Pray:
Ask God to orient or reorient you to himself. Confess any known sin. Thank him for his forgiveness. Be still and reflect on Jesus and his sacrifice for you. Ask the Holy Spirit to open your heart and mind to God’s word. Pray for others in your life that they too would know and love God today.
Pray:
Ask God to orient or reorient you to himself. Confess any known sin. Thank him for his forgiveness. Be still and reflect on Jesus and his sacrifice for you. Ask the Holy Spirit to open your heart and mind to God’s word. Pray for others in your life that they too would know and love God today.
Read:
Romans 6:1-11,
“1 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? 4 We were therefore buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. 5 If we have been united with Him like this in His death, we will certainly also be united with Him in His resurrection. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with Him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7 because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. 8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him. 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, He cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over Him. 10 The death He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life He lives, He lives to God. 11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
Understand:
In verses 8-10 Paul made a plea for believers to live up to the idea of the irreversible transformation we see in Christ’s death and resurrection. We—you and I—died to the old self and now will forevermore live as new creatures. Just like Jesus, we live our “lives to God.” We can do this because: He died to sin’s claims, it’s wages, its’ demands, and it’s penalty. He finished the work and settled the account perfectly so that it never needs to be repeated. Sin’s tyranny over us has been broken, because sin has nothing to say to a dead person. Christians must realize that the mastery of sin has been broken in their lives and forever more we are free to live for God!
In the first ten verses of Romans 6, Paul drove home what is true for us positionally. Now in verse 11, he turned to the practical working out of this truth for our lives. Paul wrote, “In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
I think it is interesting that this is the first command in the book of Romans. To “count” means “to consider something carefully with regard to taking some action in order to arrive at a decision.” It’s not something we do lightly or flippantly. We’re to think about what it means for us to be dead to sin and alive in Christ. It means that we understand that Jesus carried the sins we committed in His own body on the cross. Why would He do this? He did this so that we might live in righteousness, having nothing to do with sin. We no longer are to be controlled by our sinful nature. Instead we consider ourselves to be what God has in fact made us: people who have been given a new start.
Apply:
You belong to Christ. If you struggle getting your head wrapped around this truth, why don’t you take some time today and ask the Holy Spirit to help you grasp the reality of who you are in Christ.
*From what you have just read and considered what is a real implication/application for your life today?
Live:
(Personalize this prayer for today, make it specific to the circumstances that face you.)
Ask God to lead you through his Spirit as you go through your day. Ask him to bring to mind the truth of the gospel and its implications for what you will encounter today. Tell him “Yes” to his will today and ask him for his power and protection to live this “yes.” Ask him to create and reveal opportunities to proclaim the good news today. KEEP PRAYING THROUGHOUT YOUR DAY TODAY.
Inspiration and insight for the devotionals came from the following books: Reading Romans with John Stott; The Message of Romans: God’s Good News for the World (The Bible Speaks Today Series), Stott, John; Romans (The NIV Application Commentary Book 6) Moo, Douglas J.; Encountering the Book of Romans: A Theological Survey (Encountering Biblical Studies) Moo, Douglas J.; Believers Bible Commentary; The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, with the New International Version, Romans through Galatians; NIV Application Study Bible. The Cambridge Bible Commentary, Romans, Best, Ernest.