Living in Grace Land
Romans 6:1-14
Introduction
I believe that there is one question that is essential for all of us to ask: So what? You say you love your children? So, what does that look like in reality? You say that you care about the poor? So what does that look like in practice? There should be some connection between what we say and what we do, between what we believe and how we act. What has Paul been teaching throughout his letter? He has demonstrated that humanity is sinful. We are not capable of pleasing God on our own. Sin has touched every part of us and so even our religious activity is corrupted. Our only hope is to be saved by grace. Grace is an undeserved gift. It is not based on how many good deeds we have done and it is not based on which religious rituals we have performed. This is grace. We are saved by grace. There is no other way. The question is: So what? What does that mean for us on a practical level if we are saved by grace apart from what we do? You can see how some people would be suspicious about too much emphasis on grace. If you are saved by grace and not by what you do, why bother doing anything at all? If good works can’t help you, it would seem that bad works can’t hurt you. This is the way some people look at Christianity. At some point you choose to be a Christian and you get baptized. Everything else now is up to you. Live like you want, commit whatever sin you want, you have your ticket to heaven and that is all that matters. Some people think you still need to confess your sins after each transgression, but there is no need to actually change your life style. Is that right? Is that really what the Christian life is supposed to look like? It is not. But how do we avoid this and at the same time not fall back into trying to be good enough for God and working to earn his love? It would seem that our only choices are to live an anything goes life or else live a joyless legalism. However, there is a middle way and it all revolves around grace. Grace is not about God feeling nice one day and deciding to give people a get-out-of-hell card. Grace is defined and understood only through the death and resurrection of Jesus. Reflecting on Jesus‘ death and resurrection takes our understanding far beyond questions about rules of what we are or are not supposed to do. By understanding this, we will truly know what it means to live in grace land.
Death of Christ
So what are we allowed to do or not allowed to do? What are the rules? What can we get away with? If we believe that Christianity is really about grace, those are not the right questions to ask. If Christianity is about grace, we need to ask where grace came from. Grace came from what Jesus did and it can only be properly understood through the lens of Christ. What did Jesus do? Jesus died for us. What does that mean? We can look at in purely theological terms, that is he died so we can go to heaven. But we need to think of it in a way deeper than a simple exchange. What does it mean that Jesus died? Jesus was God incarnate. The Bible tells us that Jesus was involved in the act of creation. This God incarnate allowed himself to be arrested, tortured, beaten, humiliated, condemned and crucified. In the ancient world there were honorable and dishonorable ways to die. Crucifixion was about the most dishonorable way to die. Why would Jesus allow this to happen to him? He certainly had the power to prevent it. Jesus died this horrible and painful death because he loved us. Why go so far as to die? Because of sin and this being the only way to pay the price. So what does this have to do with us? Paul makes an interesting connection. “We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death” (Romans 6:4 NIV) “If we have been united with him like this in his death” (Romans 6:5 NIV) “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— because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.” (Romans 6:6–7 NIV) Paul expects the death of Jesus to be more than placing a reservation for us in heaven. Our life here and now should be shaped by the cross. Why did Jesus die on the cross? Because of sin. What is our attitude toward sin? We should never see sin as acceptable, nor should we see sin as desirable but technically against the rules. We should hate sin because that is why Jesus died. We should see sin as terrible not out of fear of punishment or out of a desire to look respectful but because we love Jesus. When we feel the temptation to do something wrong, we should picture Jesus on the cross and reflect on why he died. Instead of seeing the cross as giving us free rein to sin, we should put our sin up on the cross where it belongs. Christ died to save us from sin, we should let that be our motivation to holy living.
Life of Christ
So we are inspired by the death of Jesus. His self-sacrificial love should spur us on to righteous living and intolerance toward our sin. But the death of Jesus is not the end of the story. We are told that on the third day, Jesus rose from the dead. Why is this? If a person goes to heaven when they die, why not just have Jesus‘ spirit go to be with the Father and let the body rot in the grave? Was the resurrection of Jesus just so we could have a happy ending and not conclude the story on a sad note? The resurrection is essential to the story. The resurrection is so important that in 1 Corinthians 15, Paul says that if Jesus was not raised, Christianity is a waste of time. But again, this is not just a theological note. I gave some verses earlier, but I did not give the whole message. “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. If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection.” (Romans 6:4–5 NIV) The crucifixion is important, however, the resurrection is equally important. The resurrection is the sign that life has conquered death. When Jesus rose from the dead, resurrection life came flooding into the world, reviving all those who would receive its power. What does this mean for those of us trying to live in grace land. Grace land is a place of life and not death. Grace does not mean we have learned to tolerate the stench of sin but that we have learned to love the beautiful smell of righteousness. What does the resurrection mean for us as Christians? It means that we live like we really are alive. The Gospel of John tells the story of the raising of Lazarus. If you remember the story, Jesus waited until Lazarus was dead four days before arriving. That meant that his body began to decompose and he had the stink of death about him. When Jesus ordered them to open the tomb, they did not want to because of the stench. Jesus spoke the word and Lazarus came to life. But when he walked out, he still had his burial cloths on. I would assume that those wrappings still stunk like death. That is understandable but Jesus told the people to remove those wrappings because that is no way for a living man to smell. In a way that is a picture of us. When we become Christians, that is Jesus calling us out of the tomb. But when we first become Christians, we still stink like sin. It takes a while to get those old grave clothes off. However, we would never be content to stay stinking and so over time they come off. If we have been raised with Jesus, if he has shared his life with us, we cannot be comfortable with sin in our life. It is not just that it is against the rules, it is because that is not who we are anymore. As Paul says elsewhere: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” (2 Corinthians 5:17 NIV) Grace land is a place that smells like life and not like death.
Conclusion
So what does life look like in grace land? First of all, I will tell you what it does not look like. It does not look like legalism, where you are afraid that every little word or deed is breaking some obscure rule. Nor does it look like freedom to indulge in any sin you want because of confidence in some past experience. What does grace land look like? It looks like Jesus. It looks like Jesus dying on the cross and it looks like Jesus stepping out of the tomb. The cross makes us understand the seriousness of sin and the price that was paid to free us from its power. The empty tomb makes us understand that we have a new life that is filled with resurrection power. Grace land is not about telling us why we are not allowed to sin but about why we should no longer want to sin. Grace land is a wonderful place to live.
