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SIN / SELF

SIN - We Are Dead

Josh Combs · Sunday, 6 July 2025 · Romans 6:1-11 · 33:19 · 4,980 words

Romans S11 · 6:1-11 Goodrich

There is no public page for this message yet — the transcript below is the whole of it.

The sermon examines Romans 6, exploring how God’s grace defeats sin. It points out that everyone falls short, yet grace gives believers new life, unites them with Christ’s death and resurrection, and frees them from sin’s slavery. The sermon calls listeners to remember their conversion, consider themselves dead to sin and alive to God, and offer their minds, hands and speech to Him for righteousness. It also invites those who have not trusted Christ to confess Him as Lord and believe in His resurrection to receive the free gift of grace.

What this sermon is about

Ranked by keyness against every other sermon in the corpus. Each one is a word this sermon actually said — nothing here was written by a model.

grace 49 united 16 mow 10 sin 65 house 19 clarkston 6 defeat 11 grass 8 used 14 golf 6 gospel 26 enslaved 6

Topics

Sin 17 Grace 14 The Gospel 8 Baptism 5 Salvation 4 Death & Resurrection 3 Freedom 1 Faith 1

Scripture referenced 27

Verified against the transcript. A reference the recording does not support is never listed here.

Romans 6 1:40 Romans 6:1 1:40 Romans 6 2:39 Romans 3 2:39 Romans 3 2:45 Romans 3 2:53 Romans 3 2:53 Romans 6 3:07 Romans 6 3:44 Romans 6:1 3:44 Romans 6 4:16 Romans 6:1 4:16 Romans 6:2 4:20 Romans 6:1 5:47 Romans 6:2 5:50 Romans 6:6 5:55 Romans 6:3 7:32 Romans 2 8:47 Romans 2:3-4 9:39 Galatians 3 9:45 Romans 2:4 10:19 Romans 2:3 12:45 Romans 2:4 12:48 Galatians 2 14:11 Galatians 2:20 14:11 Galatians 2 14:26 Galatians 2:20 14:26

Transcript

Every word, as spoken, with the second it was said. Each word links to its own entry in the index.

Pre-service announcement — 10 lines, 0:41. Excluded from every count and search on this site, kept here so nothing is hidden.

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Thanks again for joining us, and we hope you are blessed by today's message.

It's an honor to have you here on this July 4th weekend.

Romans chapter number 6, and we're going to pick up in verse 1 in just a moment.

Paul is writing a letter to Christians in the city of Rome.

He has yet to meet many of the Christians there.

He's not been to the church in Rome, but he has, through his different missionary journeys,

met some of them, a handful of them throughout the years,

and so there's some personal connection there.

So he's writing verse 1, chapter 6.

Paul says,

Paul, just prior to this, chapter number 5, in verse number 20,

says,

where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.

So Paul is preaching the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ,

the good news that God has made a way for us to be forgiven of our sins,

a way for us to be saved, and a way for us to be saved.

So Paul is preaching the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ,

the good news that God has made a way for us to be forgiven of our sins,

a way for us to be saved, and a way for us to be saved.

So Paul is preaching the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ,

the good news that God has made a way for us to be forgiven of our sins,

a way for us to be saved, and a way for us to be saved.

a way for us to have eternal life beyond the grave.

And he says the way to receive that gift of grace is through faith.

So a lot of people criticize Paul.

He had some opponents to his ministry.

Hold your spot in Romans 6, and just go back to Romans chapter 3 for a moment.

Romans chapter 3, in verse number 8.

And Paul alludes to one of those critics and their criticism.

Romans chapter 3, in verse number 8.

Romans chapter 3, in verse number 8.

Paul says,

And why not do evil that good may come,

as some people slanderously charge us with saying?

Now go back to Romans chapter 6, in verse number 1.

This is what Paul is talking about.

Because he preaches about grace, God's grace,

and that salvation is by grace alone and putting our faith in Christ,

people would look at him and say,

Okay, okay.

You talk about grace, but that's just going to be a license for people to do whatever they want to do.

If you talk about God's grace all the time, what about God's judgment?

If you talk about God's grace all the time, what about God's rules?

What about living an upright life before God?

So this was the attack on Paul.

So chapter 6, verse 1, he says,

What shall we say then?

Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound?

So Paul is anticipating one of the arguments against him.

Those who would say,

Okay, you say we sin and God's grace is always greater than our sin.

So what if a person says,

I'm just going to sin a whole bunch because I want to experience more of God's grace.

Wouldn't that make sense to your little, you know, idea of grace, Paul?

So I'm going to be a huge sinner because I want to be a huge recipient of God's grace.

That's the question Paul's asking in chapter 6, verse 1.

And the response in verse 2 is this.

By no means.

It says in the King James, it translates that,

God forbid, like this is ridiculous.

Or one author says this is inconceivable for a Christian to think this way.

So Paul says,

How can we who died to sin still live in it?

Now sin is missing the mark.

Sin is breaking God's laws, God's standards.

Now there is one thing we all have in common.

It is sin.

John says it this way.

He says,

If anyone says he does not have sin,

the truth is not in him.

He is a liar.

There is no person who walked in the door today and said,

You know what?

July 4th weekend was great.

It was sinless in my life.

And I'm hoping to continue on this next week.

No one gets to say that.

No one gets to walk in here and be like,

You know what?

I'm on a month sinless streak and I'm hoping to make it two.

Because the moment someone says that to you,

you know they are a liar.

And they lie to themselves especially.

So we all sin.

We all fall short of the perfect.

We all fall short of the perfect holy standard of God.

That's what the Bible says.

So Paul says,

How can we who died to sin still live in it?

So in verse 1 he uses the word continue.

In verse 2 he uses the phrase live in or live in sin.

And down in verse 6 he talks about being enslaved to sin.

So the question for many people is how can we defeat sin in our life?

How can we stop sinful habits?

Now if you fall into,

if you fall into moralism or really religion,

it's I'm going to try harder.

I'm going to just have more rules.

I'm going to be more disciplined.

I'm just going to exert more effort to stop sin in my life.

Maybe it's I'll spend more time in the Bible.

Or I'll be at church more.

Or more pep talks or accountability.

Or I'll listen to better music or Christian podcasts.

Or all these different things.

And many of them are good things and have a place in our life.

But what Paul's going to say is,

what Paul's going to say here is none of them have the power to stop sin.

Only one force has the ability to conquer or defeat sin in our life.

And it is grace.

Now what is grace?

Grace is the undeserved kindness of God.

It's God's kindness to you and to me that we don't deserve.

It's the unearned blessing of God.

And it has the power to help us defeat sin.

In our life.

Well, let's look at the passage and we're going to answer this question.

How does grace defeat sin in our life?

Paul says,

Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?

We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father,

we too might walk in newness of life.

Now when Paul uses,

the word baptism here,

he is not saying baptism saves a person.

That's never been true.

Never will be true.

What he is saying here,

and he's using baptism as a way of summarizing what one author calls the conversion experience.

So in the first century,

Christians to become a follower of Jesus was a pretty dramatic and radical decision.

People would,

that meant they would change their jobs because their business,

this was associated with the pagan temple.

It meant that their family relationships would really be strained and sometimes be broken for them to proclaim.

I'm a follower of Jesus.

Well,

that was something that happened on the inside.

How would they show it on the outside?

They would be baptized in Acts chapter two.

There were 3000 people that were born again,

3000 people that get saved on the day of Pentecost and outside the temple on these steps.

There were all of these ritual,

So these places where the Jews would go and do these ritual cleansings before they would go up the steps into the temple to worship and pray and sacrifice and so forth.

So there were all of these places,

3000 people,

Peter preaches 3000 people turn from their sin and confess Jesus as Lord believe in the resurrection and they're baptized that day.

Well,

the baptism didn't save them.

What the baptism did was declare,

that guy has followed Jesus.

That guy,

I is uniting with Christ.

That guy is associating with Jesus following Christ.

So when Paul here in verse three and four uses the word baptism,

that's how he is using it.

Galatians chapter three,

he says,

for as many of his,

for as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ first Corinthians,

he says,

for in one spirit,

we were all baptized into one body.

You'll notice in verse three and four,

you'll see death,

you'll see burial,

and you'll see resurrection.

So how does grace help us defeat sin?

Well,

the gospel of grace,

the very last phrase there in verse four says we too might walk in the newness of life.

The gospel of grace gives us new life.

It makes us new,

not from the outside in,

but from the inside out,

it transforms us.

And what baptism did is baptism was,

an outward demonstration of an inward transformation.

And what happened over time is that people would see,

so and so used to be like that used to act like that used to talk that way,

used to think that way,

used to care about those things,

but they've really come to know Jesus.

It's not that they tried harder.

It's not like they assembled 50 rules and said,

I got to keep these 50 rules and smack myself when I missed the mark.

It's that they were embraced by God's grace.

The undeserved kindness of God.

So how does grace defeat sin in our lives?

Well,

first of all,

I think we have to remember our own conversion story.

The first time we came to hear the gospel at a time where we were living a certain way,

thought a certain way,

and we heard maybe a pastor or a preacher or a friend or someone on TV or a podcast or radio,

whatever it might be,

we were listening and we heard about Jesus's death for sinners,

that Jesus died to pay the penalty for sin.

That Jesus was buried in that Jesus rose from the dead.

That's the gospel.

We heard the gospel and something began to stir in our heart.

Something began to move.

We thought why I feel a burden of weight of sin in my life.

And we began to feel the Holy Spirit moving in our hearts.

And we responded to the gospel in faith.

We didn't know what to do other than to say,

I believe that the Bible says the saving response to the gospel is to confess with our mouth.

And to believe in our heart that God was raised from the dead.

The Bible guarantees if we do that,

we will be saved,

saved from the eternal consequences of our sin.

One of the ways that grace combats sin in our life is that there are times where we

need to go back and remember who we were before we met Jesus,

who we were before Jesus saved us.

But also you'll notice in verse three,

the word us in verse four,

the word we a couple of times,

this is also meant to be something we do together.

I love hearing stories of people coming to know Christ,

whether it was a week ago,

whether it was a year ago,

whether it was 50 years ago,

I had a friend of mine sitting here this morning at nine o'clock and his story is a very difficult story,

a story of a lot of hardship and loss in his life and terrible grief.

And it was during that time of grief that he opened the Bible and he began to read the Bible.

He had never read the Bible.

He didn't grow up in church.

He didn't really know much about Jesus.

Or God or anything like that.

He began to read the Bible and it was by reading the Bible that he read about Christ and that began his journey to coming to know Jesus and being saved.

I love hearing that story when he tells me that story.

I don't go,

I've heard that before.

I'm good.

Even if I've heard it two times or 10 times or a hundred times,

I want to hear it again because that is hearing his experience of God's grace in his life encourages me because this is what happens.

The gospel of grace gives us new life.

Hold your spot in Romans and go to the right to the book of Galatians real quick.

Galatians chapter number two.

Paul speaks about his new life in the grace of God in Galatians chapter two and verse 20.

It's a few books to the right.

Galatians chapter two and verse 20.

Paul says,

I have been crucified with Christ.

It is no longer I who live,

but Christ who lives in me.

So there it is an inward transformation.

He joined Christ.

The,

the old man that he was the old person he used to be was crucified with Christ and now it's no longer just him living on his own.

It is Christ who lives in him.

Let's go back to Romans six.

So how do we defeat?

How does grace defeat sin in our life?

First of all,

the gospel of grace gives us new life.

Look at verse five.

Paul says,

for if we have been united with him in a death like his,

we shall certainly be united.

With him in a resurrection like his.

So the gospel of grace gives us new life.

The gospel of grace unites us with Christ.

I was thinking about a way of illustrating this.

You have that back there.

So when I was a kid,

thank you.

So when I was a kid,

I'd go to my grandparents house,

my mom and my mom's parents house,

and they didn't have a lot.

It was a pretty strict house,

kind of boring as a kid.

I remember kicking.

The soccer ball through the window one time and,

never saw the soccer ball again.

so it was kind of that,

that type of house.

It was pretty strict.

Well,

one of the things that right around the corner from my grandpa's house was a golf course.

And you would cross this trail that used to be railroad tracks.

The tracks were gone.

And alongside of this golf course,

we would look for golf balls.

It was just kind of a fun thing to do,

especially if there was nothing to do with the house.

My grandpa loved to watch the news.

And as a kid is the worst thing on planet earth.

I watched the news for two hours every single night in silence.

Like I just,

it was very structured,

very regimented house.

So we'd go golf ball hunting.

And that was just like a little treasure hunt.

Get,

get out of the house.

And,

and I remember golf ball hunting with my grandpa one time.

And there was this tree with a vine that was growing around it.

And it was just starting to grow.

And I remember seeing it as a kid.

It's one of those things,

you know,

30,

almost 40 years later,

I have a snapshot in my brain.

So I'm thankful to the Lord.

That's,

still there.

And I remember seeing this old tree is vine growing up around it.

So my grandpa would golf ball hunt every single day.

And he would keep an eye on this,

keep an eye on this,

let it grow to finally,

he took a saw and he cut the tree off and cut the top off and brought it

home and took the bark off it and stained it,

sealed it and turned it into this walking stick.

So when I was 18,

my grandpa passed away and my grandma said,

is there anything from your grandpa's that you would really like?

I said,

I'd like that walking stick.

So for the last,

this is hung in my house.

It's just kind of a cool memento.

Well,

if you were to take this,

there are parts where you look and it's indistinguishable.

What part was the tree and what part was the vine?

It's just kind of grew together.

Bible says we are united with Christ and not just in a,

you know,

very specifically,

look at verse five.

We've been united with him in a death like his.

And because we've been united,

Paul says,

in a death like his,

we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his meaning.

What a victory like his,

his death looked like a defeat,

but it was a setup for the greatest victory ever to happen on planet earth.

The victory over death.

So what does the Bible say?

If you have been united with Christ,

someone can look at your life and it's hard to know where you start and stop and where Jesus

starts and stop because you've been united with him and he begins to transform you.

So the way that you think,

not because you tried hard,

but because of the,

because of the transformation of grace in your life,

you start to act like Jesus.

Now there's nothing wrong with wearing a,

what would Jesus do bracelet.

I'm not disparaging those at all.

But when we talk about grace,

what we're talking about is an inward transformation.

It's not something you have to even like attempt or work or struggle.

It's not something you strive for and be like,

I got to make sure I be like Jesus today.

It just begins to happen because what's happening in your life is the gospel of grace has given you new life and it has united you with Christ.

Do you begin to respond in ways where you go,

that's,

that's not how I would have responded before.

And I probably would have lit that person up.

You begin to think you begin to see people differently.

I'm amazed sometimes at my own judgmental heart.

I'll be around.

Somebody and I'm like,

And then I'm like,

I'm a Christian.

And I'm like,

I'm a pastor.

Oh yeah.

My job is supposed to be caring about people.

And I'm like,

please change my judgmental jerky heart.

What begins to happen is we begin to see people like Jesus sees people.

We begin to care for people like Jesus care about people.

Well,

how does that happen?

That happens because we are united with Christ and it's not just being united with Christ that helps us care for people or think like Jesus.

What did Jesus do?

On the cross,

he defeated sin.

He conquered sin.

And what did he do with the resurrection?

He conquered the consequences of sin.

He made a way for us to experience not just the forgiveness of sins,

but the hope of eternal life.

So what does the gospel of grace do?

The gospel of grace unites us with Christ.

I'm going to put this back because I feel like Gandalf with this right now.

And I don't want to feel like that the rest of the sermon.

So good.

Paul says,

we know,

that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.

So the gospel of grace gives us new life and the gospel of grace unites us with Christ and the gospel of grace sets us free.

no longer enslaved to sin,

meaning this way.

Sin is no longer the boss.

Now we may still sin first.

John says,

if anyone does sin,

we have an advocate with the father,

So Jesus died for that sin,

our sins in the past,

our sins in the present,

our sins in the future.

So we're thankful for the advocate,

but sin is no longer the boss.

We're no longer enslaved to sin.

When I was a kid,

my brother and I,

we had a little lawn mowing business.

So we mowed a lot of grass all over the place.

And I'd love to tell you that.

I made tons of money and invested it and was super wise.

But basically what we did is we'd go mow a grass,

get paid $20 and then go to seven 11 and spend $22.

And then we go mow the next grass and we get paid $17.

And then we would go spend 22 more dollars at seven 11,

right?

It just,

we blew through money.

It's ridiculous.

One of the lawns that we had was in Clarkston,

downtown Clarkston.

I grew up in Waterford.

So Clarkston was a little more bougie than Waterford.

And so I'd mow this grass in downtown Clarkston and I'd be working.

I'd be working hard.

I'd be pushing the mower.

And my brother who was three years younger than me would just disappear.

Right?

So,

and he was a very small guy then.

So when he was a freshman,

he was four foot 11.

So he was 14 years old,

but he looked,

you know,

And so I'd be mowing grass and my brother would just disappear at this house all the time.

I'd end up like mowing and weed whacking.

And then he'd like come out and I'd be like,

where were you?

He's like,

the lady who owns the house was,

they gave me some popsicles and stuff.

And I'm like,

where the heck's mine?

And I think in hindsight,

what she thought was I was just like enslaving my little brother.

I'm like,

he's 14 years old lady.

Like,

so she had a lot of grace for my brother.

So years go by my wife and I always said this dream,

you know,

years and years ago of living in downtown Clarkston.

She grew up in Clarkston.

And so we house went on the market and we bought this house.

It was the house that I used to mow the grass at.

So it was kind of this weird little turn of events where I'm like,

I used to mow the grass here.

My brother used to disappear here and not work still on the clock.

But now I own the house,

right?

And no longer did I have to go knock on the door to collect.

I was in the house.

I was the owner of the house.

I still had to mow the grass,

but I owned the house.

The position was different because of what Jesus has done in our lives.

This is what verse six is trying to say.

Jesus goes to the cross to free us from being enslaved to sin.

We have verse seven been set free from sin in Christ.

So how does grace defeat sin in our life?

Well,

first of all,

we realize we have a new life.

We're a new person.

We have been united with Christ.

So we have resurrection power,

the resurrection power of Jesus.

But also we're no longer obligated to sin.

We're no longer slaves to sin.

We're no longer on the outside working.

We are welcomed in the house.

Maybe a different way of illustrating.

Think of your worst job you ever had.

I'm sorry if that's the current job you have right now,

but let's just say,

you know,

the worst job you ever had.

And today you walk back into that business.

You don't have to go to work there.

You used to work there.

The boss that was a nightmare for you before he or she can't tell you what to do anymore because you don't work there anymore.

Jesus set us free from being enslaved to sin.

So when we feel temptation or when there's an offer to do something we used to do or or a girl hang out with people that we used to hang out with that was sinful.

And evil and unrighteous and detrimental.

You know what we can say?

Yeah,

I don't I don't have to do that anymore.

Sin isn't my boss anymore.

I have been set free.

I have been given new life in Christ.

I have been United with Christ.

I have been set free.

Look at verse eight.

if we have died with Christ,

we believe that we will also live with him.

We know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again.

Death no longer has dominion over him.

The death he died.

He died to sin once for all,

but the life he lives,

he lives to God.

So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God.

It's a couple more things.

The gospel of grace changes who and what we live for changes.

Why we wake up changes what we hope to accomplish for the day.

Here's how I love what verse 12 says down to verse 14.

Here's what that means on a practical level.

Every day Paul says let not sin.

so because of this because of the gospel of grace,

let not sin therefore rain in your mortal body to make you obey its passions.

Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness,

but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life and your members to God as instruments for righteousness.

The word members here.

We're talking about our body talking about our hands our feet our mouth.

Our mind our sexuality all those things instead of presenting them to sin to do unrighteous things.

We present them to God and think about for me.

I think about the amount of times my mouth and my mind have gotten me in trouble.

Sometimes my mind will run so far out ahead.

I'm like whoa.

You cannot think about that.

That's not right.

That's inappropriate.

That's sinful another other times where my mind is fast asleep and my mouth is running and I'm like,

what the heck are you saying?

It's like one is running this way one is running that way.

What the Bible is saying is here is that we take who we are or as Jesus would say our heart soul mind and strength.

We take all that we are instead of waking up and presenting our bodies or our members as the word is here to sin to be done unrighteous.

We come to God and we wake up and we say God because of the gospel of grace.

So because of the new life that you've given me because I'm United with you

because you've set me free because you've changed who and what I live for God.

I'm waking up today.

Here's my mind God.

Here are my hands here.

Here are my feet.

Here's my mouth what I say today.

I want it to be honoring to you.

I want it to be encouraging and and appropriate and building up for other people God.

Here I am.

I submit myself to you because of grace not because I want to try harder or or work at being a better Christian God.

I just.

I just need your grace.

I need your unearned kindness and and I've received so much of it.

And when I sin your grace always abounds greater than that.

So here I am today God and I submit myself.

I surrender myself to you for your use.

I think what we'll find is that if we are busy being used by God verse 13,

our members have been submitted to God as instrument for righteousness that we can't at the same time verse 13 present our members to sin as

instruments for unrighteousness.

We're already too busy doing what God wants us to do.

Now look back at verse number five to one phrase there.

And then it's repeated somewhat in verse eight Paul says for if if we have been United with him verse number eight.

Now if we have died with Christ question for each person in here is are you United with Christ?

Have you experienced have you come to the death of Jesus and said Jesus is dying in my place Jesus was

buried and Jesus rose from the dead and the way the gospel would say this.

Have you joined him in that meaning who I was is going to die and be buried and I'm going to be transformed by the power of the gospel.

If do you know Christ and you come to Jesus and confess him as Lord and believed in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead.

That's the only way to be saved.

See what God in his kindness does is he offers to you and to me the gift of Grace right now.

And what is Grace Grace?

This is the unearned kindness blessing favor of God.

He extends that to you.

He holds out the forgiveness of your sins.

He holds out the free gift of eternal life way to receive that is to come to Jesus and confess him as Lord and believe in his resurrection from the dead.

That's the only way to be saved the only way to be saved from the eternal consequences of our sin.