Those in Christ Will NOT Continue in Sin ~ Romans 6:7-12

This study is difficult for most Christians to understand since they have been taught it so differently. Let me give you an illustration to help you grasp it. When Abraham was a very old man and his wife was way past child bearing, God told him that he was going to be a father of a great nation.  And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing {Genesis 12:3}. Abraham had no children and no possible way to have children being they were both so old but he believed God. You will not completely understand how your old man, your flesh, died with Christ and you rose again with Him. You will not understand how you are a new creature and dead and freed from sin. You don't have to understand it. You just have to believe God when He tells you these things and reckon them to be so.

 "For he that is dead is freed from sin"  {Romans 6:7}.Here is the second time in the sixth chapter of Romans that tells us that we are freed from sin; Christ nailed our sins to the cross and we bear them no more. The whole purpose of this section is to prove that those that are in Christ will not continue in sin, because they have died to it in the person of Christ their head. 

"Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him:" {6:8} If we have entered into Christ so as to be a partaker of His death, we will most certainly partake of His life after death.

"Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God." {6:9,10} "Death hath no more dominion" implies that at one time death did have dominion over Christ. His death was indeed delegated, and as such, being in a natural, mortal, corruptible body, death overtook Christ and exercised full dominion. Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage {Hebrews 2:14-15}. The death Christ died was in regard to flesh and blood; He was fully God and fully man. 

By becoming flesh and blood, Christ could die on behalf of those that were under the death sentence of Adam; the entire human race. But the emphasis here is not His death for us, but our participation in that death, so that we, as He, are freed from the power of death. 

"Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord" {6:11} This is the third time mentioned that we are dead to sin. "Likewise," in the same manner and to the same degree that Christ is dead to sin and alive to God, we are to assume the same to be true of ourselves. God is not telling us to accomplish something. He is telling us what God has done, and commanding us to believe the reality as it already exists. The work "reckon" means to count as reality. Reckon yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin and alive unto God. It is through Christ that the believer can reckon these things to be reality. Reckoning is believing God, as opposed to believing one's experience as many tend to do.

"Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof" {6:12} It is now within the power of those that are in Christ to not yield their bodies to the lust dwelling there since we are freed from sin and the Holy Spirit lives inside of us. The same power that rose Jesus from the dead lives in us. We can do ALL things through Christ who strengthens us; even have the self-control to overcome all sin!  Be like Paul, "But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection; lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway" {1 Corinthians 9:27}.

Let your mind dwell on these wonderful Truths.

The study begins HERE. The next verse is HERE.