Serving a New Master

Turn back to Romans chapter 6,
in which chapter we have been engaged
in the entry into Paul’s discussion into sanctification. Paul has begun to lay a foundation,
and this discussion will carry us all the way into chapter 8,
all the way through chapter 8. But for now, Paul has merely
begun to introduce and, as I said, lay a foundation for the study
of sanctification. We began in chapter six with
a consideration of that first portion, which really lays out
an illustration. An illustration that points us
to the fact that we have died, as it were, to sin, that we have
died with Christ. We spent no little time on that.
And Paul, in a sense, packages that up and opens with a completely
new and fresh illustration of why the pursuit of sanctification
should be so vigorous for the saint. Part of What is helpful as we
begin to consider why the pursuit of sanctification is so crucial,
so important that we can’t just sit back and wait for glory,
that we need to actively and wholeheartedly pursue the grace
of sanctification where daily and moment by moment we are more
and more conformed to Christ. Part of the reason that puts
that in such bold relief is the subject of sin. Now, Paul had
dealt with the subject of sin, and I merely bring up a brief
reminder of the nature of sin. I read from one pastor this past
week who characterized sin so well, and once that is really
placed squarely before our eyes, we begin to see how eagerly we
must pursue sanctification. Here, his characterization of
sin. Sin is the most devastating,
debilitating, degenerating power that ever entered into the human
stream. Scripture characterizes sin and
its effects in many ways. It refers to it as defiling,
a pollution of the soul. Sin is called an impure thing,
Isaiah 30, 22. And it is compared to the venom
of serpents and the deadly poison of cobras, Deuteronomy 32, 33. Paul refers to sin as a defilement
of flesh and spirit and to sinners as those whose minds and consciences
have been defiled. Sin is rebellious, ignoring and
even trampling on God’s word. Sin is ungrateful, refusing to
acknowledge God as the source of every good thing. The sinner
indulges in God’s gracious provisions that are all around him that
fails to credit, much less thank God for those things. He takes
God’s blessings and uses them to self to serve self and Satan. And catch the last line. Sin
is overpowering, hanging above fallen mankind like darkness
over light, it dominates the mind, the affections and the
will. This is no light matter, nothing
to be trifled with, nothing to be met half-heartedly. The pursuit of sanctification,
the mortification of sin, which is a part of that battle, is
an absolutely crucial undertaking for the Christian. We cannot
undertake this lightly. To do so is to step into the
most perilous of traps. That’s what’s in Paul’s mind
when he renews, in a sense, his passionate study of the subject
of sanctification, beginning in verse 15. If you will, he
recharges or takes another tack. What he wants to do is so drive
into the mind of the Roman Christians and us the great need of sanctification
that we will never again consider it lightly. We will never again
take sin so casually. If you would look at verse 15.
Where Paul says, what then shall we sin because we are not under
law, but under grace? May it never be. Do you not know
that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience,
you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting
in death or of obedience resulting in righteousness? But thanks
be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient
from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed. And having been freed from sin,
you became slaves of righteousness. I’m speaking in human terms because
of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your
members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness, resulting
in further lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves
to righteousness, resulting in sanctification. For when you
were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.
Therefore, what benefit were you deriving from the things
of which you are now ashamed? For the outcome of those things
is death. But now, having been freed from sin and enslaved to
God, you derive your benefit resulting in sanctification and
the outcome eternal life. For the wages of sin is death.
But the free gift of God is eternal life. in Christ Jesus, our Lord. And so Paul opens with a completely
new and different illustration. And in a sense, it is an unpalatable
illustration, at least on the face of it. If Paul shocked us
when he reminded us that we had died with Christ and in a sense,
we were called to come and embrace that death that only in embracing
that death could we really and truly live, at least live as
God had called us to live, then Paul is going to do likewise
with the illustration that he uses in this connection. He had
already used death. Now he uses an even perhaps more
unpalatable image when he calls us slaves. Now, for those of
us who have done our study in American history, we know that
to be one of the greatest blights on our country. Its effects are
still felt today in the bitterness of the African-American community
towards the whole subject. It was a wrong and it was a wrong
that took hundreds of years to write, and it still isn’t completely
remedied. Slavery, that ugly thing that
We hardly can even imagine participating in. And yet at one point in our
country was embraced by almost all, even in the highest ranks
of public office. Slavery. Even the thought of
considering that we are slaves. That we are slaves, even to God
is a difficult illustration for us to swallow. That’s exactly
why in verse 19, in a sense, Paul almost apologizes for it. He’s using terminology that is
somewhat unpalatable. But it’s accurate. It’s very
accurate. Paul starts by pointing out that,
in a sense, We are either slaves of sin or slaves of obedience. In verse 16, it goes on in verse
17 and says that we’re either slaves of sin or slaves of righteousness. And that obedience and righteousness
and ultimately slavery to God all refer to the same thing,
just as slavery to sin is concurrent throughout. The slavery that he calls us
to is a slavery to obedience, a slavery to righteousness, which
is a slavery to God. Paul says that this kind of slavery
ultimately is really and truly freedom, freedom indeed. If you would go back, we want
to begin to digest this passage that Paul is Calling us to understand
and calling us to to grasp with regards to our standing in Christ. The interesting thing about this
passage, verses 15 through 23, is it’s almost a mirror of structurally
speaking, it’s almost a mirror of verses one through 14. You
have a question. You have almost an absurd notion
posed. You have an immediate answer.
You have a follow up detailed answer and then you have a structural
explanation that follows. We’ll see that in days to come. Look at the question, first of
all, what then? And even when he says what then
he’s pointing us backwards, back to verse 14, where Paul had just
said. That we are not under law, but
under grace. And Paul is drawing a conclusion
that others might draw, an incorrect conclusion, even a heretical
conclusion. Shall we sin because we are not
under law, but under grace? What then? Paul says. And in
a sense, he reinvigorates the question of verse one and he,
just like he did in verse one, introduces an explicit, powerful
answer To the. Simple question. The conclusions
that Paul had already dealt with in verse one, false as they were,
are a little bit differently stated here in verse one, the
false idea was that somebody could continue in sin so that
grace would continue to be lavished upon them. Here, what Paul says
is that that somebody might conclude that sinful behavior, sin, doesn’t
matter anymore. We really can’t be even charged
with sin anymore because we’re not under any kind of law. Well, we explained that last
Lord’s Day. Paul, in saying what then, looks
back to that verse 14 and Paul Assured believers there that
they were not under the law. And so the conclusion is, does
that mean that now we are free to sin? That nobody can point
us to any standard, nobody can point us to any kind of law or
moral code and say, look, you have transgressed. Shall we sin because we are not
under law, but under grace? In essence, the conclusion went
something like this. Since works now are no longer
the ground of our justification. Remember, our justification is
by our faith alone in Christ alone and by nothing else. If
works aren’t going to be used to determine our standing in
Christ, our standing before God. Then aren’t we at liberty to
sin? Without fear, we are justified already before God. Does it matter
at all how we live on this earth? And in a sense, it’s the same
argument. It’s antinomian. Remember, we
said that that meant contrary to law or against all law. It’s the same antinomian argument
that was leveled in verse one. It’s just slightly altered is
all. The man who is now under God’s
grace is the same kind of man, the same man that shares and
exemplifies the life of Christ. And because of that, his life
should be, this is where Paul will go, it should be characterized
by the same kind of obedience that Christ manifested and exemplified. I mean, no wonder Paul says in
verse 15, Once all the words are out, once the expression
of the thought is complete. The conclusion is drawn and the
expression is made, shall we sin because we are not under
law, but under grace? Paul answers it absolutely clearly. May it never be. No way. It’s
met with the same strong denial that he used in verse one, the
strongest one that could be used. In the Greek language, May it
never be. No way. God forbid. That’s the simple answer. But
Paul wants to drive home the point. He wants to answer this
once and for all. And he does it by way of reason.
And he does it in verse 16. Glance down, if you would, where
the answer there is given the principle of slavery. Paul uses
the principle of slavery to answer this question. Does it matter
how a Christian lives in the world? Can we just go on sinning? Paul says this. Do you not know?
That when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience,
you are slaves of the one whom you obey. either of sin resulting
in death or of obedience resulting in righteousness. Now, note,
first of all, this situation is conditional. It says when
you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience. It doesn’t give you the option.
You will present yourselves as slaves for obedience. We’ll talk more about that in
a moment. But it is conditional. It’s a
view of a slave in a sense standing before his would be master. When a master rings the bell
or calls on the horn or summons the slave by whatever means he
has. the intercom, the email, whatever
the case may be. When the slave arrives, he is
there to render service. Yes, sir. He is there to do the
master’s will. The phrase here present to present
yourself is to come and to stand heels together, chest out, Eyes
open, ears attentive to the Master’s voice, ready, willing and able
to do what He asks you to do. It’s a willful submission. It
is your duty. It is your job as a slave. The
Master doesn’t have to write you and say, would you pretty
please? Could I maybe have you? If you have time, The master
simply summons the slave to his face, gives him the command,
and he fully expects the slave to carry out that command. It’s
a very simple illustration, isn’t it? And you say, yes, that’s
right. When you present your slaves
to someone as slaves for obedience, that’s right. What a great illustration. When did we do that? Paul, you
already reminded us and we had kind of forgotten that when we
placed our faith in Christ, we died with Christ on the cross. When exactly did we show ourselves
as slaves for obedience? At that same time, saint, at
that same time, children of God, when you placed your faith in
Christ, you placed your faith in Christ You died with Christ
and you also stood before Him willfully desiring to do His
will, no longer your own. You desired to serve Him and
to serve only, no longer your flesh. You desired to carry out
His plan and His program for His kingdom’s sake and no longer
for your own. It was His sovereignty that you
sought, not your own. When you present yourselves.
To someone as slaves for obedience, it is conditional. But note the principle, having
presented the condition that when. Paul lays out a reminder
of the principle, and as I said, it is so simple. I know the children
in our midst can understand this one when Paul says, do you not
know? that when you present yourselves
to someone as a slave for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom
you obey. Well, that’s pretty simple. That’s
the point of Paul’s illustration. It is a simple illustration.
Don’t you know that if you’re a slave and he summons you and
you come into the chambers and you stand before him, that you
are there to obey him? then it only follows that whoever
you obey, that’s your master. Powerful illustration. Wait till
it unfolds. Do you not know? A little phrase
reminds us of where Paul’s already been. Paul has been reminding.
That’s what he’s been doing since verse 1. Reminding them over
and over again. Don’t you know? Do you remember?
Are you aware? And Paul says it again, do you
not know this is a plainly evident truth? That this bond service, once
someone is a slave, once they are in that position, it is absolutely
binding. They have to obey. That’s the
job of a slave. Now, the whole thing is it’s
that little phrase there is rhetorical. In other words, Paul is asking
the question that he knows that his readers are going to understand
this. He knows that they’ll grasp this. What he’s doing is appealing
to something that was well known among them. Essentially, the
same kind of an appeal that we found in verse three, Paul says,
do you not know you are slaves of the one whom you obey? You see, what he points to. Is
that almost by definition? Slaves. They’re bound to obey their earthly
masters. That’s what a slave is. That’s
what Paul says. In fact, this principle. This master slave obedience Principle
is a principle that even the Lord Jesus used, and he used
it so casually that it had to have been a well-known truth.
Jesus said in Matthew 6, 24, you know where I’m going. He
said, no man can serve two masters. It is inherently impossible.
No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one
and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise
the other. You cannot serve God and man. And what he does is
set up this paradigm of a potential of having two masters, both working
out orders that the slave can only do one master’s bidding. In other words, as one said,
we are simply the bond slaves of that to which we present ourselves
for obedience. Whoever you obey, that’s your
master. That’s what Paul’s saying. As
one pastor said, it enters into the idea of slavery that the
subjection is absolute and continued. The slave does not obey his own
will, but his master’s. He is subject for a time, not
for a time, but for life. He is under an influence which
secures obedience. That is his job to obey. Now,
mind you, though this was in Jesus mind and it was evidently
a part of society because Jesus just states the principle axiomatically,
he didn’t need to go into a long, detailed explanation of slavery. Others do the same exact thing.
Jesus did it elsewhere. John and John, 1334, a new commandment,
I give you that you love one another. Pardon me, and I jotted
down the wrong one. Luke 16, 13 said no servant can
serve two masters where he says in another context entirely. Galatians 4, 9. Now that you
have come to know God or rather come to be known by God, how
is it that you turn back to again to the weak and worthless elemental
things to which you desire to be enslaved all over again? It’s impossible to serve two
masters. You cannot serve God and then
turn back to the elemental things of the world and serve your flesh. Paul says the same thing in Titus
three, three. For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient,
deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasure. The truth is plainly evident.
You are the slave of the one whom you obey. And if you obey
sin, sin is your master, not God. Second, Peter two nine says
it quite plainly as well. Speaking of false teachers and
heritage heretics, he says that they promise freedom while they
themselves are slaves of corruption. That’s their boss. That’s their
master. But I want you to note, as you
look at verse 16, there are only two options. There’s only two
options. It’s not like we have a myriad
of masters out there in the marketplace, all vying for our attention,
all bidding for our services. There are two options. Do you not know when you present
yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are the slaves
of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death or
of obedience resulting in righteousness? There’s two options. We’re either
going to obey the master sin or we’re going to obey the master
obedience and righteousness. God. Years ago. That. musical artist of the 60s, Bob
Dylan, had a conversion experience. And I don’t know if it was legitimate. As far as I understand it, he’s
not walking with the Lord anymore. But it was an interesting thing
to watch and to observe, to observe his life, someone who had for
so long touted the world’s principles. Now, all of a sudden, adopting
Christ and Christianity and promoting those things. I don’t know how
long he walks with the Lord or whether he is still truly saved,
but I do know that he pretty accurately summed up this passage.
in one of the songs that he wrote soon after his conversion when
he said, you’re going to have to serve somebody. It may be
the devil and it may be the Lord, but you’re going to have to serve
somebody. And there are only two options. That’s exactly what
Paul says. You’re either going to serve
sin or you’re going to serve God by way of obedience. In righteousness, What he points to is this general
principle of obedience to a master that once that’s accepted, once
that is applied. In the case of these personified
masters, sin and obedience, it is absolute. We are there for
service. You can’t go vacillating back
from one to the other. Who’s going to be my master today?
Who’s going to call the shots in my life today? That’s not
the way it works. As we’ve already seen, the slave
doesn’t obey his will, it isn’t his program that’s in view, it’s
the master’s program. And he’s there out of obedience
to that master for life. Here’s the issue. That is, one
pastor summarized it. It’s the person’s general pattern
of living that really proves and points to who his master
really is. And so as you sit here this morning,
you say, examine your life of the past week, how you spent
your time, what you spent your time doing, how you spent your
money, how you Used your God given mouth, how you used your
eyes. What did you listen to? What
did you do? Where did you go? If a person’s general pattern of living. Is borne out by the fact that.
His living points to who his master is, was your life characterized
by sin, because if that’s true, then you are sin’s slave. If your life was characterized
this week by God’s grace, obedience, then you are God’s servant, God’s
slave. There is no idea here, there
is no third option. Of having no master at all, of
being the one that controls your own destiny, being a man’s man
of Being the one that calls the shots. There is no third option. Of not having not being a slave
at all, it doesn’t even come up in Paul’s consideration. You’re
going to be sin’s master or you’re going to be God’s. You’re going
to be sin’s servant or you’re going to be God’s. It’s that
simple. And Paul lays it out, either
of sin resulting in death And he points here to the results
of being a servant in various camps. What’s it going to be
like to be God’s servant? What’s it going to be like to
be sins? First of all, the result of being sin’s servant is ultimately
death. Sin is deadly. We’ve already
seen it. That has been one of the most
recurring words in this entire chapter. Sin is death. Sin brings death. Death, not
only physically, but ultimately spiritually, it brings death
and destruction. It follows in its wake. As one pastor said, he who serves
sin is the slave of sin. He is under its power. He cannot
free himself from its dominion. He may hate his bondage. His
reason and conscience may protest against it. His will may resist
it, but he is still constrained to obedience. He cannot escape. And that, people, is exactly
what the world is held by. They are held by the devil to
do his will. They are in bondage to their
sin. They cannot escape without the
grace of God. And once you begin to see this,
this idea of slavery, this idea of obedience, this idea of Bearing
out who it is our master is by how we live our lives. Thank
God there is another option. And there is. And that’s what
Paul points to at the end of verse 16. Do you not know that
when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience,
you are the slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin
resulting in death or of obedience resulting in
righteousness. People were called to obedience,
were called to a life of obedience, were called to a life of righteousness
and sanctification. And that’s what this chapter
is all about. We’re called to be changed people. We’re called
to a different master, we’re called to follow someone new
and obey someone new and to disobey the old master. Righteousness, one said, which
obedience promotes, should also be interpreted inclusively to
refer to righteousness in all its aspects, culminating in the
consummated righteousness of glorification. What we are now,
what we are becoming now, one day we will be in completeness. perfectly righteous, perfectly
sanctified, but it must be the trend and direction of our lives
in the here and now. Here, the master personified
is the complete opposite of sin, isn’t it? What he points to here is obedience
and the meaning of that points to the fact that this act of
submission that we render towards God because of the freedom of
sin that we’ve experienced, the forgiveness that we’ve experienced
from God now calls us to a life of obedience. What is true of sin, as we saw,
is also now we see explicitly true of holiness. That is, one
said, he who by virtue of union with Christ is made obedient
to God becomes a slave of obedience. Obedience personified is the
master to whom he is now subject. He cannot but obey. In the case of both sin and holiness,
obedience is certain. It is rendered certain by a power
superior to the will of man. It’s God who enables us to obey. As we’ll see explicitly in a
moment. It’s not that we cannot sin any
longer. We can take our eyes off. We
can stumble and fall. We just spent time in confession
for that very thing. But we are called to obedience
and it’s there for our taking. We’re there to yield ourselves
to a new master. And he gives us the grace and
he gives us the example. He calls us to live and walk
in newness of life, as he said in the first portion of this
great section. And so the question posed. Shall we sin? Because we are
not under law, but under grace is so ludicrous that Paul answers
that as strongly as he can and then gives the answer in full,
do you not know? That you are a slave, essentially,
of a new master. That’s what Paul says. You’re
a slave of a different master. It doesn’t make any sense that
you could go back and live that way. And he calls us to the hope
to consider rather thirdly, the hope of liberation to a better
slavery. Look at it. And Paul is is So enthusiastic,
a Boolean, you might say here. Thanks be to God. Paul has a
worship service right there while in the midst of writing this
letter. But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of
sin. You became obedient from the
heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed and
having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. You got a new master. You have
a new calling. Thanks be to God. Paul starts
with a very typical response by Paul. Paul so often just responds. There are people I know you come
across. Oh, praise the Lord. I used to know something. They
would intersperse that phrase almost between every sentence
to where it becomes almost meaningless. For Paul, I mean, when Paul erupts
like this, Paul means it from the bottom of his heart. He falls,
as it were, on his knees and he says, thank ye to God, because
God has seized you. God has rescued you. And though you were slaves of sin,
and that’s not what he’s thankful for, he’s thankful for the second
clause there. You became obedient, though you
were slaves of sin, you’re changed. You’re different. The emphasis there in that. Little
clause, though you were slaves of sin. We can’t look, we can’t
overlook that we shouldn’t. That’s part of our calling as
Christians is to look back on our lives of sin and to know
that it’s back there. that we left it behind, that
we’re different now. Such were some of you, Paul says,
elsewhere. You were slaves of sin. This is one of the most recurring
themes in Paul’s writings. And I want you to very quickly,
very quickly. Paul says, In 1 Corinthians 6, 9, drop these
down and I’ll read them. If I read them at all, it’ll
be brief. 1 Corinthians 6, 9. Listen to this. Do you not know that the unrighteous
shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither
fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor
homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards,
nor revilers, nor swindlers shall inherit the kingdom of God. I
mean, that’s not a surprise to us, right? This might be. When Paul says in verse 11, and
such were some of you. Oh, God’s grace, if man, it is
big, isn’t it? I mean, it saved us. And when
he says such were some of you, what he’s saying to the Corinthians
is that’s got to be the old story. It can’t be the current testimony
of your lives. Such were some of you. Ephesians
two. Ephesians 2, Paul echoes the
same thing. You were dead in your trespasses and sins in which
you formerly walked. He begins to drive this point
home. That’s the old life. That’s who
you used to be. Such were some of you. Colossians
3, he does the same thing. Consider the members of your
earthly body is dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire,
greed, which amounts to idolatry, for it is on account of these
things that the wrath of God will come. And in them you also
once walked. It’s over. In them, you once walked while
you were living in them. No wonder Paul is so enthusiastic. Thanks be to God. That though
you used to be, you once were slaves of sin, you became obedient
from the heart. To that form of teaching to which
you were committed. And that form of teaching, you
can call it the pattern of sound teaching, the apostolic teaching.
Ultimately, that’s what Paul’s talking about. That is our standard
now. The word of God is our standard.
It’s the teaching of Christ. It’s the example of Christ. And
that’s why I said a moment ago, when you have the life of Christ
laid out before us in the Gospels, you have the spirit of Christ
dwelling within. You have the example of others,
faithful saints with whom to walk. We have every reason for
obeying a new master. We have the Holy Spirit dwelling
within us, coaching and guiding and chastening us. We have to walk differently. Paul elsewhere calls. What he
refers to here is that form of teaching, he calls it the tradition,
most often. First Corinthians 11, 11 to second
Timothy, 113. It’s the standard of sound words,
as he so often calls it in the pastoral epistles. You remember, Paul says, Christians
are truly and only the only ones who can obey. We’re the only
ones who can truly obey God. There are some that might get
some things right sometime throughout the day. Given the fact that we have the
example of our Lord Jesus Christ, we have the testimony of the
scriptures. We have the internal witness of the Holy Spirit. We
have the manifold grace of God. We must obey. Obedience must
become part and parcel of our lives. Obeying God at every turn. Obeying God with everything in
our hearts, seeking to please the master. And yet the process
of liberation to a better slavery is only partly complete. Paul
summarizes it in verse 18. Having been freed from sin, that’s
what happened when we placed our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
He reached down and unlocked the key. And he sent the old
master out the door. And we were free. We were free
to serve a new master. Having been freed from sin, you
became slaves of righteousness. He bought us. He’s our our new master. We are
his servants, not our own. Let’s pray. Well, father, we thank you and
praise you now. For this illustration. That Paul
uses and Lord, we know that Paul did not intend this crassly. That we are merely slaves to
God. And not his beloved children
whom he bought with the price. Father, thank you for this reminder
that it really is our. Mastery of sin that we must attend
to. And we must faithfully seek out
obedience of a new master. God grant us the grace. Grant
us the grace that it may well up in our own hearts. that we
too may say, thanks be to God, that though we were slaves of
sin, by God’s grace we have become obedient to a new master. It’s
in Jesus’ name that we pray. Amen. As we close, if you would
take your hymnals and turn to hymn number 455. And can it be
that I should stand together and sing verses 1, 3, 4, and
5. And can it be that I shall see
an angel’s face, the Savior’s face? to dispersion Amazing love, how
can it be that I long to die for thee Amazing love, how can
it be He left His Father’s throne above,
And we were infinite in His love. O’er the land of the free and
the home of the brave? O’er the land of the free and
the home of the brave? His mercy falls, His mercy falls,
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave? Amazing love, how can it be that
the life of your God so dear? My imprisoned spirit Has bowed
in sin and nature’s might My life used a quickening ray I’ve opened up a hunch and claimed
with a lie My dreams go on, I am not free Oh, how can it be that thou,
my God, shouldst die for me? Oh, condemnation, how I dread
thee, God of my heart! I can’t keep my feelings in control
I’m trapped, I can’t hold on No, I won’t let it turn me on
I can’t keep my feelings in control Oh, how can it be? The power I know should die for
me. You are dismissed.