1 What then are we to say?
Should we continue in sin in order that grace may abound? 2 By no means!
How can we who died to sin go on living in it? 3 Do you not know that
all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into
his death? 4 Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into
death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of
the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have
been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united
with him in a resurrection like his. 6 We know that our old self was
crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we
might no longer be enslaved to sin. 7 For whoever has died is freed from
sin. 8 But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also
live with him. 9 We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will
never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. 10 The death he
died, he died to sin, once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to
God. 11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to
God in Christ Jesus. 12 Therefore, do not let sin exercise dominion in
your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions. 13 No longer
present your members to sin as instruments of wickedness, but present
yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and
present your members to God as instruments of righteousness. 14 For sin
will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under
grace. 15 What then? Should we sin because we are not under law but
under grace? By no means! 16 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? 17 But thanks be to God that you, having once
been slaves of sin, have become obedient from the heart to the form of
teaching to which you were entrusted, 18 and that you, having been set
free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness. 19 I am speaking in
human terms because of your natural limitations. For just as you once
presented your members as slaves to impurity and to greater and greater
iniquity, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness for
sanctification. 20 When you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard
to righteousness. 21 So what advantage did you then get from the things
of which you now are ashamed? The end of those things is death. 22 But
now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the advantage
you get is sanctification. The end is eternal life. 23 For the wages of
sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus
our Lord.
CONTINUE |