1. This is Memorial Day weekend so this may be a good time to use this illustration. LE Maxwell told the story of the man who reported to his commanding officer, “I have taken a prisoner.” His commander said, “Bring him along with you.”
2. “He won’t come,” complained the soldier. “Well, then, come yourself,” replied the officer.  The soldier then said, “I can’t. He won’t let me.”
3. We laugh at a silly story like that but it is a good illustration of the power of indwelling sin.
4. The Bible plainly says, “For sin shall not have dominion over you” (Rom. 6:14), but apparently many Christians do not believe it. 
5. Jesus healed the impotent man and then said to him, “Sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee” (John 5:14).
6. The Word of God has been saying this to Christians for 2,000 years but they do take it seriously.
7. Our Lord told the woman taken in adultery, “Go, and sin no more” (John 8:11).  He would not have told her that unless she was capable of obeying His command.
8. First John 2:1 says, “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not.”  Do you think our Lord would command us to do something we were incapable of doing?
9. The Bible says we are “dead to sin” (Romans 6:1, 2, 7, 11).
10. Most Christians understand that they have been freed from the penalty of sin, but they do not understand that they have been freed from the power of sin.
11. In the Bible justification is always linked with sanctification.  First Corinthians 6:11 says, “But ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.”
12. Romans 8:30 says, “Whom he justified, them he also glorified.” 
13. We were declared righteous in Christ in order that we might be a holy and godly people.
14. “We want to be purified as well as pardoned. Justification without sanctification would not be salvation at all. It would call the leper clean, and leave him to die of his disease; if would forgive the rebellion and allow the rebel to remain an enemy to his king” (CHS).

I. WE HAVE BEEN SAVED AND SANCTIFIED BY GOD’S GRACE.

1. Romans 6 begins with the question, “What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?”  The answer of course is, “God forbid” (6:2).
2. You may have wondered why the apostle Paul even asks this question.  But there have always been people who have misunderstood the doctrine of grace, and some have even perverted the doctrine of grace (cf. Jude 4).
3. Paul says in Romans 6:2, “God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?”
4. I have met people that have said, “Since we are saved by grace anyway, it does not matter how we live.”  Or, “We are not under the law, but under grace.”  This is a misunderstanding of Romans 6:14).  (It is interesting how they always leave off the first half of Romans 6:14.)   Cf. Titus 2:11-15.
5. It is not unusual to hear older Christians tell new believers, “Just because you are now saved doesn’t mean you will not sin anymore.”
6. While this is true, it would be far better to emphasize, “Now that you are saved, you have been delivered from sin’s bondage.  You are dead to sin.  Sin does not have dominion over you.  You have victory over sin” (Romans 6:14).
7. Without realizing it, many Christians have gotten used to a substandard and defeated Christian life.
8. Christians ask, “If what is being practiced today is substandard, what is God’s standard?”   First Peter 1:15, 16 says, “But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation; Because it is written, Be ye holy; for I am holy.”
9. A. J. Gordon said, “Divine truth as revealed in Scripture seems often to lie between two extremes. If we regard the doctrine of sinless perfection as a heresy, we regard contentment with sinful imperfection as a greater heresy. And we gravely fear that many Christians make the apostle’s words, ‘If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves,’ the unconscious justification for a low standard of Christian living. It were almost better for one to overstate the possibilities of sanctification in his eager grasp after holiness, than to understate them in his complacent satisfaction with a traditional unholiness. Certainly it is not an edifying spectacle to see a Christian worldling throwing stones at a Christian perfectionist.”

II. VICTORY OVER SIN IS POSSIBLE BECAUSE OF OUR UNION WITH CHRIST.

1. We see three dreadful words in Romans 6:1 – “continue in sin.”  No wonder the apostle Paul says, “God forbid” (6:2).
2. We are not to continue in sin because we are dead to sin (6:2).  We are not to “live any longer therein” (6:2).
3. Our sanctification rests upon the same foundation as our justification – i.e., our union with Christ. 
4. Can a dead man sin?  Of course not.   When Christ died, we that believe in Him died with Him (6:6-8).
5. This is what Paul means when he says in Galatians 2:20, “I (old man) am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I (new man) live…”
6. “Knowing this, that our old man (old unregenerate man) is crucified with Him…” (Rom. 6:6).
7. Before we were saved our body was a “body of sin” (6:6).  It was an instrument of unrighteousness unto sin (6:13) and a servant of sin (6:17).  But it was crucified and thereby rendered powerless – “that the body of sin might be destroyed (“done away” – Scofield margin)” (6:6).
8. Our union with Christ in His death and resurrection means absolute severance from sin.  “Christ liveth in me” (Gal. 2:20) and Christ cannot sin.
9. So why do Christians sin?  Oftentimes it is through ignorance.  Notice how often Paul says, “Know” (6:3, 6, 9, 16; 7:1).
10. How do we know that we have been saved from the penalty of sin?  Faith.  We believe the Bible (cf. Rom. 10:9).
11. And how do we know that we are being saved from the power of sin?  Faith.  We believe the Bible (Rom. 6:8).
12. This is the secret to victory over sin. “Faith is the victory” (cf. I John 5:4).
13. When Christians yield to sin, it is because they lack faith.  The Bible says they are “free from sin” (6:22), but they do not believe it.
14. When the Gospel is preached there is an emphasis on Christ’s death for us (and there should be – Rom. 5:6-8).
15. There is a death for sin (atonement); and there is a death to sin (victory), which means that sin ceases to have a place in the life of a Christian.
16. Romans 6:10 says that the Lord Jesus Christ died not only for sins, but that “He died unto sin.” When He was “made sin” (II Cor. 5:21), God exacted of Him sin’s penalty to the full.
17. That penalty was death. In death, sin’s penalty and power were exhausted. Sin’s power, as well as sin’s claims, are no more. Therefore we read in Romans 6:9, “death hath no more dominion over him.”
18. And we are dead to sin through our union with Christ.
19. Many people have this notion that Christianity is just like any other religion – you believe a few doctrines; you follow certain rules or rituals; you observe a few holy days – and then you basically live just like every other sinner!
20. But that is not Biblical Christianity!  That may be dead liberal Protestantism, and that may be Roman Catholicism, and unfortunately that may be true of worldly, wishy-washy modern-day evangelicalism – but it is not what the Bible teaches.
21. When Christ died on the cross for our sins, He died as an atonement for sin; He died to destroy sin; and He died to rob sin of its power (for the believer).
22. Before I move on, let me say a few words about the importance of baptism (Rom. 6:3-5).  Baptism by immersion is a picture of our union with Christ.  In baptism we identify with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection.
23. Baptism is an outward visible sign of an inward spiritual work.
24. The Bible teaches that believers are to be baptized after they get saved (cf. Acts 8:36-38).
25. But first there must be that inward spiritual work.  Have you experienced that?

III. WE MUST CONTINUALLY RECKON OURSELVES DEAD TO SIN (6:11).

1. We must understand what the Bible means by “reckon” – this is an attitude of faith, based on facts.
2. Here is where many believers get confused.  “Dead to sin” does not mean the death of sin as a power in the heart.  The great preacher, H.A. Ironside, was taught that as a young preacher and it nearly drove him insane.  He was taught that a Christian could reach a state of “sinless perfection” and that sin would be “eradicated” from his life.
3. Ironside struggled with this for quite some time and wound up in a mental hospital (with many others who were taught the sinless perfection doctrine).
4. The Bible does not teach that sin is dead to us.  What it teaches is that those of us who are in Christ are dead to sin (6:11).
5. There is a vast difference between reckoning myself dead to sin and reckoning sin dead to me. Every attempt to make sin dead to me, through self-effort, or through struggle, will lead to frustration.
6. God says we are to reckon ourselves dead to sin. We are “in Christ,” and to be in Christ is to be “dead to sin.”
7. We must continually reckon ourselves to be dead to sin (Rom. 6:12). WH Griffith Thomas wrote, “When sin makes its appeal we must refuse to recognize it by reckoning that we died to it in Christ, and at once it will go, its power broken” (St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, p. 172).
8. This is a matter of faith, not feelings.  You may not “feel” dead to sin.  You may leave church today feeling close to God, and then some one will cut you off while you are driving and all of a sudden sin is ready to strike like a dangerous snake!
9. So we may not necessarily “feel” dead to sin.  But we do not walk by feelings; we walk by faith.  The Bible says, “our old (unregenerate) man is crucified with Him…” (6:6).  Do you believe that?  We must simply believe God’s Word, and continually reckon ourselves dead to sin.
10. I heard a true story about two Irishmen, Pat and Mike.  They found a strange looking turtle running around with no head.   It had been completely severed from its body. A big argument started with Pat insisting that the turtle was dead, and Mike insisting that the turtle was alive.
11. Finally, a man named O’Brien walked by and they asked him his opinion.  O’Brien looked at the turtle and said, “The turtle is dead, but he doesn’t believe it!”
12. That’s the way many Christians are.  They are dead to sin but they do not believe it.
13. “Reckon” is a faith word, not a “feelings” word.  Too many people act upon their feelings.  Most people select churches based upon their feelings (ritualism, emotionalism, sentimentalism, etc.)
14. In fact people make many important decisions based on feelings (marriage, job, where to live, etc.).
15. We must understand what the Bible means by “reckon” – this is an attitude of faith, based on facts.  God reckons us dead to sin; therefore we must continually reckon ourselves dead to sin.
16. “Reckon” is a fact word; “yield” (6:13, 16, 19) is an “act” word.
17. God reckons us to have died with Christ; therefore we are to keep on reckoning ourselves to have died and to have risen with Him.  These are Bible facts, which we are to believe (6:11), and then act upon (6:11-13).
18. A dead man cannot sin (6:7-9).   At the cross, Christ died as our Substitute.  He died for our sins (5:6).   Therefore, we have been saved from the power of sin.
19. We not only died with Christ, we have been raised with Christ (6:8).  Colossians 3:1-3 says, “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.  Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.”
20. The old man is dead, and so the Christian must “put on the new man” (cf. Eph. 4:22-24; Col. 3:9, 10).   This is made possible because of our union with Christ.
21. When asked the secret of his service, George Muller replied, “There was a day when I died, utterly died: died to George Muller...died to the world...and since then I have studied only to show myself approved unto God.”

CONCLUSION:

1. God’s way of victory over sin is not through the suppression of sinful desires.
2. God’s way of victory over sin is not through the eradication of the old nature.
3. God’s way of victory is through crucifixion – deliverance is only through death. Each time we come up against some particular sin, we are to remember that we are crucified to the world and the world to us.
4. The faith we need for victory over sin is the same faith that we have for salvation. “The just shall live by faith” (Rom. 1:17; cf. Habakkuk 2:4; Galatians 3:11; Hebrews 10:38).