glory to God when we work to our fullest potential.
[32:31] We bring glory to God when we treasure Christ. We bring glory to God when we admit our weaknesses and beg Him for help. God's radical grace gives us a new life.
[32:44] A new life where we can bring glory to God. This new life that you've been given is dead to sin. Give God glory with your lives not just in the knowledge or theology that you carry with you.
[33:00] This new life will no longer die. Give God glory with your entire life and not just your Sunday morning when you attend a church gathering. This new life is free from being mastered by sin.
[33:14] Give God glory with your life, not just when you experience something emotional. This new life is secured by Jesus. Give God glory this morning by repenting from your self-effort and sin.
[33:29] This new life is because of His radical grace. Give God glory with your mind, your heart, and your soul. God's grace is radical.
[33:40] It is radical enough to kill you and it is radical enough to give you life. Let us celebrate this grace forever and not abuse it as our question in verse 1.
[33:53] Hence act.