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Romans 6:15-18
What then? Shall we sin because we are not
under law but under grace? By no means! 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 are slaves 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.
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April
27
Believers are Dead to the Law
Paul equates the law with sin as the law
constantly points out our sin. Likewise
the law causes us to sin in that it creates a
standard which we constantly fall short of.
Because we all fall short of the law, we need
grace to wash away our sin. The Romans
thought that more sin brought about more grace
and hence it was a good thing. Paul says
just the opposite.
Even though salvation isn't found in obeying the
law, we are still called to obedience. We
will always serve a master of sin or
righteousness, doing what one or the other wants
us to do.
There is a stark difference between obeying God
and following the law. Even though the end
result may appear to be the same because the
rules are the same, the result is drastically
different.
Obedience to God is done out of love. We
obey because we love God and want to please Him.
Because of this, obedience is a joy, not a
drudgery. Following the law is done out of
duty however. We follow the law because we
feel that we must because we expect a reward or
fear the punishment for not following.
Following out of duty will produce a poor
follower because we are incapable of following
perfectly. Obeying God comes easily
because God knows that we aren't perfect and we
know that we'll experience forgiveness when we
fall short. |
