Present Your Members as Slaves
Romans 6:16-22 · Roger Henderson · Oct 29, 2023
Romans (2022-25), No. 047
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926193392984

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Today, this is sort of the middle section. I'll show you this outline that Chester McCauley proposed for this section of scripture. Remember, this section is like the third section in chapter 6 of Romans. And this is like the second part of that third section. And you'll see as we get into it here. This is kind of interesting.

I labeled this. If you catch my drift here, so to speak, present your members as slaves. So you can think, well, he's talking about the sin nature. Well, you can also take that and present your members as slaves to righteousness. That's a good thing. So we're going to learn that slavery is something that God has in mind for the unbeliever and for the believer. Vastly different outcomes, vastly different situations, but slavery is not to be thought of as a bad thing, necessarily. with that in mind.

So here's the big picture. Mike read 17-22. So this is kind of Macaulay's... Macaulay is just amazing. I listen to different people. The Lord gifted him in being able to look at scripture and pick out, organize it. Mike and I both utilize him a lot. So anyway, I know these verses really, the foundation of the third part of Romans chapter 6 is really the first 14 verses, right? Where Paul talks about the fact that we've been identified with our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, and His death, burial, and resurrection. And then he implores us to reckon ourselves dead. Well, that kind of comes out in shoe leather as we get into the last part of this.

So what we see is there's this process that has happened in the believer's life, and this word transform is used by Macaulay, which I think is not bad. It's good to kind of picture that our new life in Christ. It's a transformed life. So the first part is, and I did it last week, in verses 17 and 18, we saw that there was a transformation in the believer's relationship. Today we're going to talk about this transformation in terms of his conduct and then next week this transformation in terms of benefits and if you look through those verses as Mike read them, you'll notice that Relationship kind of shows up and conduct shows up today and then benefit shows up later on.

So that's kind of what we're about So I'm going to review the last week a little bit here. I Actually, it's neat. I have come to like going back and reviewing at least some part of the previous lesson because I get a chance to go back over it again. I get to rethink it. In some cases, I like to maybe add some things I missed the first time around. And that's the case today.

So from last week, we saw that from 17 and 18 that the believer's relationship has been changed by his being identified with Christ and his death, burial, and resurrection. So you could look at it this way, we once were, we once were this, and we are now that, if you will. And we saw that in verses, you were slaves to sin, and you became slaves to righteousness. And then pick up on the fact that slaves, you're going to see slavery, slavery, slavery, slavery throughout this whole message. And we're also going to see freedom, freedom, freedom, freedom. But context, context, context, context. In one context, we're talking about the sin nature, the first part of this. The second context is the very righteousness of God.

And so the principle that kind of comes through this, and it's true for believers too, you are the slaves of the one whom you obey. Certainly when you were a believer, you had no choice, right? You obeyed. You obeyed. Your master was your sin nature. But now you have a new master, so that's changed. So that phrase, you are the slaves to the one whom you obey, holds true before you were a believer and it holds true now. Conditionally, as you walk through the Christian life, you cannot be obeying who you are in Christ. You can be off abiding in your old man, in your sinful nature.

Okay, so let's carry on here. So let's start out with the first part. So I'm carrying on my Both Jim and, they aren't here today, Jim and, so you can move over now. That's okay. Both Jim and Roy, last week, I said, do you like these pictorial things I do? And he said, yeah, that's kind of cool, that's kind of nice, Roger. So I'm going to carry it on until somebody tells me to stop. So, anyway.

Alright, so, just basically to understand the verse. It starts off, but thanks be to God, So Paul uses this term a lot in his word. One of my favorite ones is in 2 Corinthians here, but thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Jesus Christ. Paul is thanking God. He's telling God just the tremendous benefit that he has in certain aspects of what God has done for him.

So in this case, he says that though you were slaves to the sin, but thanks be to God that though you were slaves to these sin and the idea here is that though you were is the idea is talking about this is what you used to be you used to be as an unbeliever used to be in this state continuously in past time that's the thing called the imperfect tense in past time continually you had no choice you were continually in this state continually slaves to Slaves of this word, doulos, and Vines defines it as, one who gives himself up to the will of another. So in a sense, you're giving your will up to your nature from Adam, your Adamic nature. You're giving yourself up to that. And doulos, in the structure of the sentence, identifies who the believer was in past time. That's who he was. He was a slave to sin. He was a slave to the sin nature.

Okay, that's the first part of the verse. Then we go on to the last part of the verse. But the good news is you became obedient. Actually, this is the part that I learned something new here. When I re-said it again, I listened to some other people talk about it. You became obedient from the heart. just a beautiful and actually we're going to learn this verse is going to tell us another little nugget of truth about what happens in our salvation and you wouldn't think in the midst of right here he's going to tell us something that is going to kind of clarify our salvation you became obedient from the heart this part we probably understand pretty well you listen under to God's word that's that word hupakuo in the Greek just beautiful word you listen under to God's word Listen and it's you did that at a point in time As a fact it's reality and You you listen you perform the action and I like the fact that it's from or out of out of the heart And we're going to learn this in Romans chapter 10. You know, man, the heart is the core of who you are with the heart a person believes so you believe in your heart and You believe in your heart. You became obedient. You listened under. Not originally, but you're listening. And you heard the message. The message of salvation. And you believe it. You believe in your heart.

Now here's the part that I didn't have quite understood as well. To that form of teaching, and the translation is a little bit different here. To that form of teaching into which you were delivered. And that's from Merriman. But also, Wiest picks up almost identically that same translation.

And what I like is, if you look at the translation from the New American Standard, it has, to which you were committed. It sounds like I've got to do something there. I've got to commit myself. I've got to do something. Well, the original is much more as Merriman has it, much more as Wiest has it. you were delivered, the form of teaching that you were delivered.

So what does that mean? So this form of teaching, and this is kind of really key, this form of teaching can be thought of actually as this body of truth. The body of truth about our Savior, the Gospel. And it's called the faith in Jude. The faith, you know, once for all given. This body of truth. So that form of teaching and the idea that you were handed over to this body of truth.

Passive voice. So this is the salvation process. God is not willy-nilly. We have this wonderful truth about His Son. This body of truth. And in a sense, He performs the action on us. We're given over. We understand that body of truth. We believe it. And that's part of the salvation process. And it fits so well with Ephesians. And it's all about grace. It's not about, I got to do something.

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and the middle part I left out, and not of yourself, it's a gift of God. And the question always is, and key in this verse, what is the gift? The gift is not faith. If you look carefully, it's not faith. It's salvation, basically.

And it fits beautifully here. This is this body of truth. And that was God's gift to us, and we believed it. Our action was to believe it. His part was to have that body of truth available to us. So that helped me much more about this verse. You become obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were delivered. So you believe God performed the action and you were saved.

Okay, let's go on. So that's verse 17, then verse 18. So it connects with the and statement. And having been freed, And we're going to see a lot of errors tense in this. Having been freed, delivered from sin, and speaking of the sin. So this is the good news. Delivered from sin. You were freed. Merriman says you were freed from the sin when you were delivered into the body of truth. You believed, right? You believed that body of truth. And we see this you know and and this is pretty it'll be pretty evident.

We just studied this back several months ago In the first part of Romans, how shall we who died to sin still still live in it? You died to it. You're separated from it. You're freed from it 6 7 Romans 6 7 he who died is freed from sin and So what is freedom?

Talk to people, I'm free. I'm free to do this. I'm free to do that. Everybody's free these days, right? No, we're not free. Freedom is not doing as you please. That's the first, that's the first, what's the right, I can't think of the right word, anyway.

Freedom, actually, if you think about it, Scripture just describes it perfectly freedom is a change of masters. You were a slave to sin you were Slave to the sin nature now You're slaves to Jesus Christ. You have been freed. So you freedom is a change of masters You have been freed from the master is in nature and then we'll study this next week But now having been freed from the sin nature and enslaved to God So it's a change of masters. That's true freedom. And that's what God provides in His Son, in faith in His Son.

You became slaves of righteousness. You became slaves of the righteousness. You became slaves, as Dulas again, And it's another Aorist tense. You believed it. It's fact. And you received it from God. And you became slaves of righteousness. And here's the point. We are enslaved to that kind of righteousness. God's kind of righteousness.

And the reason I thought Merriman did this was because we're going to see that we can we can be enslaved to our own righteousness which is not not right the idea is that servanthood of the believer has two aspects freedom and slavery and we see that in the unbeliever and we see it in the believer okay so today's verses verse 19 and 20 I'm speaking in human terms because 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 freed in regards to righteousness. And that verse 20 really kind of explains the freedom that an unbeliever has. And it's not a good freedom. you're freed from God's righteousness, which is not good.

The overview of the message here is that there's a transformation of conduct. You once did this, and what do you do now? You were slaves to impurity, etc., and now you become slaves to righteousness. So pre-salvation and post-salvation have similarities. They both have slavery and they both have freedom.

So you kind of see, I'm kind of repeating that message, it kind of comes up, it came up in the first section in 17 and 18, now it comes up in this section as well. Okay, so here's the pictorial overview of verse 19. We're going to spend some time in verse 19, but here's kind of the flyover, if you will, So you start off.

So Paul says, I'm speaking in human terms. And why does he say that? He says, just as you once presented your members, and I put in the sin nature, but he delineates that with the fact that it's impurity and lawlessness, resulting in further lawlessness. It's interesting is that there's an increase, a spiraling effect, if you will, you present your members to the sin nature, lawlessness, and more lawlessness results as that. Then the next part, so the contrast of that, just as, so now you present your members as slaves to righteousness, resulting in sanctification.

And we'll talk about that. You know, when we say the word sanctification, you always think, wow, it sounds like a big word. What does that mean? Literally it means separation, but we're gonna we're gonna talk about that more. So here's the big picture.

I'm speaking in human terms Just as she presented your members to the sin nature Resulting in lawlessness. So now you present your members as slaves to righteousness resulting in sanctification Okay, so let's we'll start with the first part I'm speaking in human terms and So this is present tense, he's continually speaking in the present tense about this.

He's talking about, when he says human terms, it belonging to man, it's man's customs, it's nature, everything that's about man. And Weiss brings us across as, I'm using an illustration drawn from human affairs. So one of the questions is, keeping in mind, so what's the What delineates as human terms? What's a trademark of that and what Paul is saying? And I'll try to answer that.

And the reason he does this, he says, is because of the weakness of your flesh. He says, I'm going to speak in human terms because you have a weakness. So, because tells us the reason. The weakness can mean a general inability or frailties. And it's frailties of our sinful nature. Even believers have that same frailty. We all have that frailty.

So what occurred to me, and also what Macaulay mentioned, is that if you think about it, we looked at Romans 6.1 and 6.15, and what was the hallmark of those two verses? The hallmark was that Paul answered a question that he couldn't believe people were asking, and it kind of, in my mind, it kind of points to man's frailty. What does man say to Paul, quote-unquote, in 6.1?

He says, Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? Huh? Can you imagine being in a Bible study and he says, Well, Mike, can I sin some more? I have lots of grace. Can I go sin some more today? And Mike says, Hmm, well, I'm not sure that's probably the best... So people are asking those kind of questions. Then the second question in 6.15 is, Shall we sin because we're not under law but under grace? So both those questions kind of, where do they come from?

Well, that's kind of where, that's how man thinks. That's his frailty. That's his, you know, that's his fallen nature, if you will. Okay. For just as, so now, actually, with that in view, we have that start. That's the first part. The A part of that verse is, I'm speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. So hopefully I've established that. So now we go on to the middle part of the verse.

For just as, so he's going to do a comparison. He's going to compare one thing, just as, and then so now. We saw that in the overview. Just as. So here's the just as part. You presented, I underlined ed. So you presented this. And we're going to have some aorist tense here again. To place or set before. I like the King James Action. I like it. You yielded.

One of the keys that comes out of this is you can't be neutral in how you Present or yield yourself. You're you're either one of the other right? It's either it's either to sin or It's the righteousness. There's only two options and that's not immediately obvious I don't think but it's but the looking at the the the way it comes across That's exactly what Paul wants to put forth. You have two options if you yield to sin or to righteousness Those are the two options Aorist tense again, prior to salvation.

It's a fact. You did it. You presented your body. You yielded your members. And these are your members. So what are my members? It's basically the parts of your body. Your hand, your feet, and your tongue. A tongue is a biggie, right? Just think about that. How many times do we fall with our tongue? Me personally, that seems to be my major way I do it. I open my mouth, and I say something, and I realize, why did I say that?

Anyway, so the next part is going to tell us about this, I call it downward spiral. Maybe it's not quite a severe spiral, but it's a downward trend, if you will. You presented, I'll repeat that again, your members first as slaves to impurity, that's the first part of it, and impurity is moral uncleanness, lewdness, unrestrained. Isn't it interesting that the key part, if you look at today's world, what would you say that there are lots of problems in our world today? Lots and lots of problems.

But isn't it kind of remarkable that everything seems to go that direction. Everything goes to moral uncleanness and lewdness. I mean, just kind of across the board, if you look at any Big blow up. A lot of times it's always something in that arena it seems like. Sometimes it's money, but a lot of times it's this area. Impurity. And I put this verse in here.

There are other verses that might have been better, but this kind of contrast for God has not called us, speaking to the believer, for impurity, but in sanctification. So the second part of this spiral, as slaves to lawlessness. And lawlessness, the point here from Vine, this is from Vine's dictionary, is the fact that it's more the violation of the law, not so much the fact of no law, it's a violation of the law that's in view here. So we go from as slaves to impurity, as slaves to lawlessness, then we go resulting in further lawlessness. So this is the idea, you're going down this spiraling down, impurity, lawlessness, further lawlessness.

Actually, I didn't get my... I didn't do the bullets right here anyway. Okay, not to worry. In the life of an unbeliever, you went from one depth of sin to another, and in 1 John 3, verse 4, it tells us, everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness, for sin is lawlessness. So, you start with lawlessness, you start with impurity, lawlessness, and further lawlessness.

So that's the negative side. So now we go to the last part of the verse. So now, here's the contrast. You present, and notice that the E.D. is gone. So this is now. This is an event in a believer's life, and it's an imperative. God wants you to present. You do it, and you present. It's your members again, but they're presented to unrighteousness. So now you say, well, how do I present my members to unrighteousness?

And we all know this, we basically all understand, how do we present... So this is how you live the... How do I live the Christian life? How do I do that? Because the Christian life is basically that presenting your members to righteousness. You do that by walking in the light as he is in the light. You abide in Christ, you abide in me, he says. The same members that were used for lawlessness and unrighteousness are now used for righteousness. So that's a contrast. You were this, now you're that. And the result is sanctification.

And again, it's going to be a deepening process. And the process is described many times to grow in grace and the knowledge of Him. That's what the Lord desires us to do. Day by day to grow, to know Him more, to walk with Him more. And remember, sanctification is being delivered from the power of sin. As we walk with Him and understand that we're being delivered from the power of sin, we're no longer under His domination as we walk in Him. Okay, so that wraps up 19. So 20. Now 20 is an interesting verse because 20 is going to kind of explain something that we talked about before. Okay, so 20 says, Let me just read the whole verse and then we'll go to the first part.

For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regards to righteousness. You know, I read this verse many times. At first I said, I don't understand this verse. I kept reading it and I said, eventually it kind of hit me. It takes me a while. Maybe you're the same way. For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regards to righteousness. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? When is this? So anyway, here we go. So this is speaking, and one of the key parts, I believe this is speaking of the believer's past life. This is before he was saved. That's a big help.

So it has two Two times it uses the same verb, amy. You were, it uses this in the first part of the verse and the last part. It says, you were, and that's the state in which you existed, and it's in the imperfect tense, you continuously existed in past time in this state, this is where you were in past time as an unbeliever.

So this is talking about prior to salvation, Slaves of sin you said well, we've been here before right with last 10 minutes. We've been talking 30 minutes. We've been talking about slaves of sin You were for when you were slaves of sin That's the first part Okay, the believer is pictures of due loss one who's under the control of the damning nature. That's his sin nature That's where he's so that's the first part. You're under the control of your damning nature and So the second part is another you were. So you're under the control of the damning nature, and it says you were free in regards to righteousness. It's the same verb, same tense, continuous action past time, prior to salvation, same as before, but here's kind of the key.

This free is the idea of freedom from restraint or obligation. You had no relation. So the picture here, you had no relation to righteousness. And that would make sense, right? If you're slaves of the sin nature, you are free from God's righteousness. And that's a bad thing. So I finally understood the verse after spending some time. You're free from God's righteousness. That's the picture. So Weist, with a little help from me, this is a Weist edited by Roger, And you can throw it out if you don't like it, or think I made a mistake, or tell me, please.

So we say, as you were those who were continually free, that's what the verb tends to, continually free with respect to, had no relation to righteousness. And just like You know, if that's the case, if you have no relationship to God's righteousness, right? You're only left with your righteousness. And what's the testimony of Scripture about your righteousness?

It's this verse right here. And all our righteous deeds are like filthy garments. So this is a bad thing. And this is where we're not. And it's interesting how he went through verse 19 and explained all that content and then comes back with this verse. But I think we'll see next week how this fits into the flow. Okay, so actually I don't have much to say. No great sweeping statements at the end.

Just here's what's ahead for next week We're going to finish up this set of verses here This is the believers benefits the transformation of the believers benefits you were going one way and now you're going another way and using the the text it says things of which you are ashamed and versus things that result in sanctification. We come back to the word sanctification again, things that you are ashamed versus things that result in sanctification. This is a trilogy of this section, those three areas, benefits for the believers. Okay, so let's close in prayer. We thank you, Father. We thank you so much for the blessings we have in our Savior. We thank you for your word, Father. Thank you for the Just the magnificent content of your word, how it shows us so many things. In Christ's name, Amen.