by Bishop Mark Shaw

 

 

Have you ever read this verse and realized that it isn't working in your life?

 

Romans 6:14 For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.

 

That is exactly what happened to me several years ago. When I read that verse I realized that something was wrong because sin was master and I was it's slave. So I prayed and asked God what it was that I was doing wrong, and that I wanted to be in that place where sin was not my master. The Holy Spirit began to teach me why .

 

You see, I know that I am not alone.... that is others are like me. You look at Romans 6:14 and you wonder, if this is true why do I still sin? We all war against the flesh and we all desire, that is if you are a Christian, to do good. We do not want to sin, we want to be obedient to the law of God. We get frustrated with ourselves when we do not rise to that standard that we want to attain.

 

Sin has power. We all know this, or none of us would have sinned. If asked where sin gets it's power, most of us would say the old nature. But where does that power really come from? Now what I mean by power is strength. Sin gets its power or strength from the Law. (The Law is a set of requirements that was given to Israel, that gave man a look at what God required from us as humans to please Him as God.)

 

1 Corinthians 15:56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.

 

How could this be? The law is good, how can it give sin strength in our lives? What is it about the law that it would cause me to want to sin? Is this a correct view of what the law does in my life?

 

The law is good....

 

Romans 7:12 So the law is holy, and the command is holy and right and good.

 

If the law is good, why does it give sin strength?

 

Romans 8:3 The law was without power, because the law was made weak by our sinful selves. But God did what the law could not do. He sent his own Son to earth with the same human life that others use for sin. By sending his Son to be an offering to pay for sin, God used a human life to destroy sin.

 

Oh, so the law was made weak by our sinful nature, then we are right back where we started. What we have is a dual effect.....our sinful natures weaken the law, and the law strengthens sin. So we are in a quandary, what hope do we have if this dual effect is feeding each other and causing weakness in our lives?

 

Romans 7:5 For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, THE SINFUL PASSIONS AROUSED BY THE LAW were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death.

 

Romans 5:20 The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more,

 

So why was the Law given in the first place if it only increases sin?

 

Romans 7: 13 Did that which is good, then, become death to me? By no means! BUT IN ORDER THAT SIN MIGHT BE RECOGNIZED AS SIN, it produced death in me through what was good, SO THAT THROUGH THE COMMANDMENT SIN MIGHT BECOME UTTERLY SINFUL.

 

So the Law was given to show us just how lost we really are, and that we cannot hope to meet the demands of the Law through our own works, and without the redeeming blood of Christ.

 

Romans 3: 20 Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, THROUGH THE LAW WE BECOME CONSCIOUS OF SIN.

 

You should, at this point, have a good indication that we are lost under the Law; that sin is increased by trying to observe the Law. Therefore the power of sin is the Law.

 

This addresses the need that we have for Christ. For Jesus breaks this catch 22 dual effect. It reaches to the very core issues in our lives! We want to live Godly! We need to live Godly! We can live Godly! So how does bringing Jesus into our lives break sins power?

 

Well as you remember the very first verse that I quoted, "sin shall not have power over you." That is a stated fact, not a proposition! So if sin has power over me and I am a Christian, then perhaps I don't understand something, maybe I am living in a tent inside of a mansion. Perhaps maybe I just don't see that I am free and I have in a sense bound myself because I am not believing this freedom.

 

I was like a man who was in a jail cell, but the door was not locked. It looked like I was locked up, but I never really tried to open the door.... Let me assure you saints, Jesus has unlocked that door, you just have to see that you are free before you can walk in that freedom.

 

Okay so the law strengthens sin in us and we, by our sin, weaken the law. What if one or both of those elements were removed? They are! Let's look at it.

 

Romans 7:4-6 In the same way, my brothers and sisters, your old selves died, and you became free from the law through the body of Christ. This happened so that you might belong to someone else— the One who was raised from the dead— and so that we might be used in service to God. In the past, we were ruled by our sinful selves. The law made us want to do sinful things that controlled our bodies, so the things we did were bringing us death. In the past, the law held us like prisoners, but our old selves died, and we were made free from the law. So now we serve God in a new way with the Spirit, and not in the old way with written rules.

 

Now you can see why sin is not supposed to be your master. Sin gets its power from the Law, but you are not under the Law. You are under Grace! Many Christians are living their lives as if they are under a system of law. They have requirements that they feel they have to fulfill to please God. Does this sound like you?

 

What is grace? In short it is a special favor shown to you by God when you believed. This special favor applies to you the very righteousness God when you did not deserve it or earn it. It applies to you the complete obedience of the law, even though you were a law breaker. In grace, God makes you righteous so that we can again have a relationship with Him.

 

If you understand what true grace is, and what it is like to live under it, I am convinced that if you go back to a life of sin, you will not remain there. Because it is under grace where we experience freedom, it is under grace where we experience the fullness of life.

 

In Christ we are free, we are called to freedom. We are God's very own children. If God is holy, doesn't it follow that His children are holy also? Since we are made holy by Christ, then we ought to show it in our everyday lives..... and we can.

 

Hebrews 13:12 So Jesus also suffered outside the city to make his people holy with his own blood.

Since we are made holy we have access to things that we never had access to before. We have access to God's holy nature. We have access to God's throne, in which we are told to approach boldly. This can only be done if you are holy.....without sin of any kind.....totally clean. Can you actually look at yourself and what you do in your life and say that by your own holiness you can approach God's throne with boldness?

 

No, we can only come to His throne if we are made holy, made clean, made righteous. So in light of this, what role does sin play any longer in our lives?

 

If you have been released from the Law, then sin does not have power over you. You are free from the punishment that our sin deserves. Here is a very important statement that is necessary for you to grasp. Where there is no law there is no sin imputed to your account.

 

Romans 4:15 because the law can only bring God's anger. But if there is no law, there is nothing to disobey.

 

Romans 5:13 Sin was in the world before the law of Moses, but sin is not counted against us as breaking a command when there is no law.

 

Sin still exists, but it is not put to your account as a child of God. You will still suffer for committing sin, but it is in this life, not eternity. You might be thinking; "wouldn't that just give us a license to sin?"

 

In a sense, it seems that way, but you must remember that the truly converted will not want to sin! That is, God is installing His nature within you. It is no longer "I can't" but "I won't." It is no longer "I have to read my bible" but rather "I want to read my bible." It is no longer "I have to pray" but "I want to pray". The law says, "I can't sin" but grace says, "I don't want to sin".

 

Also we do not want to enter into a period of discipline in our life. Since God is our Father, He treats us like children. When we do wrong, He exposes it and disciplines us, and this is painful. So we just don't get away with it.

 

Apostle Paul said.

 

1 Corinthians 6:12 "I am allowed to do all things," but all things are not good for me to do. "I am allowed to do all things," but I will not let anything make me its slave.

 

What a powerful statement! Paul understood the totality of his freedom in Christ. He understood that he was not under sin's power anymore, that he was set free by the blood of Christ to live in the fullness of life that God intended for us to live in.

 

Sin is not beneficial at all. It only will cause hurt and destruction. There is a universal law that states that I will reap what I sow. Sin will still cause pain, but not the fear of being eternally lost for those who have believed. There is also an expectation of discipline from the Father of our spirits when we sin.

 

Hebrews 12:4-11 You are struggling against sin, but your struggles have not yet caused you to be killed. You have forgotten the encouraging words that call you his children: "My child, don't think the Lord's discipline is worth nothing, and don't stop trying when he corrects you. The Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as his child." So hold on through your sufferings, because they are like a father's discipline. God is treating you as children. All children are disciplined by their fathers. If you are never disciplined (and every child must be disciplined), you are not true children. We have all had fathers here on earth who disciplined us, and we respected them. So it is even more important that we accept discipline from the Father of our spirits so we will have life. Our fathers on earth disciplined us for a short time in the way they thought was best. But God disciplines us to help us, so we can become holy as he is. We do not enjoy being disciplined. It is painful, but later, after we have learned from it, we have peace, because we start living in the right way.

 

Okay, so how do I not sin? How do I get to a point in my life where sin does not have any power over me?

 

Romans 6:13-14 Do not offer the parts of your body to serve sin, as things to be used in doing evil. Instead, offer yourselves to God as people who have died and now live. Offer the parts of your body to God to be used in doing good. Sin will not be your master, because you are not under law but under God's grace.

 

Sin does not have power over you! That is a fact! Only you can let sin rule your life now. You see, submission is the key in your fight against sin. Sin now becomes a barometer of the relationship that you have with God, as relationship is the barometer of the amount of submission that you have toward God.

 

If the sin in your life is high, it is because you relationship with God is low, and you relationship with God is low because your submission of your self to God is low.

 

If the sin in your life is low, it is because relationship with God is high, and relationship is high because the amount of yourself that you submit to God is high. I hope that makes sense to you. See for yourself if this is not true! So if you also want to conquer the fear and the bondage, you can. You do this by an offering of yourself. You can by just praying this and meaning it:

 

Father God, I approach your throne with a request for my life. I request that you make me into the person that you created me to be. I give you permission to do this without any regards to my family, my finances, or my body. I give you all of me. I give you permission to remove anything in my life that is not pleasing to you. I am yours to do with what you want Father. In Jesus name.....amen.

 

 

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