How to be Free From Sin
On Good Friday, I shared a message with you on Receiving Forgiveness. Someone said that Christians are not perfect people, they are only forgiven people.
Forgiveness is the fundamental benefit of Easter.
Colossians 1:14 (KJV)
In whom we have redemption through his blood, [even] the forgiveness of sins:
We are reconciled with God because our sins are forgiven.
Colossians 1:22 NLT
“Yet now he has reconciled you to himself through the death of Christ in his physical body. As a result, he has brought you into his own presence, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before him without a single fault.”
There’s More!
God didn’t only forgive our sins in Christ. He also delivered us from sinfulness.
Forgiveness is when God pardons your sins. It’s like a criminal who receives state pardon. But how can you be sure that someone who’s pardoned won’t repeat the crime? This is why God forgives our sins but also uproots the sin nature which makes us sin.
What is Sin Nature
Sin nature is the reason why you sin. It’s the tendency to commit sins.
Romans 7:19-24 NLT
“I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it. I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. I love God’s law with all my heart. But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me.”
“Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death?”
Many people after giving their lives to Christ can relate with this struggle.
They find themselves rising and falling as it were.
But thank God, there’s a way out!
“Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord…
Romans 7:25 NLT
Another Reason Christ Died
1 Peter 2:24 (KJV)
Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.
– [ ] Jesus died so that you and I can be dead to sin.
– [ ] It’s not the will of God for you to be a slave to sin.
– [ ] Don’t hide under the excuse that everyone is a sinner.
– [ ] Consider 1Pet.2:24 again. We should live unto righteousness…
– [ ] No scripture ever sanctions living in sin as many teach today. Without holiness no man shall see God (Heb. 12:14).
How God dealt With Sin Nature.
In Christ, God dealt with the sin nature.
How?
When Christ died, you died with him.
In Adam, you died to God. You died spiritually and ceased to exist unto God. 1Cor.15:22.
In Christ, we also died. When Christ died, we died with him. But this time around, we died to sin.
Romans 6:3 (KJV)
Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
Don’t you know that so may of us as are immersed into Jesus Christ were immersed into his death?
When you gave your life to Jesus, it was more than joining a church. You were immersed into Christ’s death. You died with him.
You died to sin.
Romans 6:4
“Your old sin-loving nature was buried with him by baptism when he died; and when God the Father, with glorious power, brought him back to life again, you were given his wonderful new life to enjoy.”
Romans 6:5 TLB
“For you have become a part of him, and so you died with him, so to speak when he died; and now you share his new life and shall rise as he did.”
Romans 6:6
Your old evil desires were nailed to the cross with him; that part of you that loves to sin was crushed and fatally wounded, so that your sin-loving body is no longer under sin’s control, no longer needs to be a slave to sin;
Romans 6:7 (KJV)
For he that is dead is freed from sin.
The key to Freedom
After explaining to us what happened in Christ, the Holy Spirit through Apostle Paul now tells us how we enter into this victorious life over sin.
Romans 6:11-14
Number 1: Reckon
Romans 6:11 (KJV)
Likewise reckon (count, consider, weigh, deliberate, deem, judge, decide…) ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
This word reckon deals with reality. It means in the light of the aforementioned details, consider that you are dead indeed to sin.
Romans 6:11 TLB
So look upon your old sin nature as dead and unresponsive to sin, and instead be alive to God, alert to him, through Jesus Christ our Lord.
If I reckon (logizomai) that my bank account has $25 in it, it has $25 in it. Otherwise I am deceiving myself. This word refers more to fact than supposition or opinion.
Number 2: Let Not
Romans 6:12 (KJV)
Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.
Do not allow sin to reign…
If God says don’t allow something happen, it means he’s given you the ability to enforce it.
Remember Christ is in you…Col.1:27
Not only are you dead to sin but alive to God
Romans 6:13
Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin] It is not sin to be tempted; the sin is in yielding (Jas. 1:13-15).
While sin exists as satanic solicitation, it is Satan’s lust and sin, not ours. When we yield, we make the Devil’s sin our own.
When man refuses, regardless of how
strong the temptation is, no sin is possible (1Jn. 3:4; Jas. 1:13-15).
b [but yield yourselves unto God] Yield your will to God. Satan cannot force your will, and God will not, so the safe and normal thing is to will to do God’s will.
– Pastor Theo Ajadi