1.     My message last week was entitled, “Deliverance From the Power of Sin.”  I stressed that Christians are dead to sin (cf. 6:1, 2, 11).

2.     We are saved by grace through faith and we are sanctified by grace through faith (6:14, 15).

3.     Romans 4 & 5 teach justification by grace through faith.  Romans 6—8 teach sanctification by grace through faith.

4.     “Sanctification” means “holiness” (cf. 6:19, 22).

5.     Romans 6—8 are very practical.  We have been saved from the penalty of sin, and we have been saved from the power of sin.

6.     We stopped off last week at Romans 6:14, which is the transitional verse in this chapter.  As I stated last week, many people are confused over this Scripture.  They seem to think that because we are not under the law we are lawless.  This is not what the Bible teaches.

1. WHAT “NOT UNDER THE LAW” DOES NOT MEAN
2. WHAT “NOT UNDER THE LAW” DOES MEAN
3. WHAT “UNDER GRACE” MEANS

I. WHAT “NOT UNDER THE LAW” DOES NOT MEAN

1.     As I have said, it certainly does not mean we are to be lawless.  The word, “antinomianism” comes from two Greek words: anti means against and nomos means law. So antinomianism means against the law, specifically against God’s moral law. It means lawlessness.  This describes many churches and many professing Christians today.

2.     Nearly two thousand years ago, the apostle Paul wrote, “For the mystery of iniquity (lawlessness) doth already work” (II Thess. 2:7).   This mystery of iniquity or lawlessness has infiltrated many churches.

3.     On the one hand, we have churches and cults that are trying to put Christians under the Mosaic Law (e.g., SDA), and on the other hand you have churches and Christians that are promoting worldliness and lawlessness. 

4.     These days it is not unusual to meet church members living together but they are not married (to each other).  Churches are becoming increasingly tolerant of homosexuality (even performing so-called “gay marriages” and ordaining homosexual “ministers”). Churches are damaged and corrupted with gossiping, carnality, backbiting, lying, stealing, and wickedness.

5.     Many churches have adopted a rock and roll worship style.  Rock music is characterized by lawlessness, rebellion, worldliness, sensuality, and immorality.

6.     It is not unusual to meet so-called Christians who drink, commit fornication, use dirty language, etc. and then when they are corrected they say with great indignation, “Hey, we are not under the law!”  But this is not what this means.

7.     Romans 6—8 teach us victory over sin.  But no person can expect victory over sin who has a soft attitude toward sin.

8.     Have you ever heard someone say, “He’s a hard preacher”?   Sometimes they are being complimentary but sometimes they are not.  I’d rather say, “He’s a Bible preacher.”  Because all true Bible preachers have to preach hard against sin.  And preachers who do not preach hard against sin are not Bible preachers.

9.     We must be hard against sin.  We must not be soft on sin.  The attitude that grace gives us license to sin makes deliverance from the power of sin impossible.

10. Let me make a simple analogy.  If you do not believe that sin put Jesus on the cross, and if you do not believe you are a dirty, rotten, hell-bound sinner, and if you do not believe there is a heaven to gain and a hell to shun – you cannot be saved.

11. Likewise, if you do not think sin is so bad, if you make excuses for your sin, if you play with your sin like a dog plays with a bone – you will never have victory over the power of sin.

12. I remember years ago being on a cable TV show debating a RC.  I said I have been saved from the penalty of sin, and I am being saved from the power of sin, and some day I will be saved from the very presence of sin.  The RC laughed and said, “Oh, that’s just something they taught you in your Baptist Bible college.”

13. His remark bothered me but he had a point.  He had probably seen very few Christians who have given evidence of being saved from the power of sin.

14. So we know that “not under law” does not mean “lawless.”  It does not mean license to sin (6:15). Then what does it mean?

II. WHAT “NOT UNDER THE LAW” DOES MEAN

1.     The apostle Paul is referring here to “law” (no article in the original Greek) and not just the Mosaic Law.  The term “under the law” means ruled or governed by the law as a way to find victory over sin.

2.     We are not justified by the law, nor are we sanctified by the law.

3.     Here is a good illustration from H A Ironside:

Some years ago, I had a little school for young Indian men and women, who came to my home in Oakland, California, from the various tribes in northern Arizona. One of these was a Navajo young man of unusually keen intelligence. One Sunday evening, he went with me to our young people’s meeting. They were talking about the epistle to the Galatians, and the special subject was law and grace. They were not very clear about it, and finally one turned to the Indian and said, “I wonder whether our Indian friend has anything to say about this.”  He rose to his feet and said, “Well, my friends, I have been listening very carefully, because I am here to learn all I can in order to take it back to my people. I do not understand all that you are talking about, and I do not think you do yourselves. But concerning this law and grace business, let me see if I can make it clear. I think it is like this. When Mr. Ironside brought me from my home we took the longest railroad journey I ever took. We got out at Barstow, and there I saw the most beautiful railroad station and hotel I have ever seen. I walked all around and saw at one end a sign, ‘Do not spit here.’ I looked at that sign and then looked down at the ground and saw many had spitted there, and before I think what I am doing I have spitted myself. Isn’t that strange when the sign say, ‘Do not spit here’?

“I come to Oakland and go to the home of the lady who invited me to dinner today and I am in the nicest home I have been in. Such beautiful furniture and carpets, I hate to step on them. I sank into a comfortable chair, and the lady said, ‘Now, John, you sit there while I go out and see whether the maid has dinner ready.’ I look around at the beautiful pictures, at the grand piano, and I walk all around those rooms. I am looking for a sign; and the sign I am looking for is, ‘Do not spit here,’ but I look around those two beautiful drawing rooms, and cannot find a sign like this. I think ‘What a pity when this is such a beautiful home to have people spitting all over it—too bad they don’t put up a sign!’ So I look all over that carpet, but cannot find that anybody have spitted there. What a queer thing! Where the sign says, ‘Do not spit,’ a lot of people spitted. Where there was no sign at all, in that beautiful home, nobody spitted. Now I understand! That sign is law, but inside the home it is grace. They love their beautiful home, and they want to keep it clean. They do not need a sign to tell them so. I think that explains the law and grace business.”

As he sat down, a murmur of approval went round the room and the leader exclaimed, “I think that is the best illustration of law and grace I have ever heard.” {Illustrations of Bible Truth by H. A. Ironside, Moody Press, 1945, pp. 40-42}

4.     This is what Romans 6:14 means. The law commands but the law cannot enable.   To teach that one can be saved by the law is to deny the Gospel (cf. Gal. 2:21).

5.     Paul says in Galatians 3:24 that “the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.”

6.     The law reveals our sin and shows us our sin, so that we might turn to Christ and be saved (Rom. 8:3).

7.     You can think of the law as a mirror showing you your need for soap and water.  The law shows us our need for salvation but the law cannot save us.  We are saved by God’s grace (Eph. 2:8, 9).

8.     When people boast of keeping the Law (e.g., Orthodox Jews, SDA, etc.) they are deceiving themselves.  “Being under the law” implies at least three things:

a.      A Divine commandment ordering perfect obedience

b.     A Divine promise of reward for perfect obedience

c.     A Divine threatening of punishment for falling short of perfect obedience (from W.H. Griffith Thomas, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans).

9.     Compare Exodus 19:8 and Deuteronomy 27:26 with James 2:10 and Galatians 3:10-12; 5:4.  These Scriptures demonstrate the utter futility of attempting to live under the law.

III. WHAT “UNDER GRACE” MEANS

1.     The word “grace” is one of the most beautiful words in the English language. It speaks of reconciliation with God, cleansing from sin, the enjoyment of God’s favor, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, victory over sin, eternity in heaven – and much more.

2.     The idea behind the term “under grace” is God’s gracious bestowment of inward power to obey Him (Rom. 6:14).

3.     The law demands obedience but grace supplies the will to obey and the power to obey.  Grace breaks the mastery of sin as law could not.

4.     Therefore, “under grace” cannot possibly mean license to sin (Rom. 6:15).  Rather, it refers to the power not to sin.

5.     There are certain things a Christian must know if he is to have victory over sin.  First there is our union with Christ (6:3, 6, 9).

6.     Union with Christ in His death means victory over sin – we are dead to sin.  Union with Christ in His resurrection means walking in newness of life (6:4).

7.     Now we see in verse 16 another fact that we must know – we now have a new Master (6:16).   Over and over the Bible teaches we can only serve one Master (cf. Matthew 6:24). 

8.     Sin is a terrible slave-master. Sin always enslaves people (Rom. 6:16).  We see this vividly here in NY where there are literally millions of people enslaved to sin – drugs, alcohol, smoking, pornography, gambling, homosexuality, adultery, etc.

9.     When we say we believe the Bible, we mean we believe everything the Bible has to say about sin and salvation, heaven and hell, God and the devil, etc.

10. Therefore, since the Bible says sin enslaves and sin destroys, we believe it (Rom. 6:16, 21, 23; 1:32).  This is why the apostle Paul says, “Know ye not?” (6:16).

11. The Bible teaches that when a man yields to sin, sin gets a hold on him and soon he is under the power of sin (cf. John 8:34; II Peter 2:18, 19).

12. Lord Byron was an English poet, whose short life (died at 36) was marked by detestable sins – adultery, incest, homosexuality, and drunkenness.  His life was so wicked that he could not live in England and chose to live abroad.   He was so wicked they refused to bury him at Westminster Abbey.

13. Byron was enslaved to sin at a very young age.  He wrote these words, “The thorns which I have reaped are of the tree I planted, -- they have torn me and I bleed.
 I should have known what fruit would spring from
 such a tree” – Lord Byron.

14. He “should have known” and should have believed (6:21).

15. How much differently things would have turned out for Lord Byron had he repented of his sin and received Christ as his Lord and Saviour (cf. Rom. 6:17).

16. Byron’s short life and miserable death clearly illustrate Romans 6:21, 23.

17. But thank God there have been multitudes of sinners who have turned from sin to Christ (6:17).  “But God be thanked…” (6:17).  We ought to thank God that we are no longer servants to sin (cf. 7:25a).

18. We ought to thank God that now we have the privilege of serving Him.

19. Ephesians 5:20 says, “Giving thanks always…”

20. First Corinthians 15:57 says, “But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

21. Second Corinthians 2:14 says, “Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ.”

22. Most religions teach you must serve in order to be saved.  But the Bible teaches that we have been saved to serve (6:18).  We are free from the power of sin, and free to serve God (cf. vss. 18 and 20).

23. Last week we saw the difference between “reckon” (6:11) and “yield” (6:13).  Verse 19 reminds us that our flesh is weak; therefore we must not yield to the flesh.

24. Instead we must yield to righteousness and holiness (6:19).

CONCLUSION:

1.     There is an interesting word found in Romans 6:17 – “form of doctrine.”  This word can be translated as “mould.”

2.     Some members were asking about building a wall out in the parking lot.  I said we’d have to pour a footing first.  That means digging a trench and laying out forms.

3.     Vine’s Expository Dictionary says, “The metaphor is that of a cast or frame into which molten material is poured so as to take its shape.  The Gospel is the mould; those who are obedient to its teachings become conformed to Christ.”

4.     Another preacher put it this way, “When we were saved, God cast our inward natures into the mold described in Romans 6.  The gospel not only delivers us from the penalty and power of sin; it shapes our character as well” (John Phillips, Exploring Romans).

5.     Beloved, let us thank God for our salvation (6:17).  Let us thank God we have been delivered from the bondage of sin and the power of sin. 

6.     And let us “obey from the heart that form of doctrine” so that God can mold us into the kind of Christians He wants us to be.