Session 20 – Romans; Romans 6:14-23: Mark Lanier, 10/26/25

Romans 6:14-23 - Freedom from Sin (Mark Lanier)
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Introduction & Viktor Frankl Story
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Next fall. All right. Hey, I wanna thank y'all for being here this morning. when, when this fall comes around and it's been rainy and it's starting to get dark early. It's easy to watch on the internet, and we're glad you're watching on the internet, those watching on the internet. But we're also really thankful it's encouraging to have you here.

So thank you for coming. I was thinking about this lesson today and how to introduce it, and I thought a great way to introduce the lesson today would be to talk for a moment about a fellow named Viktor Frankl. Now, Viktor Frankl lived into his nineties [00:01:00] in the 20th century. He was born in about, I think it was 1905, and, well, I know it was, I researched it.

He was born in 1905. And he died in 1997. Now, Viktor Frankl was an interesting fellow. He grew up in Vienna, Austria, and he studied at a very early age, and I think it was a equivalent of middle school, junior high. He started basically taking college classes. He wanted to be a psychologist. Now. There were psychologists being put out by Vienna, Austria.

That's where Sigmund Freud was from. Alfred Adler, I believe, was from there. And so Frankl was following in the footsteps of some leading figures, but he kind of developed his own view of psychology. It was a [00:02:00] bit distant from what Freud said, a bit distant from what Adler said. I don't know that they were the biggest fans of his, but he made a name for himself with what he called logo therapy.

The idea that you can help people, uh, figure out life and address life by helping them find meaning. If you have meaning in your life, you'll be much more, uh, balanced and able to handle things psychologically. If you don't have meaning behind your life, you're gonna be a basket case. That's, uh, the way it would be put in Lubbock speak.

And so. He develops this and he actually becomes really successful at helping people, uh, in suicide clinics. And that's kind of his niche. And he takes people who are suicidal and he had a tremendous. Uh, uh, um, win-loss ratio. I mean, he, [00:03:00] he was really able to effectively help people move past suicide ideation and suicide attempts.

Uh, and then as, uh, being a Jew as, uh, the Nazis started taking over in the 1930s, he was famous enough. To where he and his wife actually got a visa to leave Austria before the clamp down on the Jews. But his parents couldn't get a visa because his parents weren't famous. So he could have taken his family in a sense, but his parents would've been left to fend for themselves and he didn't know what to do.

So he was, uh, went to a synagogue and was looking at the 10 Commandments and he saw the commandment, honor your father and your mother, and he decided I'm gonna stay [00:04:00] here with my father and my mother, and we're gonna help them. Well, uh, his parents got shipped off to a concentration camp and died in the concentration camp.

Uh, Viktor Frankl got shipped off, his wife got shipped off. His wife died in a concentration camp. Uh, Viktor Frankl, um, moved from several different concentration camps. He was in Auschwitz. Uh, it you, you, it was devastating. Uh, I mean, it will move you to tears to read and understand these firsthand accounts.

And he's in his mid to late thirties when he goes and he's, um, uh, he comes out of it. He survives World War ii, survives. The concentration camp is liberated by the Allied forces. Again, thanks to all who serve in the military, is liberated by the Allied Forces. And he wrote a book that I first came across, I think in high [00:05:00] school.

It was entitled, man's Search for Meaning. The Library of Congress said that it's one of the 10 most influential books that they have at the Library of Congress. That's back in 1999. I don't know that they still say that, but it was originally published under a different title. Frankl published it in German under the title A psychologist experiences the concentration camp, and originally he was going to be publishing it anonymously because he thought he could be a lot more candid and a lot more blunt if his name wasn't associated with it, but someone convinced him.

It's more powerful if you'll put your name with it. So we put his name with it. It and he didn't set it apart. Part one of the book discusses concentration camps, but it doesn't just go through the detail of what [00:06:00] happened because he said, you can read that. Those are horrors. He didn't care to repeat them.

But what he did do is repeat just the minimum you needed to know to understand how he analyzed people psychologically and the effect that the concentration camp had on them. And it's fascinating because he said there were basically three different stages. That first stage is one of shock and deniability.

You just don't really think this is happening. You're just stunned. You just can't believe it. You're, you mentally cannot accept that this is really what's going on. And he talked about each of the stages and one of the most fascinating parts at the end of part one is where he talks about the stage of what happened when the prisoners got liberated.

So long quotation I'm gonna put up here. I don't like [00:07:00] to put long quotations up. We can get lost in them. Don't get lost in it. Let's work on it together Psychologically. Psychologically, what was happening to the liberated prisoners? The ones that got liberated could be called de. Personalization. They just didn't seem to be people in a personal sense.

Everything appeared unreal. Unlikely as in a dream. He said we couldn't believe it was true. He tells the story about when the liberation was coming and everybody was fighting to get all, all of a sudden the Ss uh, people who had been so abusive and so mean, turned friendly, and they'd be offering the prisoner [00:08:00] cigarettes and they'd be smiling and they'd be saying, Hey, wouldn't you like some extra food?

And you're gonna get liberated. And he said there were some trucks that were set up to, to take the prisoners away. 'cause the, the allies were coming, the Red Cross was coming. So they were, this, SS would say, Hey, you're gonna be liberated. And there was only room to put, I think it was, uh, I don't remember the exact number, but there were two people that wouldn't have fit on the last vehicle to pull out with everybody.

And so, um, uh, Viktor Frankl stayed behind with the prisoner hope, with another prisoner hoping that they could get out somehow, because they didn't want the front line. The, the SS were saying, Hey, we're getting y'all outta here. 'cause the front line is so close, you don't want to get caught up in the, the fighting.

But what they really did is they hauled those prisoners out and killed them all so that they wouldn't be witnesses to the atrocities that had happened in the concentration camp. [00:09:00] And I mean, it, it's, they, he told the story, you know, he'd get off the, when he got off the train at Auschwitz, uh, everybody had to just walk up to the line.

And there's one guy who was just really nice, he said, looked very friendly and he would just say, go left and go right, go left and go right. He'd Sasha go left and go. Right. Left meant you were going straight to the gas chamber right. Meant you were healthy enough. To work, uh, uh, as a slave. And so this depersonalization happened when they were finally liberated and he recognized with him and with his buddy, but also, uh, uh, with the other prisoners that he talked to that were liberated.

You know, they can open the gates of Auschwitz, he said, but liberation wasn't just opening the gates. You had to help the prisoners believe that they were free, that it was real, and then they had to [00:10:00] learn to live as free people. They didn't have to sleep nine people on a wooden slat that wasn't much bigger than this table.

They didn't have to, to, to, you know, live on on five ounces of bread a day. The, it, it was, it was a radical, they, they didn't have to live in fear that they were going to be killed or snuffed out in a moment. They had to learn how to put socks on again because they could have socks, that they could find clothes that fit.

It was really hard. But look at this statement. Liberation wasn't just opening the gates. It required helping prisoners believe they were free and learned to live as free people. They were shell shocked. [00:11:00] They were depersonalized. They could not believe and fathom that what had been happening to them, that it altered the way their minds worked, the way their bodies worked, the way their bodies looked, everything about them.

They could not believe the freedom. And that my friends, is what Paul's talking about in Romans chapter six. It's just not a concentration camp. It's slavery to sin. That's what Paul is talking about, because as Christians, we all too often don't understand the liberation that we have. We need to learn to believe that we're free and then we learn.

Need to learn to live as free people. So we're gonna look at this three ways today. Shine our light. First on the promise of God, of of grace, reigning in our life. That's gonna be Romans [00:12:00] chapter six, verse 14. And then we will look at the choice of masters. We get to choose which master we're gonna serve.

That's verses 15 through 19. And then finally, the outcome of that service that we give to the master we choose, which is what Paul talks about in verses 20 and 23. So let's start with the promise of Grace's reign. This is Romans six 14. Now those of you who've been watching or paying attention or coming to this class, know that we are moving through at a snail's pace.

And it's got the benefit of us really getting inside these verses. It's got the detriment of trying to stay in a flow. And then last week we did, we had John Barclay here, so we had an interview, so I wasn't even in Romans six. So we've got to, to make sure we get right back into our [00:13:00] flow. So we're going to Romans six, verse 14, which says, for sin will have no dominion over you.

Since you are not under law, but under grace now this is a hard way to just start cold in a Bible study because word four in Greek, gar and gars generally placed after the first word. Um, it's rarely a first word in the Greek, so it's very standard, but in English we say four. In, in, in Greek, they say sin for over you.

No lordship, no dominion. But for us, we see that word for gar in the Greek, like a, a gar fish sort of, uh, that's a G, which looks like our G It just doesn't have the circle on it. A and their, their ours look like our Ps. But [00:14:00] sorry, I can't do anything about that. That's gar. Four In Greek, it generally means the purpose or the reason can even be the result.

So Paul is saying four as a result, or because, and for what? I mean, you, you, you gotta go backwards for sin will have no dominion over you for because. Uh, uh, you, so let's go backwards. We've got to four. The reason why three verses earlier, Paul said, you must consider yourselves dead to sin. That is a present imperative.

He's, it's a command. He's saying you must. Count yourself. Consider yourself. Enter it into the bank account. Rely upon it. [00:15:00] Reckon you must consider yourselves dead to sin. So you think about it and you just decide in your mind that you are dead to sin. You must do that. This is an order, this is an imperative.

And then he's got another imperative. Don't let sin reign in your body. Don't let it be Lord in your body. Don't let it. That's a present imperative. He said, don't let it so He's got a do and a don't. Here the do. Consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. That's an imperative He's telling you.

Commanding you to do that, and he's commanding you. Don't let sin reign in your mortal body to make you obey its passions. There's a do and a don't, and then he gives you a second do and a [00:16:00] don't. He says, don't present your members. Your, your, um, hoopla, your, your weapons, your tools, your instruments don't present what you got.

To sin as instruments of unrighteousness. Again, a present imperative. Don't, he's ordering this. It's imperative. Don't do that, he says, but. Present yourselves to God as those who've been brought from death to life and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. So this is another present imperative.

So he's got a do and a. Don't hear the don't. Don't present your members to sin as tools or weapons for unrighteousness, but do. Present yourselves and your members to God as [00:17:00] instruments holla for righteousness. So he's given us four instructions, two dos and two don'ts, and then he says four, and that's where the four comes in.

Here's the reason why you do those things. You do those things because sin will have no dominion over you. Look at that. Sin will have no dominion over you. What can anybody believe? That could be true. What does Paul mean? That sin won't be the Lord. And Paul's using a verb form of the word Lord, what does it mean?

That sin won't be Lord over us. [00:18:00] Sin will have no dominion over you, is a bold promise that Paul is making. Do y'all do pinky promises where you grew up? That's my picture, is a pinky promise, you know. In, in, in Korea, they, they do the pinky promise and then they fold up the thumbs like that, just for what it's worth, that you go to Korea, you'll, you'll know that.

Okay? Anyway, this is a bold promise that Paul's making sin will have no dominion over you. Now, when I say it's a bold promise. You could read it differently but don't because Paul's making it as a bold promise. That's the four. Sin will have no dominion over you. That's the link. Now some people might, you ready for your slide?

I told him I had a [00:19:00] slide that looked just like him, except, uh, for some of the tats and all, little bit more hair on top. But, uh, other than that, he said, stand, stand up for us. Go ahead. Go ahead. Turn, turn around, whatever everybody say, okay. Okay. Now when he says, sin will have no dominion over you, this is not some moral.

Exhortation. Paul's not saying sin should not be your master. He's not offering a moral exhortation, nor is he saying here that you are gonna work really hard to make sure sin doesn't have dominion over you. This is not try to keep sin from being your master. He's not giving, um, a moral exhortation. He's not pushing human effort here.

He's not saying, oh, you should work really hard to make sure, uh, sin is not your master, [00:20:00] nor is he talking about some distant hope where you've thrown a note in a bottle and pray. Someone one day will come find you on the deserted island. It's not a distant hope. Um, that's terrible. You can't see it. It's lost in the cloud.

But trust me, it's not a distant hope. It's not saying essentially that, uh, uh, eventually sin won't be your master. Paul's not saying that either. Paul is making a factual statement. Future tense. Yes, but a factual statement. Four, sin will have no dominion over you. He's making a bold promise here. He's saying it's a fact that sin will have no dominion over you.

Sin will have no dominion over you. Four sin will [00:21:00] have no dominion over you. And then there's another four, but this time they translate it since. See the gar and the gar. It's translated sense for because sin will have no dominion over you because you are not under law. You are under grace. This because for you are not under law.

You're under grace. Now think about it. I don't know where people are watching this from, but it's being delivered from the United States of America. And you can probably see this in a lot of different countries around the world, but one where you probably can't see it is North Korea. So I threw up the North Korean flag as my example.

If you live in the United [00:22:00] States, you are under the jurisdiction and authority of the United States of America.

That's where you are. If you are in North Korea, you are under the jurisdiction and authority of the North Koreans. That's just the way it is. Paul's using that kind of language. He says, you are not under law. None of us are under the authority of North Korea, not a one of us. I, I don't think anybody watching this.

If you're watching this in North Korea, I pray for you. I pray for you, but assuming nobody's watching this under North Korea, 'cause the government won't let it. They don't, they don't have open internet, they don't have stuff that allows this. You are not under law, but under grace you're under a different system.

And Paul is saying if you are under law. [00:23:00] You are fighting sin with human effort. You're gonna do the best you can. You're gonna try really hard and you will fail.

But if you are under grace, you're fighting sin with divine power.

There's a difference here. And Paul wants us to understand this difference. He wants us to understand anytime we try to fight sin with human effort, it is epic fail. We will only succeed when we fight sin with divine power. Now if you are out there saying, I have fought sin. And by the grace of God, I am victorious and I sin no more.

Then I would [00:24:00] urge you to realize that's not scriptural either. Scripture does not teach. You will find perfection in this life, in this body. There's a movement within Christianity. Of perfectionism that was prominent in the 19 early 19th century, mid through the mid 19th century or 20th century. Sorry. Um, the perfectionism movement, I, I, I, that's not what Paul's saying here, and I can talk about that another time, but I want to stay with what Paul is saying.

So if you're not gonna be perfect, and yet Paul is saying sin will not have dominion over you. And that's a bold promise you should rightly be asking. Okay then why do I still struggle with sin? If sin doesn't have dominion over me, why am I still struggling? And the best analogy that [00:25:00] I can give you, I think may be going back to World War ii.

After World War II was over, there were still pockets of resistance. There was still some fighting, there was still some cleanup that had to be done. Heavens, after the Civil War. Do you know I was taught this? I've did never check this out as an adult, so this could be wrong, but it's in my brain is being right.

So in my brain. I was taught that the last battle of the Civil War was fought in Texas, and it was fought some months after the Civil War was over because word hadn't gotten here yet, that the war was over. The, the war can be over, but it doesn't mean all the fighting is quit and sin is still very real.

So what do we know? We know sins dominion is broken. [00:26:00] Sins, that's what Paul says. Sins dominion is broken. Even though sin is still present in the world and in our life, the dominion is broken. And the ultimate defeat is assured as we continue to try to struggle in this life, but we're not struggling from a position of our effort.

We're not fighting to win the war against sins. Dominion. Christ won it. It's happened. It's a victory. We're fighting sin from a victory not to get a victory. And this was all laid out by Paul and his partio at the start of Romans one, in Romans one, 16 and 17. I'm not ashamed of the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.

It is the power of God for salvation in salvation. He's [00:27:00] not just talking about at the end of time you will live in eternity in God's care. As opposed to going to hell or being extinguished or whatever. You view the opposite of being. He's not talking only about that. He's also talking about the salvation, the so, the healing, the, the victory that we live in this life as well as in the life to come.

It is in the Death Bureau and resurrection of Christ that the power of God to save everyone who believes is revealed. That's what's happened. God says, I have one, A victory, a decisive victory at Calvary. And the empty tomb shows the resurrection power for a new life that the Holy Spirit brings. And if you are associated with the death of Christ, you are associated with the resurrection of Christ and that [00:28:00] same Holy Spirit works in you.

And it has freed you from the dominion of sin. That's what Christ died to. He wasn't resurrected, bound and in bondage to sin. So that's the promise in verse 14 of Grace's reign. Now that leaves us getting to choose between masters in the nitty gritty datey day-to-day life. We live. So we continue with Paul in Romans six 15.

So what then are we to sin? Because we're not under law, but under grace? Heavens, no. By no means mercy, no meto in the Greek. He's already used it before. It's one of his favorite expressions. It just means no way. Absolutely [00:29:00] not. It's, it's, it's, it's inconceivable. So we don't sin just because we're not under law, but under grace.

I love what Emmel Bruner said about this. Emmel Bruner wrote, freedom from the law does not mean freedom from God. It means freedom for God. See, we're not free from the law, so we just do whatever we're free from the law so that we can serve the living God. Christianity is not about, um, oh, I'm gonna get forgiven from my sins so that I can do anything I want.

And I know once saved, always saved. And so I'm always in God's good grace and he's gonna take care of me fine, and I can just now skip the rest of the way of my life until I get real sick, and then I'll pray for [00:30:00] help. That is not Christianity that Paul's teaching. Paul is saying here that this is a real thing.

You really are enslaved to sin until you meet Christ at his cross and you die with him and you're resurrected with him. And when you are, you're brought into a new life. There's been a transference. You don't live in North Korea, you live here. You don't live under sin, you live under Christ. You're not.

You're not. Now you're just freelancing out there on your own. You have transferred from one realm to another. So Paul continues. He says, don't you know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves? Now Paul's writing. In a different economic system than we [00:31:00] have. Paul is writing to people who know slavery intimately well because it is a part of the Roman Empire, and you can become a slave in a variety of ways.

You can be born into it because your parents were slaves. You could be a captured people. Who are enslaved as Rome has been victorious. You can sell yourself into slavery because you don't have enough money to pay your debts. You can sell yourself into slavery because you want protection. You want a job, you want someone who will feed you.

But if you presented yourself to someone as a slave, you were a slave. And your slave owner had the power, not just of life and death, but your slave owner had the power and you had to obey. [00:32:00] So Paul says, don't you know now in, in Greek, ate,

um, translated, do you not know? Uh, it, it, it, um, in Lubbock speak. What he's saying is, Hey, this is a gimme. Okay? It is a no-brainer. Everybody knows this. This is not like, oh, oh, I never thought that. I mean this, you know, this. This is a gimme. You know, if you present yourselves and this this verb that's translated present, it's in the present tense.

That means it's an ongoing action. That means this is something you just do daily. If daily you live in a way where you're presenting yourself to anyone as an obedient slave, you're a slave to the one you present [00:33:00] yourself to.

You're gonna be a slave wherever you present yourself. This is, um, kind of a contract language. He's saying obedience is gonna determine who's signing off on who's being your boss, who's your boss. So you get to decide, you can present yourselves as obedient slaves, and you'll be the slaves to the one who you obey.

It can be of sin, which leads to death, or you can be obedient to, um, uh, righteousness. It's your choice and that's the gi, but it's choice of A or B. You can be a slave to sin or a slave to righteousness. He if, if, if you are in school, I see a [00:34:00] lot of you look school age Larry Gwen ette you. You may have an exam tomorrow when you go back to school.

Do you remember taking multiple choice tests in school? If the teacher offers only A or B, those are your two choices, say A or B. Don't put all of the above.

If the only choice is A or B, don't put C. You won't get it right. Paul's given you two choices. You are gonna be a slave to sin or you're gonna be a slave to God. I know what you're thinking. You're thinking Will Mark play.

I won't play the whole thing. It's five minutes. You may [00:35:00] be an ambassador to England, you may like to, you might like to dance. You may be the heavyweight champion of. It may be social with a long string of pearls, but you're going have to serve somebody. Yes, indeed. You're going have to serve somebody.

Well, it may be devil, it may.

It's really, really hard for me not to play the whole thing. I'm just saying. It gets really good, but you get the idea. That's what Paul's saying. Paul's saying, you're gonna serve somebody. You're gonna present yourselves. This is a gimme and it's A or B. So you got a choice. [00:36:00] You can serve sin, which leads to death, or obedience to the Lord, which leads to righteousness.

Which one do you want? Do you wanna go up or do you wanna go down? Because you gotta pick. And then he says, but thanks be to God that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed. You were once slaves to sin Now. Paul's using a, a verb here that is, um, what's called the imperfect tense.

It means in the past you were continuously doing this. You were a slave to sin all the time. That's what you were. And he says, thanks be to [00:37:00] God that that's in the past. Thanks be to God. That's was your continuous past state. But now you've become obedient from the heart, the heart he's using here in the sense of you're, you're, you're just all in.

It is very important to us to understand that we're not saved by what we do. That that's a no-brainer. Don't ever get confused on that. We're saved by what Christ did. Not by what we do. None of us is good enough to merit God's love and he doesn't have a threshold of how good you have to be. There is no measuring stick that says, um, uh, when you die, I'm gonna put all of your deeds in the scales.

And if the good deeds outweigh the bad deeds you get in. [00:38:00] You remember the parable? I like to tell. Of the fellow who dies and he gets to heaven and he's waiting outside the pearly gates. And, uh, Peter's there at the pearly gates. And as people come up, the man overhears the folks in front of him and the folks in front of him, the Peter says to him, he says, uh, takes a thousand points to get in.

And uh, uh, the guy in line is feeling pretty good about it 'cause he was a good guy. So he gets up to his place in line. Peter says it takes a thousand points to get in, and the guy says, um, okay, let's see. I think I'll start here. And he starts listing all of these incredible things he has done in his life, and there are so many, he decides just for good measure, he's gonna list 2000 instead of one.

When he is done, Peter is gobsmacked. I mean, Peter's like, whoa. We haven't had anybody that good in a long time. [00:39:00] That's incredible. I'm gonna give you a point. And the guy looks at Peter and he saying a point, ah, I left out all the church stuff. Okay. I went to church all the time. I never missed the biblical literacy class.

Uh, in fact, I was a greeter. Um, uh, I went to Vicki's lunch. Uh, I went to coaches, uh, Bible study, uh, men's group. I, um, did the Christmas party every year except the year I had COVID. Uh, I always went to Pastor Jared's sermons. I sang all the songs. Um, even the ones I didn't like, um, I tithed and he lists 5,000 things he did with church.

And Peter said, put down his fence. And he says, I've just gotta tell you, most impressive thing I've heard in months. I'm giving you another point. Well, this goes on and on, and finally the guy says to Peter, well, how, but [00:40:00] by the grace of God, does anybody get in there? And Peter said, that's the thousand points.

None of us work our way into God's good grace.

But Christianity, the kind of Christianity that would call for people to die, Paul is martyred for his faith. A decade after this, the kind of Christianity that calls on people to die is one that truly believes this is real. This is not a, I don't know that Christianity stuff's for real, but better safe than sorry.

You know, I might as well give it a shot and we'll see what, you know. Worse comes to worst. When I die, we will find out. I, this is, this is the real thing. And we're to make a choice. Do we wanna live for sin or do we wanna live for the Lord? [00:41:00] There's a paradox here. True freedom isn't the absence of a master.

True freedom is serving the right master. It's still serving.

So Paul says, thanks be to God that you who were once in the past continually serving as slaves of sin. You've become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed. And I love that verb there. Parado is, is, um, entrusting someone. So you were entrusted to this teaching.

Paul's in telling it to him, but all of us, we've been entrusted to know there's more to Christianity than simply, uh, making the confession of faith and figuring we're, we're okay. Coast is clear. I've done it. I've turned the corner. Everything's great. They didn't just hear teaching. [00:42:00] They were entrusted to the teaching.

It's like being placed in the care of a guardian. The gospel becomes your new master teacher. It's gonna teach you your manners. It's gonna teach you how to behave. It is gonna be your master that helps you live the life that God has called you to live. This is a life where you've been set free from sin.

You become slaves of righteousness. You have been, this is something that's been done for you. You just may be like the people out of the concentration camps and may not realize it. But if you have put your faith in Jesus, if you have invited him to be Lord of your life, this is true of you. Whether you realize it or not, you have become slaves of righteousness.

These are passive verbs. This is what God's doing. These are God's actions. You did not free your self from sin. You did not [00:43:00] enslave yourself to righteousness. God did both.

Now, Paul says then in verse 19. He says, now look, I'm speaking in human terms because of your natural limitations. I love this. What Paul is saying there is, um, let's just isolate that for a moment.

These are really hard to understand truths about life. So I'm putting them into like slavery terms. I'm putting them into relationship terms. I'm using metaphors and allegories, uh, to help you understand because the, the ultimate thing that's happened here is really hard for us to grasp. But if we put it into those terms, then we'll understand better.

And so I'm speaking to you in human terms, [00:44:00] but just as you once, and he, then he continues. Just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to the lawlessness that led to more lawlessness. Get it. It was a spiral down. It was a vicious cycle of sin. Just as you once presented yourselves as members, your members as slaves, to impurity, and then to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, now present yourselves as slaves to righteousness, leading to sanctification Before you were spiraling down.

Now you can soar. Before you were handcuffed. Now you are set free to serve the Lord, but you make the choice of your master. [00:45:00] Now, don't think it's a choice without a consequence because there is an outcome of who you choose to serve. He picks back up with this in the next verse, verse 20. When you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.

I mean, you do what you want, but what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? The end of those things is death. Paul is calling to have you look back on what your life was like before you became a Christian, or from a season of backsliding or from a season of not really paying attention.

When you look back at that, what do you [00:46:00] see? He says, you see shame and regret.

Sin promised pleasure, freedom, fulfillment, meaning happiness, joy, excitement, thrills, but it delivered shame, bondage, and death. Pastor Jared quoted in his sermon this morning, the proverb. That says you wind up with a mouthful of of gravel. That's what sin is gonna give you. All the promises and allure of something wonderful.

And the best example I can give you other than your own personal life is [00:47:00] the Garden of Eden. Oh, you wanna be like God, knowing good and evil. Eat the fruit baby. It's right there for you. Come on. Don't you don't have to be bound to God. You don't have to follow him. Who made him boss? You besides, have you seen him today?

Just take it. It looks good. I don't, I don't even understand why God doesn't want you to have it. What kind of God is that? Doesn't it make sense? You should eat it. It's there. Would he have planted it just to taunt you? Just to say, Nana, Nana, you can't eat me. That's not very nice. Eat it. And with all of that promise, what did it bring?

Shame. They realized they were [00:48:00] naked. They hid from God bondage. Bound to sin and death.

But Paul says, then in the next verse, you've been set free from sin and you've become slaves of God and that fruit you get leads to sanctification. A big word. Uh, a theological word. It means being made holy, being set apart, being special. You get to eat the fruit that leads you to growing into being right and the way you live, and ultimately eternal life.

And now we get to the last verse in Romans, which is often quoted 'cause it's on the Romans road, [00:49:00] but I want us to see it and make sure we get the whole thing. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Wages, if you choose one free gift. If you choose the other, it's a choice.

Let me put it in today's economic terms, instead of Paul's, you want a new job? I got two options for you. Job one and job two. Here are your offers. You pick which one you want. Now offer number one. I promise you it's gonna give you freedom. Pleasure. Fulfillment. However, just between you and me, it's gonna really produce bonded shame and emptiness.[00:50:00]

The promises a lie are temporary at best. Here's offer number two, it's gonna give you life, joy, and purpose, but in reality, it's gonna really transform you and make you holy and give you freedom. It really will give you life, joy and pleasure, which, which and purpose, which job you gonna take. That's what Paul's saying in today's terms.

So Viktor Frankl, impressive fella. Man's search for meaning. I recommend you read the book. I do think it's one of the most 10 influential books still today. The idea of a psychologist being in the concentration camps and looking at what's going on and understanding what was happening to the liberated prisoners that were depersonalized, where everything seemed unreal and unlikely, and it was a dream.

Could that really be true? Could I really have victory over [00:51:00] sin? Is that even remotely possible? Is it possible that I could have liberation? That it's not just opening the gates? Yes, Paul says, believe you're free, and then learn to live as free people. This is something you can do. By the way, he spends two more chapters teaching us how we're not through with it, that all of these are the step by step.

This is the problem with having to teach this over time instead of in one fell swoop. But boy, we've got a big key to it already and that's what gives us our points for home. Point for home. Number one, believe the promise sin will have no dominion over you. That's not an exhortation to try hard. That's not an exhortation to just trust that one day there may be hopefully something good's gonna come of it.

No, this is an actual fact. This sin [00:52:00] will have no dominion over you. When you walk and choose to walk in the Lord's purposes by the power of the resurrected Jesus, sin will not be your Lord. Does that mean you won't mess up? Oh heavens, of course you'll mess up. Does that mean that you don't have bad habits that you're gonna need to, to rewire your mind over?

Absolutely. God's at work and Paul will get to this. Rewiring your mind. We worship. Because it rewires our mind, we pray. Because it rewires our mind. We study because it rewires our mind. We fellowship with the saints because it rewires our mind. We encourage and uplift each other because it rewires our mind.

We sing a new song to the Lord because it rewires our mind. We worship and adore the Lord because it rewires our mind. [00:53:00] All of this is rewiring our mind because. The fact is sin will have no dominion over us. And so by the grace of God and the power of God and the work of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, we are able to walk in victory.

We just gotta learn how. And part of what rewires our mind is choosing our master daily, Daley,

your slaves of the one whom you obey.

Commit that to memory. You are slaves of the one whom you obey. You got a chance to gossip today. Tomorrow, you're slaves of the one whom you obey. You got a chance to say something negative about somebody body, [00:54:00] your slaves of the one whom you obey. Tomorrow's video. Thought the day I hadn't filmed it yet, but, uh, I was talking to a, a wonderful lady before class and she said, would you do some on kindness?

Absolutely. That should be our calling card. You got a chance to be kind tomorrow. You're slaves of the one whom you obey. You got a chance to help somebody who needs help. You're slaves of the one whom you obey. This is daily what we need to be about. And if we're daily about this, and this is a real priority and we're thinking about this, and by prayer and the grace and the power of God, we're working through it.

Coach Max said, you know the Holy Spirit's gonna help you do this. Do you ask the Holy Spirit for help? Absolutely. If we say, holy Spirit, help me, and you'll begin to see God's rewiring your mind. You're gonna see the fruit and it's good fruit. [00:55:00] And that's the final point for home. Remember the fruit? 'cause if you're choosing, right, it's not gonna be stuff you're ashamed of, it's gonna be sanctification.

If you're not, it's gonna be stuff you're ashamed of.

Who would want to live in a cesspool when they can soar on angel's wings? And if we really believe and understand that. We're we, we've got half of, of the battle won. Jesus has won the whole war. He's won the whole battle. But we're still embroiled in it. And it starts with us understanding that we're working from the victory of Christ.

Amen. Amen. Alright, let, um, let me bless you in the name of Jesus and I'll see you guys next Sunday. God will, um, Lord, in the name of Jesus, the victorious one. We [00:56:00] come before you. We pray your spirit, holy Spirit, convict us of our sin, but also convict us of the righteousness that we have in Christ. Empower us Lord, bring to our mind and our memory daily these choices that we have and instill in us a great drive to follow you.

And obey you as you have enabled us to do through Jesus. Thank you Lord. Amen.