Living this new life…

 
This morning I’m tempted to cut and paste; first from the Bible and then from my devotional book. Yesterday was filled with God’s presence and power — in our worship service, in conversations with others, and in witnessing someone enter the kingdom of God through faith in Jesus Christ. After that, we had a lovely time with family and watched our home team win another game in NHL playoffs. Lots of emotions, much to stimulate my mind and choices.

Today the topic is freedom from the slavery of sin. All this is incredible good news as we see the results in our own lives and the lives of our Christian family. “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.” (Romans 6:6)
How did this happen? The NT tells the events in the life of Jesus Christ and how that affects our lives. Our choices are expanded. Yes, I can still sin, but first He gives me this option:

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. (Romans 6:10–11)

And with a new way of thinking, I’m also given a new ‘task master’ which is a negative word to describe the One who gave me this new life:

Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? 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, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness… For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification. For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 6:16–23)

While the choice to live in newness of life seems the winner, the Bible warns against the pull to return to life under those old options. It says, “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.” (Galatians 5:1)

The devotional illustrates how a woman can have a job and is obligated to do what her boss asks, but they love each other and decide to marry her — the relationship changes. Her reason for doing her job is different. While that describes the difference in her motivation, it also describes how her ‘boss’ is no longer the same. Instead of the world, her old nature, and all sorts of other ideas, her life is now in the hands of the Son of God and she is united to Him and His perfect love.

Unfaithfulness to that perfection seems so unlikely, yet it happens. In Christ Jesus the choices of the old life count for nothing. He wants from me faith working through love. I might start well but become hindered from obeying the truth, and that is not His idea. I know that even a little temptation can initiate a big crash. It could come from a worldly desire, or yielding to false teaching, or the pressure of persecution, or lies from the enemy. However, Jesus called me to freedom, and not use that freedom as an opportunity to go back to the habits of my old nature. I’m to love others, even my enemies, and that means being like Jesus. He listens, wants the best for me, pays attention to the details of my life, is always there for me, never puts me to shame…

PRAY: You, Jesus, are wonderful. To be like You is not slavery at all but a joyful way to live. May the delight of being dead to sin always keep me alive to You and reflecting Your love to the world around me, especially to Your children and increasingly to those who need to experience the same freedom You alone can give.

A Slavery that Sets Us Free

 

Forty to fifty million people in this world are living in slavery, that is over 1 percent of the population are in slavery to other people. Somewhere around 8-10 percent of the world’s population (perhaps more) are believers in Jesus Christ. The rest are in slavery to sin. One might say a slave is a slave, yet clearly the difference is defined by the taskmaster.

Jesus said so: “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.” (John 8:34) Paul also wrote, that creation itself will one day be “set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God” and that Christians are already “set free from sin and have become slaves of God . . . .”

 Slavery to sin is bondage; slavery to God is freedom. While we talk about having freedom of choice, this only applies to those set free from sin, for as a sinner I had no choice; everything I did was sinful. God says this:

But whoever has doubts (about eating food sacrificed to idols) is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith. For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin. (Romans 14:23)

If faith is missing, so is a relationship with God and sin is bondage because it ruins my ability to know what is true and good. I’m left to do my own thing and even if it looks okay to me (or others), the “way that seems right leads to death” for the wages of sin is death and eternal separation from God.

Without faith in Christ, all actions are sinful. However, redemption changes everything. God’s gift of salvation includes the gift of faith: “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8).

Being free from doing my own thing, there are only two choices: slavery to the will of someone else — which is human bondage OR being in slavery to the will of God — who wants the best for me and knows the best for me because He created me and loves me. The first has no appeal. The second is an amazing gift.

However, faith is needed to do what God says. I need to believe that He is right, good, loves me, and knows what He is talking about. How can I know that is true? Only if He reveals it to me. Redemption is a revealed truth. In contrast, sin blinds and separates me from truth. Sin messes with every faculty I have, no matter how good it may appear. For that reason, sin is an awful taskmaster. It leads me away from God to trusting my own judgment but my own judgment is seriously flawed. Sin can even cause me to see good as evil and evil as good.

The grand truth is this: Jesus delivers sinners. He fills us with the knowledge of His will so we can walk with Him, please Him, bear eternal fruit, increase in knowledge of God, endure in patience with joy, and give thanks to the Father who does all this because “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (Colossians 1:9–14).

None of that belongs to sinners. We cannot be godly, and most do not want to be godly. Only Jesus can produce that desire, even in people who assume their slavery is the best way to live. Without faith, this is a lie and a trap. Only faith in Christ equals freedom, not freedom to do as I please, but freedom to choose something and Someone to rule my life other than sin.

Oh Lord, thank You for taking me out of the darkness and sin, out of the lies I kept telling myself in my efforts to make life better. Only You know what is best for me, a truth that You keep affirming and that fills me with delight in You. You rescue me from sin and from myself, from thinking I know what I’m doing by constantly reminding me how helpless and foolish I am without You. What a wonder You are!

STUDY: Romans 6-8, 1 Corinthians 4:1–5, Philippians 2:5–11