Romans 6
1 So what's our response? Should we continue to sin so we can have even more grace?
What are we to say, then? Are we to continue to sin, in order that God’s loving kindness may be multiplied?
2 Of course not! Since we're already dead to sin, how can we continue to live in sin?
Heaven forbid! We became dead to sin, so how can we go on living in it?
3 Don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
Or can it be that you do not know that all of us, who were baptized into union with Christ Jesus, in our baptism shared his death?
4 Through baptism we were buried with him in death so that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father we too can live a new life.
Consequently, through sharing his death in our baptism, we were buried with him; so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by a manifestation of the Father’s power, so we also may live a new life.
5 If we've become one with him in dying like he did, then we'll be raised like him too.
If we have become united with him by the act symbolic of his death, surely we will also become united with him by the act symbolic of his resurrection.
6 We know that our old self was crucified with him to dispose of the dead body of sin so that we wouldn't be enslaved by sin any longer.
We recognize the truth that our old self was crucified with Christ, in order that the body, the stronghold of sin, might be rendered powerless, so that we should no longer be slaves to sin.
7 Anyone who has died has been set free from sin.
For the man who has so died has been pronounced righteous and released from sin.
8 Since we died with Christ, we have confidence that we will also live with him,
And our belief is, that, as we have shared Christ’s death, we will also share his life.
9 for we know that because Christ has been raised from the dead he won't ever die, because death has no longer any power over him.
We know, indeed, that Christ, having once risen from the dead, will not die again. Death has power over him no longer.
10 In dying, he died to sin once and for all, but now he lives, and he lives for God!
For the death that he died was a death to sin, once and for all. But the life that he now lives, he lives for God.
11 In just the same way you should consider yourselves dead to sin, but alive to God through Christ Jesus.
So let it be with you – regard yourselves as dead to sin, but as living for God, through union with Christ Jesus.
12 Don't let sin have control over your mortal body, don't give in to its temptations,
Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal bodies and compel you to obey its cravings.
13 and don't use any parts of your body as evil tools of sin. Instead dedicate yourselves to God as those who have been brought back from death to life, and use all parts of your body as tools to do something good for God.
Do not offer any part of your bodies to sin, in the cause of unrighteousness, but once for all offer yourselves to God (as those who, though once dead, now have life), and devote every part of your bodies to the cause of righteousness.
14 Sin won't rule over you, because you're not under law but under grace.
For sin will not lord it over you. You are living under the reign, not of Law, but of love.
15 So then, should we sin because we're not under law, but under grace? Of course not!
What follows, then? Are we to sin because we are living under the reign of love and not of Law? Heaven forbid!
16 Don't you realize that if you make yourselves someone's slaves, obeying their orders, then you are slaves to the one you obey? If you are slaves of sin, the result is death; if you obey God, the result is you are made right with him.
Surely you know that when you offer yourselves as servants, to obey anyone, you are the servants of the person whom you obey, whether the service be a service to sin which leads to death, or a service to duty which leads to righteousness.
17 Thank God that though you once were slaves to sin, you whole-heartedly chose to follow the truth about God that you learned.
God be thanked that, though you were once servants of sin, yet you learned to give hearty obedience to that form of doctrine under which you were placed.
18 Now that you've been freed from sin, you've become slaves of doing what is morally right.
Set free from the control of sin, you became servants to righteousness.
19 I'm using this everyday example because your human thinking is limited. Just as you once enslaved yourselves to immorality, piling up sin upon sin, now you must enslave yourselves to what is pure and right.
I can but speak as people do because of the weakness of your earthly nature. Once you offered every part of your bodies to the service of impurity, and of wickedness, which leads to further wickedness. Now, in the same way, offer them to the service of righteousness, which leads to holiness.
20 When you were slaves to sin you were not required to do what's right.
While you were still servants of sin, you were free as regards righteousness.
21 But what were the results back then? Aren't you ashamed of the things you did? Such things that lead to death!
But what were the fruits that you reaped from those things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of such things is death.
22 But now that you're set free from sin, and have become God's slaves, the results will be a pure life—and in the end, eternal life. (aiōnios g166)
But now that you have been set free from the control of sin, and have become servants to God, the fruit that you reap is an ever increasing holiness, and the end eternal life. (aiōnios g166)
