The significance of God’s grace in the life of the true saint is superbly described in the sixth chapter of the Apostle Paul’s letter to the church at Rome. The entire chapter is dedicated to the subject of grace as it relates to sin among church people. In my series titled The Message of the Cross (key word–Cross), I point out that God provided grace so that man’s PAST sins could be forgiven (Rom. 3:25). Biblically this act is called “justification,” as noted in verse 24. But there is a caveat relative to God’s grace–the believer, now free of sin, MUST NOT RETURN TO SINNING. Read John 5:14 and 8:11. This is where God’s Word and church doctrine part ways with deadly results. As the Apostle Jude states in verse four, Satan’s false prophets have turned God’s grace into a license to sin, thereby “DENYING THE ONLY LORD GOD AND OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST.” This means that those who participate the church’s sin-repent, sin-repent cycle DENY THE GODHEAD’S LORDSHIP OVER THEM. Like Adam and Eve, deniers have taken unto themselves the power to determine good and evil, truth and falsity, right and wrong which is a power held only by God. By assuming that power, the church has replaced God, making her guilty of idolatry, thereby breaking the first commandment in God’s Law. Today the church’s collection of Satanic theological “truths” is called “church doctrine.” See the home page of this website for some examples of such “truths.”

This spiritual phenomenon is not new. Paul found the same problem existing in the churches of Galatia whom he chastised for embracing a “perverted” Gospel (1:6-9)–the result of accepting “another Jesus,” a heresy about which he had warned the church at Corinth (2 Cor. 11:4). Let us now turn to the Book of Romans to learn what Jesus Himself told Paul about the true Gospel (Gal. 1:12), specifically as it relates to the grace-sin connection. Before delving into chapter six let us remember that “SIN IS THE TRANSGRESSION OF THE LAW” (1 Jn. 3:4), and that “THE LAW HAS DOMINION (TOTAL CONTROL) OVER US AS LONG AS WE LIVE” (Rom. 7:1). Both Truths are rejected by the vast majority within the Catholic/Protestant Religious System.

As an introduction to Romans chapter six, Paul makes a life-changing statement in the previous verse (5:21) where he states that, though sin did (in the past) reign (exert control) over us, leaving us spiritually dead, now (following our conversion) God’s grace has freed us to live in righteousness which will result in eternal life because of the past death and present life of Jesus Christ Who continues to live in us. The expression: “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col. 1:27) means that He lives within the true saint in the form of His Holy Spirit which empowers us to obey God’s Law which is necessary in order to qualifying for eternal life. Read Romans 5:21 and 6:22. Grace does not do the above for us, rather, it enables us to be forgiven of our former sins (justification) and empowers us to “walk as Jesus walked” in this life. Having done so until the end, we can afterwards live with Him in paradise forever (Mat. 10:22).

In Romans 6:1 Paul refers back to 5:21 with a question that we all must answer for ourselves: Following my conversion, does God’s grace give me the right to continue to (in) sin? His answer found in verse two is: “GOD FORBID.” God forbids us to even think such a thing. In 8:6-8 Paul repeats that Truth: “For to be carnally minded is (to be spiritually) dead because the carnal (worldly, fleshly) mind is enmity against (the enemy of) God and unable to please Him.”

In 6:3-11 Paul relates the act of baptism to Christ’s death and resurrection. Our physical emersion into water and rising up out of the water is symbolic of Christ’s physical burial and spiritual resurrection from the tomb. By changing from physical to spiritual bodily composition–His rebirth–is Christ’s example of the true saint’s being born again upon his/her future resurrection. Read Born Again and The Resurrection of Jesus. Key words–Again and Resurrection respectively. The key that enables us to be born again from physical to spiritual upon His return is to live (“walk”) in obedience to His Holy Spirit in the present.

A very important Truth found in verses one and two has been rejected by the church masses for many generations. This unknown Truth involves a couple of two-letter words: “in” and “to.” The church “truth” exposed in verses one and two is one of Satan’s most cleaver deceptions. Note in verse one that Paul refers to continuing “in” sin, whereas in verse two he uses the word “to” relative to sin. Satan has deceived salvation seekers into believing that these are two different concepts. The theory is as follows: Prior to our conversion we lived “IN” sin, meaning that we sinned on a continual (regular) basis. Following conversion we must continue to sin (thanks to Adam), but not as much as before. The theory is that though we continue “TO SIN,” we no longer live “IN SIN.” Though we are still controlled by Adam’s sin gene, all is well in that we have cut back on our sinning. It’s simply a math situation.

Jesus exposes this deadly ruse in John 5:14 and 6:11 where He tells the man at the pool and the prostitute to “SIN NO MORE” following their encounter with Him. Contrary to popular opinion, “no more” means exactly that. Law-deniers solve the problem by ignoring the passages altogether, along with many other passages that do not fit into their doctrinal narrative.

It finally happened. We are now being informed by liberal Bible scholars that Jesus is “woke.” The “proof” they offer is found in the John 6 episode in which Jesus is dealing with the prostitute. Proof of His Wokeness is supposedly revealed when He tells her that, following His forgiveness of her sins, He does not condemn her, meaning that she can continue to be a prostitute as long as she calls Him “Lord.” To no one’s surprise, these Biblical “scholars” fail to include His caveat (condition) found in His following statement where He commands her to “SIN NO MORE.” Why? Because if she did, HE WOULD CONDEMN HER. This is clearly brought out in His dealing with the man at the Bethesda pool whom He had healed of an incurable disease. After healing him Jesus commanded him to “SIN NO MORE, LEST A WORSE DISEASE COME UPON YOU.” Here Jesus is telling the man (and us) that sin had caused his disease, and that any future sin would result in his being cursed with an even worse disease. This Truth is also brought out in Matthew 9:2-6. Here we find Jesus healing a man of a physical illness, then saying to him that his sins had been forgiven as part of the healing process. His explanation tells us that sin is the cause of diseases, along with other curses. Read The “Voices” of God. Key word–Voices. Now back to Romans 6.

In verses three through nine Paul expounds on the relationship between water baptism and the Christian “walk” in this life. In verse four he equates emersion in water with dying. Rising from the water is symbolic with being raised from the dead, meaning the death that results from man’s sins. The “newness of life” Paul writes about is the true Christian walk in that the “old man” of sin has been put to “death” and a “new man” now lives. Unlike the “old man” who was “alive to (served) sin” (Satan), the “new man” is “alive to” (serves) God in newness of life. As we are told in Second Corinthians 5:17, at conversion man becomes a new creature (creation)–“Old things pass away, BEHOLD, ALL THINGS ARE MADE NEW.” “All things” include sin, which must “pass away”–no longer a part of the believer’s life. No one dies partially. We are either living or dead. The same holds true in the spiritual realm. Read Revelation 3:14-20 where Jesus describes the end-time (Laodicean) church of today which claims to be both hot and cold (saved sinners). God compares such people to vomit.

In Romans 6:8 Paul tells us that in order to live with Christ in the future, we must die to sin in the present, as Jesus did. In verse 11 he states this Truth again, saying that because Christ died to sin (Satan) and lives to God (vs 10), so we must be “dead indeed to sin (Satan’s temptations–vs 11) and alive to God (His call to holiness–vs 13). The Word “indeed” relative to sin (vs 10) means to manifest our death to sin by our “deeds”–words, thoughts and actions of holiness. Being “alive to God” (vs 11) means that we must exhibit God’s “deeds” before the world that surrounds us so that, as was the case with Jesus, when people see us they see God. However, the world, especially the church world, will not see God in us just as their spiritual ancestors did not see God in Him. L.J.