Death to Sin, Alive in Christ
Romans 6:1
6:1 Paul had just written (in Rom 5:20) that where there is an increase in sin there is an even greater increase in grace.1 So the question was bound to arise, Why not continue in sin so the greatness of God’s grace may be seen more fully? The question may have arisen from antinomian sources that purposively misconstrued the doctrine of justification by faith as providing an excuse for a sinful lifestyle. Against such a perverted inference W. Barclay writes, “How despicable it would be for a son to consider himself free to sin, because he knew that his father would forgive.”2 Equally possible is that the question stemmed from conscientious Jews who felt that the doctrine of salvation by faith alone would encourage moral irresponsibility.3 Although the latter group questioned the teaching for fear of what it might do, the former embraced the doctrine for what they felt it would allow them to do.
6:2–3 The answer to the rhetorical question is a resounding “By no means!”4 How could it be possible for those who have died to sin to continue to live in it?5 Death separates. Death to sin removes the believer from the control of sin. This truth finds expression throughout Paul’s writings (Rom 6:6, 11; Col 3:5; cf. 1 Pet 2:24). The text does not say that sin dies to the believer; it is the believer who has died to sin. Origen, the most influential theologian of the ante-Nicene period, described death to sin in this way: “To obey the cravings of sin is to be alive to sin; but not to obey the cravings of sin or succumb to its will, this is to die to sin.”6 Sin continues in force in its attempt to dominate the life and conduct of the believer. But the believer has been baptized into Christ,7 and that means to have been baptized into Christ’s death as well.8 Christ’s death for sin becomes our death to sin. Sin lies on the other side of the grave for those who have in Christ died to it. Paul asked incredulously, How can we who have died to sin “breathe its air again?” (Knox).9
6:4 The believer has been “buried with [Christ] through baptism into death.”10 Burial certifies the reality of death. Baptism is the ritual act that portrays this burial.11 That Paul did not speak of faith at this point is immaterial. He was using the ritual act of baptism as a symbol of the complete redemptive event that finds its effectual cause in the death of Christ and its completion in the faith of those who believe.
But death and burial are not the end of the story. In God’s redemptive plan burial is followed by resurrection.12 As Christ was raised from the dead in a manifestation of the Father’s glorious power, so also are we raised to an entirely new way of living.13 The cross has as its ethical purpose a change in conduct. The Greek expression translated “a new life” is better rendered “a new sphere which is life.” Apart from Christ people are dead in their sins (Eph 2:1). But raised from the dead through faith in Christ, they enter an entirely new sphere of existence. They are alive in Christ. As Jesus promised, “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full” (John 10:10). Although contemporary use has tended to trivialize the expression “born again,” the vibrant reality of new life in Christ is still portrayed most graphically by the metaphor of spiritual birth. The lives of believers are to be as different from their preconversion days as life is from death.
Mounce, Robert H. Romans. Vol. 27. Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995. Print. The New American Commentary.
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