As we enter eternity, or experience the beginnings of our eternal life now, there are two things Paul says we can count on, Romans 6:11. First, we can “count ourselves dead to sin,” and secondly that we’re “alive to God,” both of which were accomplished for us by Jesus – the first one by his death, and the second by his life.
We do not enter eternity, then, with our old body of sin. Jesus nailed it to the cross and rendered it powerless. We are free of it once and for all (verse 7). In this new life of ours, the typical human evils Paul talked about in chapters 1 and 2 “no longer have mastery” over us, just like they had no mastery over Jesus (Romans 6:9-10).
But that’s not all we can count on. We can also count on the fact that Jesus rose from the dead to lift us into a completely new life that’s just like the life he lives. And what kind of life is that? Simply put, Jesus “lives to God (verse 10).” But so can we, verse 11, because we’re “alive to God,” too. So the life Jesus lives right now is the life we can live right now, as well.
It’s at this point a Christian may well ask, “But what’s our part in all this?” So far, Jesus seems to have done everything for us. “He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification (4:25),” so what’s left for us to do? It’s all been done. We’ve been credited with righteousness (4:24), we’re at peace with God (5:1), we’ve been saved from God’s wrath and reconciled to him (5:9-11), and now we discover sin has no power over us either, so now what? What part do we play in all this?
Paul has an answer: “Therefore,” Romans 6:12, now that we’re alive to God, or living to God, “do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires.” It’s a nasty shock to discover that even though we’re walking in eternity with the living Christ, evil still exerts a strong influence. It’s like the children in Narnia. It’s a wonderful new world, in which Aslan the great lion rules and he’s with them all the way to their final destiny, but evil still exists. There are evil witches trying to thwart Aslan’s purpose for them, and the children still fall prey to their human nature. It’s not a bed of roses for them, and nor is it for us, but there’s a reason for that….
Filed under: What's our part?
