Romans Chapter 6:15-23

Romans 6:19 TPT - I've used the familiar terms of a "servant" and a "master" to compensate for your weakness to understand. For just as you surrendered your bodies and souls to impurity and lawlessness, which only brought more lawlessness into your lives, so now surrender yourselves as servants of righteousness, which brings you deeper into true holiness.

Scripture Translations

White Flag of surrender

Teaching Videos

Commentaries

Romans Chapter 6:15-18

Romans 6:15-18 NLT - Well then, since God's grace has set us free from the law, does that mean we can go on sinning? Of course not! Don't you realise that you become the slave of whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to sin, which leads to death, or you can choose to obeey God, which leads to righteous living. Thank God! Once you were slaves of sin, but now you wholeheartedly obey this teaching we have given you. Now you are free from your slavery to sin, and you have become slaves to righteous living.

Be right with God, yourself and others - By Warren Wiersbe

Why we are to yield (vv. 14-23). Three words summarize the reasons for our yielding: favor (Rom. 6:14-15), freedom (Rom. 6:16-20), and fruit (Rom. 6:21-23).

Favor (vv. 14-15). It is because of God’s grace that we yield ourselves to Him. Paul has proved that we are not saved by the law and that we do not live under the law. The fact that we are saved by grace does not give us an excuse to sin, but it does give us a reason to obey. Sin and law go together. “The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law” (1 Cor. 15:56). Since we are not under law, but under grace, sin is robbed of its strength.

From Be right with God, yourself and others By Warren Wiersbe

NKJV MacArthur Study Bible

Romans 6:16 NKJV - Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness?

 form of doctrine . . . delivered. In the Gk. “form” is a word for a mold such as a craftsman would use to cast molten metal. Paul’s point is that God pours His new children into the mold of divine truth (12:2; cf. Titus 2:1). New believers have an innate and compelling desire to know and obey God’s Word (1 Pet. 2:2).

From:NKJV MacArthur Study Bible

NIV Quest Study Bible Notes

Romans 6:18 NIV - You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.

WHO WANTS TO BE A SLAVE? (6:18)

Everyone is a slave to someone or something. It’s the master who determines whether slavery results in life or death. Apart from the grace of God, we are slaves of sin. And when sin is our master, we die. But by grace, we can be slaves of God. When God is our master, we live. A kite is free to fly only when it is a “slave” to the string. Cut the string and the kite’s freedom to fly is severed as well. Slavery to God frees us to fully be what we were created to be!

From: NIV Quest Study Bible Notes

Wendy's thoughts on related scriptures

Romans 6:16 AMPC - Do you not know that if you continually surrender yourselves to anyone to do his will, you are the slaves of him whom you obey, whether that be to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience which leads to righteousness (right doing and right standing with God)?

So who do we want to be a slave to? I love that song No Longer Slaves - no longer a slave to fear!

Romans 6:17 AMPC - But thank God, though you were once slaves of sin, you have become obedient with all your heart to the standard of teaching in which you were instructed and to which you were committed.

How commited are we to understanding God's word? 

Psalm 1:1-3 TPT - What delight comes to the one who follows God's ways! He won't walk in step with the wicked, nor share the sinner's way, nor be found sitting in the scorner's seat.
His pleasure and passion is remaining true to the Word of "I Am," meditating day and night in the true revelation of light. He will be standing firm like a flourishing tree planted by God's design, deeply rooted by the brooks of bliss, bearing fruit in every season of his life. He is never dry, never fainting, ever blessed, ever prosperous.

Worship Songs

Romans Chapter 6:19-20

Romans 6:19-20 GOD'S WORD Translation: I'm speaking in a human way because of the weakness of your corrupt nature. Clearly, you once offered all parts of your body as slaves to sexual perversion and disobedience.  This led you to live disobedient lives. Now, in the same way, offer all the parts of your body as slaves that do what God approves of. This leads you to live holy lives. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from doing what God approves of.

Warren W. Wiersbe - Be right with God, yourself and others

Why we are to yield (vv. 14-23). Three words summarize the reasons for our yielding: favor (Rom. 6:14-15), freedom (Rom. 6:16-20), and fruit (Rom. 6:21-23).

... Freedom (vv. 16-20). The illustration of the master and servant is obvious. Whatever you yield to becomes your master. Before you were saved, you were the slave of sin. Now that you belong to Christ, you are freed from that old slavery and made the servant of Christ. Romans 6:19 suggests that the Christian ought to be as enthusiastic in yielding to the Lord as he was in yielding to sin. A friend once said to me, “I want to be as good a saint as I was a sinner!” I knew what he meant because in his unconverted days he was almost “the chief of sinners.”

The unsaved person is free–free from righteousness (Rom. 6:20). But his bondage to sin only leads him deeper into slavery so that it becomes harder and harder to do what is right. The Prodigal Son is an example of this (Luke 15:11-24). When he was at home, he decided he wanted his freedom, so he left home to find himself and enjoy himself. But his rebellion only led him deeper into slavery. He was the slave of wrong desires, then the slave of wrong deeds, and finally he became a literal slave when he took care of the pigs. He wanted to find himself, but he lost himself! What he thought was freedom turned out to be the worst kind of slavery. It was only when he returned home and yielded to his father that he found true freedom.

From: Warren W. Wiersbe - Be right with God, yourself and others

Wendy's thoughts and related scriptures

Romans 6:19 TPT - I've used the familiar terms of a "servant" and a "master" to compensate for your weakness to understand. For just as you surrendered your bodies and souls to impurity and lawlessness, which only brought more lawlessness into your lives, so now surrender yourselves as servants of righteousness, which brings you deeper into true holiness.

Surrender to God, and He transforms us.

2 Corinthians 3:18 TPT - We can all draw close to him with the veil removed from our faces. And with no veil we all become like mirrors who brightly reflect the glory of the Lord Jesus. We are being transfigured into his very image as we move from one brighter level of glory to another. And this glorious transfiguration comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

Worship Songs

Romans Chapter 6:21-23

Romans 6:21-23 TPT - So tell me, what benefit ensued from doing those things that you're now ashamed of? It left you with nothing but a legacy of shame and death. But now, as God's loving servants, you live in joyous freedom from the power of sin. So consider the benefits you now enjoy - you are brought deeper into the experience of true holiness that ends with eternal life! For sin's meager wages is death, but God's lavish gift is life eternal, found in your union with our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One.

NKJV Maxwell Leadership Bible

COMMUNICATING VISION: PAUL DELIVERS A CLEAR IMAGE OF OUR NEED

Romans 6:1–7:6

Knowing that his readers would need pictures to catch the revolutionary truth of the gospel, Paul uses the vivid images of water baptism, dead bodies, and slavery to explain God’s message.

Paul sums up his point in Romans 6:23 and in Romans 7 moves to a marriage analogy. The first six verses remind us that the dead are no longer bound to sin. Although none of us started well, we can all finish well, thanks to God. He remains committed to our welfare.

These chapters are the final ones dedicated to helping us see humankind’s need. Because of our fallen human state, everybody has three fundamental needs:

1. To believe: All human hearts need to have faith in something or Someone.

2. To belong: All human hearts need to experience community and family.

3. To become: All human hearts need to grow, stretch, and reach their potential.

From NKJV Maxwell Leadership Bible

Warren W. Wiersbe - Be right with God, yourself and others

Why we are to yield (vv. 14-23). Three words summarize the reasons for our yielding: favor (Rom. 6:14-15), freedom (Rom. 6:16-20), and fruit (Rom. 6:21-23).

Fruit (vv. 21-23). If you serve a master, you can expect to receive wages. Sin pays wages–death! God also pays wages–holiness and everlasting life. In the old life, we produced fruit that made us ashamed. In the new life in Christ, we produce fruit that glorifies God and brings joy to our lives. We usually apply Romans 6:23 to the lost, and certainly it does apply, but it also has a warning for the saved. (After all, it was written to Christians.) “There is a sin not unto death” (1 John 5:17). “For this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep” (1 Cor. 11:30 nasb). Samson, for example, would not yield himself to God, but preferred to yield to the lusts of the flesh, and the result was death (Judg. 16). If the believer refuses to surrender his body to the Lord but uses its members for sinful purposes, then he is in danger of being disciplined by the Father, and this could mean death. (See Heb. 12:5-11; note the end of verse 9 in particular.)

These three instructions need to be heeded each day that we live. Know that you have been crucified with Christ and are dead to sin. Reckon this fact to be true in your own life. Yield your body to the Lord to be used for His glory.

Now that you know these truths, reckon them to be true in your life, and then yield yourself to God.

From: Warren W. Wiersbe - Be right with God, yourself and others

Wendy's thoughts on related scriptures

Romans 6:22 NLT - But now you are free from the power of sin and have become slaves of God. Now you do those things that lead to holiness and result in eternal life.

God's grace is still sufficient for us when we sin and repent. We are not perfect and neither was the Apostle Paul.

Romans 7:15-25 TPT - I’m a mystery to myself, for I want to do what is right, but end up doing what my moral instincts condemn. And if my behavior is not in line with my desire, my conscience still confirms the excellence of the law. And now I realize that it is no longer my true self doing it, but the unwelcome intruder of sin in my humanity. For I know that nothing good lives within the flesh of my fallen humanity. The longings to do what is right are within me, but will-power is not enough to accomplish it. My lofty desires to do what is good are dashed when I do the things I want to avoid. So if my behavior contradicts my desires to do good, I must conclude that it’s not my true identity doing it, but the unwelcome intruder of sin hindering me from being who I really am.

Through my experience of this principle, I discover that even when I want to do good, evil is ready to sabotage me. Truly, deep within my true identity, I love to do what pleases God. But I discern another power operating in my humanity, waging a war against the moral principles of my conscience and bringing me into captivity as a prisoner to the “law” of sin—this unwelcome intruder in my humanity. What an agonizing situation I am in! So who has the power to rescue this miserable man from the unwelcome intruder of sin and death? I give all my thanks to God, for his mighty power has finally provided a way out through our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One! So if left to myself, the flesh is aligned with the law of sin, but now my renewed mind is fixed on and submitted to God’s righteous principles

Romans 6:23 NLT - For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.

The free gift of God is eternal life.

Ephesians 2:8-9 NLT - God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can't take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.

Worship Songs

What's next?

Some questions to consider:

1. What did God say to you when studying this passage?

2. What does that mean for how you live your life? (ie is there something you believe God wants you to do differently?)

3. How can we as a Lifegroup support you?

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