Dying to Live: Dying to Sin

God, thank you so much for the opportunity to be here today and to be able to celebrate

not because of anything that we have done, but Lord, because of what you've done.

Father, this morning we are very thankful that you are worthy to do all the things that

we cannot do ourselves. And Lord, not just thinking about things to come like

breaking the seals on the scroll and bringing judgment like it's been promised

that would happen, but God, that you were worthy to be the sacrifice for our sin.

You were worthy to be Lord and God and to be worshiped and for us to put our faith

in and our trust and our hope in. And God, this morning we just we ask that you

would send your spirit in this place and that you would work and move in a mighty

way. That you would break down the barriers and the things in our heart

that's holding us back from experiencing you more. God, we need you today. We need

you. We need you in our lives. We need you to guide us and show us and we need

you to rescue us from ourselves in so many ways. So God, I just ask that you

would make yourself present and known. That every person here could feel you

moving and working in their lives, even though they cannot explain it or

understand it, but they can feel you in this moment. And Father, we give you this

time. We give you all of this and pray that you would help us to be pleasing and

honoring to you in it. Father, this morning we lift up Miss Lois and Mr.

Harold, as both of them are recovering from from procedures done this past week.

We pray that you continue to be with our bodies to help them to heal. God, this

morning we pray for Jonathan's mom, Miss Angelina, and the Lord. We just ask that

you would touch her today if she's in the hospital or that you had work in

moving her life and do a miracle there and in her friends life as well. Father,

we need you this morning. Lord, we need you spiritually, need you physically. We

need you in all aspects of our lives. And I pray this morning we would humble

ourselves before you and invite you in. Jesus, we love you this morning. We thank

you so much for the opportunity to be here and we pray and ask all this in

your precious and holy name, all God's people said. You may be seated. Well, as

always, if you feel the Lord speaking to you and you work up the courage, don't

feel like you can't interrupt me at any time. I will be more than happy to let

you speak as well. He is no fool to give away what he cannot keep, to gain what he

cannot lose. Jim Elliot is given a lot of credit for writing that, although some

think that it was said or written before he ever did. But probably the most

the older you get, the more precious it becomes because you're running out of it.

It's temporary. You don't get as much as you would like to have. It always ends

sooner than you think that it should and you never can truly appreciate how

special and important life is until you lose someone that you love or you come

close to losing someone that you love and are very close to. Jesus understands

more than we could ever fathom how important life is. And it's exactly why

he called us to be willing to die. That's why he was willing to die. He calls us to

be willing to die because life is very important. But no matter what, we are

going to die. That day comes for every single one of us. And Jesus calls us to

do it willingly rather than begrudgingly. And over the next several

weeks, we're going to be talking about this concept of dying to live. That

there's a calling on your life if you claim to be a follower of Christ, that

you have a calling on your life to die. That you are dying to many different

things in the world, that you're dying to yourself, you're dying to the world,

you're dying to sin. And we're focusing this morning specifically on dying to the

sin in our lives. There is a common theme throughout scripture that you see

where it talks about us dying with Christ, dying for Christ, dying to ourselves

constantly from Matthew all the way through Revelation. And this morning

we're in Romans chapter 6 verses 6 through 18. And if you want to, you can

Romans 6:6–18

turn there. It's going to be on the screen. But about Romans chapter 3

Romans 3 · chapter mention

through about chapter 10 is kind of considered what a lot of theologians say

is the Roman road. It's the Roman road to salvation. It is probably the best

description of what it means to be saved and to be a follower of Jesus Christ

that we have in scripture that is compacted in this kind of like

chronological order that you can read and get a pretty good understanding of

what it means to be a Christian, Romans 3 through 10. In the middle of that

section of scripture you have Romans 6 when Paul writes about how sin's power

should be broken in our lives. Okay? So let's read this together and we got a

good bit to talk about. So verse 6 it says, we know that our old sinful

selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our

lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. For when we died with Christ we were set

free from the power of sin. Now I want to just inject something in the middle of

this this morning. There is a feeling in our lives that when it comes to sin and

things that we know that we shouldn't do, sometimes we can get bound up in these

things and we feel like, man, I cannot overcome this. I cannot make it through

this. I want to quit. I can't stop. This is just something I don't feel like I'm

ever gonna be free from. This is just something that just keeps burdening me

over and over and over again and I want to quit and I just can't and I just feel

trapped and I feel like I do not have the power of God within my life. Paul is

writing this letter to Christians. These are Christians who are like the Church

of Rome. They have put their faith in Jesus Christ and yet they are still

struggling in their sin and Paul is reminding them in this moment you are

no longer a slave to the sin that you feel enslaved to. Sometimes we get so used

to something that it's hard for us to get out of it or see ourselves beyond this

thing but Paul is reminding these Christians and he's reminding us this

morning that we are free from that enslavement. He has paid our price. He

has bought us. He has given us freedom and this morning I'm challenging you

guys to understand that if you are remaining under the slavery of sin you

are doing it in your own choice. It's not because the power and love and

mercy of Jesus is not enough to set you free because he has set you free. Look

at verse 8. And since we died with Christ we know we will also live with him. We

are sure of this because Christ was raised from the dead and he will never die

again. Death no longer has any power over him. When he died he died once to break

the power of sin. But now that he lives he lives for the glory of God. So you also

should consider yourselves to be dead to the power of sin and alive through

Christ Jesus. Do not let sin control the way you live. Do not give into simple

desires. Do not let any part of your body become an instrument of evil to

serve sin. Instead give yourselves completely to God for you were dead but

now you have new life. So use your whole body as an instrument to do what is right

for the glory of God. Sin is no longer your master for you no longer live

under the requirements of the law. Instead you live under the freedom of

God's grace. Well then since God's grace has set us free from the law does that

mean that we can go on sinning? Of course not. Don't you realize that you become

the slave to whatever you choose to obey? And the truth is this morning is

that there are many people who have put their faith in Jesus Christ and we've

called on his name for mercy and forgiveness and grace and yet in the

midst of that we have chosen to remain enslaved to sin despite what we have

experienced in our salvation in Jesus. Verse 16 don't you realize that you

become a slave to whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to sin which

leads to death or you can choose to obey God which leads to righteous living.

Thank God once you were slaves to sin but now you wholeheartedly obey his

teaching we have given you. Now you are free from your slavery to sin and you

have become slaves to righteous living. That's some heavy scripture. Point

number one this morning all Christians have died with Christ. All Christians

have died with Christ and I want to ask do I have your permission this morning to

speak honestly? I mean you want me to butter it up you want me to to be honest

okay since nobody objected we forget that when we call on the name of Jesus

Christ it's not that we should have died it's not that we will die but it's

the fact that we have died and are dying if we belong to Christ. You cannot truly

belong to Jesus Christ unless you have died and are still dying. There is no

life in Christ without death. You cannot live in Jesus Christ and not have died

to many things but we're talking about sin this morning and think about this

you cannot be with God unless you die a physical death right? Like we all

claim to be Christians we all claim to want to go to heaven but we cannot get

there until we die a physical death so we can't be with God until we physically

die and we can't be filled with God until we die to ourselves and we die to

the world and we die to sin. It's not gonna happen. We cannot belong to God

until we have died with God and are committed to continue dying with God

throughout the rest of our lives. Unchanged people are not saved people. I

will say it again. Unchanged people are not saved people. There is no possible

way you can belong to Jesus Christ and him not change you. It is a must. He did

not come and die so that we could remain the same but he came and died

to set us free so that we can become new creations to be born again to die to the

world and to have a brand new life through Christ Jesus and this is such

an interesting passage because it feeds the entire New Testament. Everything that

we talk about where you have to die in order to live and if you cling

to your life you will lose it but if you give up your life you will find it

or have it. Like it's all throughout the New Testament and to understand this

morning when Paul is talking about dying in verse 13 he talks about this

new life and so understand today as part of this process of understanding that

that we have to die with Christ it's not like Christ is calling you to die

in order for you to be miserable or you to lose but the faith to believe in

God to understand that when he calls you to die he's calling you to give up

something that isn't really that good because he has something for you that is

so much better and only people who've truly experienced the work of God in their

lives and God has changed them can testify to that because the life that God

has for you is better than the life that you have before and when you're not

saved you can't see that you can't understand that and there's things that

you want and dreams and hopes and aspirations and for God to call us to

die to things like that is almost like it's crippling in some ways because

you're just not sure if what God has on the other side is actually better than

what you could have something that's tangible that you can see that you can

actually like put your thoughts in your eyes and you can touch and feel and

smell and you know like I can maybe get that one day and that's willing I'm

gonna be willing to give that up for something that I'm not quite sure what

God has for me and that's where faith comes into the picture you have to

believe in Christ Jesus enough to understand that he loves me he cares for

me he not only has he prepared eternity for me but even in this world he has

something better for me than this world could ever give me and apart from sin

something that we are called to die to the very first thing man God has

something so much better for us in those things and the truth is is if we

have not surrendered to Christ you probably very much believe in that you

are living your best life like you you probably are like all in like trying to

get the most out of this life and living and think like there's a lot of

people who think they have a really good life and and what they do is not

that big of a deal but in Galatians 2 verse 20 Paul wrote to the church in

Galatians 2:20

Galatians he says my old self has been crucified with Christ it is no

longer I who live but Christ lives in me so I live in this earthly body by

trusting in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me we are called to

put our faith and our trust in a Savior who literally died not only died to

things the world but gave up his physical life and died physically so

that you and I could have life and it is no outlandish thought to think that he

would ask us to die with him in some way shape or form so as a Christian this

morning you need to understand that if you claim to be a Christian you should

have died with Christ and you should be dying with Christ daily because

whatever you died to whenever you first got saved I guarantee you whatever Christ

freed you from in that moment and did a work in your life and in that moment

from the years that have passed since then for some of you who's been saved a

little longer the devil has brought in new things to tempt you with he's

brought in new things to kind of get your attention and pull you away and

distract you and and there's always going to be something that we have to

die to we talk about themes and things that you see regularly throughout the

Bible you go back and you follow the main characters about it's almost you can

see it where God calls them to do certain things but he never just calls

them once he never just calls them to give up one thing it's almost like God

always comes back and say okay now I want you to give me this now I want

you to follow this now I want you to do this now I want you to say this now

I want you to preach this now I want you to do and there's always this thing

of where God comes back and he brings up this issue are you willing to die

again are you willing to give this up again are you willing to be mine again

because make no mistake about it this morning saved people are changed people

you cannot know who Jesus Christ is and not be changed if you've truly had an

encounter with him if you're not changed chances are you need to take an

internal look at where you're putting your faith and your hope and your trust

because we should be dying with Christ point up to death to sin is the primary

death death to sin is the primary death it is the very first thing that we are

called to die to when you look at what it means to be a Christian the very

first thing that we have to do as people is acknowledge that we are

sinners that we have iniquity in our heart that we need to be forgiven of

things that we have done and said and who we are and our desires and the ways

that we've treated people that there is sin that needs to be forgiven and

cleansed and that's just a part of becoming a Christian it's the first

thing that we have to die to and it's not one of those things that whenever

you get saved God is just gonna like wipe you clean and all of a sudden

you're just gonna be like the cleanest most holy person ever live so there's

gonna be some things that you die to initially when you come to Christ and

then as you follow him there's going to be a process of this continual choosing in

your life to die to the sin and the things in your life that you need to

die to in order to walk with Christ as you go and he will reveal more things to

you as time goes on and in the beginning it's like sins of the youth and sins

of the flesh and sins of the world that are easy to identify and we can all

see and we can all like know it's like yeah that's not good we we shouldn't be

doing that and people can hold you accountable but the longer you walk with

Christ what happens is is that we we tend to have these sins in our hearts

that nobody really knows about like the way we look at people the way we think

about people the way we talk about people you know when you start

dealing with church and you start really getting in church and you start

dealing with with gossip and division and the way that we talk about things and

the way that we sow seeds of division and all those all that stuff is hard to

identify it's hard for other people to point at those things in our hearts and

say hey man you need to work on that that's a sin that's some internal stuff

that only the Holy Spirit can deal with us on and convict us on and so we

have to have this attitude of God I'm not just dying to sin whenever I first

get saved but I'm committed to dying to sin throughout the entirety of my life

until I can be with you there's a commitment to die regularly and the

problem is is that so many people call on the name of Jesus Christ and we ask

for forgiveness of our sins but then we want Jesus to just accept our sin and

we just want to keep on doing what we've been doing all along

and it's exactly what we said earlier is is that saved people are changed

people and we have a we have a world and a culture of people who claim Jesus

Christ as I'm a Christian but I'm still living in the same sins that I was

before I was saved but when you look at scripture it clearly says that he came

to set us free from the power of sin we don't have to continue on in our sins

because he died to set us free from that and your sins might be little itty-bitty

this morning it may be nothing compared to what your friends may be doing or

what you see is doing in the rest of the world but let me remind all of us

this morning that the standards of Christ is not the standards of the

world so your sin may seem little itty-bitty but when we stand before God

one day we are gonna stand before a holy God we are standing before a sinless

God and any amount of sin is going to be unacceptable do we realize and

understand that scripture says that the heavens and the earth will be destroyed

because sin had was entered into heaven when Satan rebelled against God and sin

came into the earth when Adam and Eve ate from the tree and so both have been

tainted with sin and both will be destroyed and God's gonna create a new

heavens and a new earth without sin and do you really think that he's gonna go

through that much effort and judge the world and create this new perfect

sinless place to invite sinful people in he died to cleanse us and to set us

free from our sins so that one day we could be able to be qualified and

worthy to go there through his power and his love and his mercy Jesus is not

going to tolerate our sin I just we need to remind ourselves of that we make a

lot of excuses we make a lot of rationalizations in our lives but Jesus

Christ is not going to tolerate our sin he suffered and bled and died to free us

from that sin it will not be tolerated he's not going to change his expectations

based off of the culture of the world in Galatians 5 verses 24 to 25 it says

Galatians 5:24–25

those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their

sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there sin wouldn't be tempting if

there wasn't something enjoyable about it I guess let's be honest this morning

it wouldn't be tempting to you if there wasn't something enjoyable about it

wouldn't be tempting to you if you did not get some sort of gratification out

of it but those who belong to Christ have nailed their sinful passions and

desires to the cross of Christ not your own cross but to the cross of Christ

your cross is not good enough to get rid of them but the cross of Jesus is good

enough to get rid of since we are living by the spirit let us follow the

spirits leading in every part of our lives and and if you are in this boat

this morning when you say okay man like I've asked Christ into my heart I do

think I'm saved I'm still struggling with sin so I'm feeling pretty garbage

this morning all right it's like I've been here I'll just say I've been in a

situation where somebody's preached on this and I've had sin in my life and

you feel like garbage in this moment so I understand where you are and you say well

I don't know what to do because I've tried and I've said I'm not gonna do this

anymore I've said I'm not gonna I'm not gonna partake in this anymore and I

just keep on going back to it and I don't understand why in verse 25 reveals

the reason because if we're living by the spirit we will follow the spirits

leading in every part of our lives but if we're living in our own strength and

our own abilities we are going to fail over and over and over again and

chances are if you're living in your own strength following Jesus has been

exhausting for you and you feel defeated and you feel like you don't have any

power and you don't feel his presence and you don't feel like your prayers are

being heard and you just feel like so empty in this whole aspect of being a

Christian but through the power of the Spirit there's all these wonderful

fruits that are provided there's all this guiding there's all this this this

power and authority that comes within us that helps us to do these things and

only through the power of the Spirit can we take our sinful desires and come

to the realization of God I'm ready to die to this and I'm gonna nail this to

your cross cuz only your cross can get rid of it and God whatever you have for

me on the other side it's got to be better than what I'm feeling right now

because this garbage stinks and I want to make really good and sure this

morning that you understand that I'm not trying to come down hard on you and

to be this hellfire and brimstone kind of person saying well you're all going

to hell this morning you know it's like no that's not what I'm saying but I do

think it's very important that as we have a lot of new people we have a lot

of young people this morning to start out as early as we can to understand

that Jesus Christ died to set you free you do not have to stay in bondage

to sin you do not have to stay in bondage to addictions you don't have to

say in bondage to anything in this world and Lord knows I have had to die to a lot

of things and I'm still dying to a lot of things and Hannah can testify to that

we're all dying together that's the way it should be

so there's no condemnation this morning there's no calling you unworthy none of

us are worthy but as the song said Jesus is worthy he's the one who's worthy

he's the one with the power he's the one with the authority and apart from him

we're done we don't have it and chances are if we're still struggling in the

same sins and addictions and all the things we've been dealing with for

years after we've claimed to belong to Christ we just don't have the spirit of

God living in us giving us that power and that victory death the sin is the

primary death because until until we're willing to die to sin we'll never be

able to die to things of the world I mean think about it man like sin is not

the only thing that Christ called his people to die to I mean we're gonna

talk about death to the world next week but how in the world are we ever

gonna die to careers and hobbies money fame all the desires that we could have

is things that aren't inherently sinful but they're distracting how can we die

to sin which we know separates us from God how can we die to these things

which aren't sinful but yet they're just pulling us away from the the calling

that God's put in our lives if you haven't died to sin you're never gonna be

able to die to these things we might as well not even talk about it until you

talk about dying to the sin first and if we don't die to sin we're not gonna

die to the other things

point three dying to sin makes us the most like Christ dying to sin makes us

the most like Christ if you call yourself a Christian I think it's really

important you understand what that means like putting that title on your

life in the original Greek what we derived the word Christian from it

means little Christ that you're identifying yourself as as a little

Christ or as Christ like and the one of the most significant and important

qualities and characteristics of Christ was that he was without sin how in

the world can we run around in this world move throughout our families move

throughout our communities move around at our workplaces and continue to live in

sin and yet claim the title of Christ in our lives one of the things that we

celebrate him the most in is that he was sinless and perfect and it gave him the

qualifications to be worthy of the sacrifice for our sins and to be the

one to open those scrolls when the day of judgment comes and so many things that

we do as people just does not equate to the expectations that God has for our

life for us to be like Christ there needs to be an absence of sin and I'm

not saying this morning like you need to be perfect and 100% without sin but

you need to be committed to the dying of sin there is sins that you've died to

and you need to be able to identify that and place your finger on those things I

have died to that and I have died to that and I am dying to this and this

and this and I'm willing to die to anything that comes my way into the

future the death process gives us the ability to be more and more like

Christ in Romans 8 verses 12 through 14 we're still in that whole section of

Romans 8:12–14

that that Roman road of salvation of what it means to be a Christian so in

6 you have death to sin and in chapter 8 he's talking about life in the spirit

because you can't die to sin and you can't live a life in the spirit

without being full of the spirit so in verse 12 of chapter 8 it says

therefore dear brothers and sisters you have no obligation to do what your

sinful nature urges you to do and that's hard because like we said earlier

it wouldn't be tempting if there wasn't something in you that wanted to do it

and didn't enjoy doing it it would not be a temptation but you don't have to do

what it urges you to do and in the moments when you're tempted we have to

remind ourselves of that like I don't have to do this Jesus died to set me

free Jesus died to break the power of this thing in my life and we have to

remind ourselves in those moments rather than giving in to our own desires and

urges in verse 13 it says for if you live by its dictates you will die again

you see that theme if you live for yourself if you choose yourself you die

if you give it up if you live for Christ you live for eternity but if

through the power of the Holy Spirit you put to death the deeds of your

sinful nature you will live for all who are led by the Spirit of God are

children of God you cannot live without sin in your life unless you are filled

with the Spirit you cannot be a child of God unless you are living in the

power of the Spirit we have to be led by the Spirit you can't die to sin without

it you can't die to the world without it if the Holy Spirit dwells within us it

frees us from our sins and only then can we truly be like Christ and this

morning my reminder to you today is you've been called to live a holy life

you believe in a holy God you serve a holy God you believe him to be sinless

and perfect and all good and all these wonderful titles that we give him and

to think this morning that he sent his son to die and his Holy Spirit to live

in you to help you become more like him and yet to say that we don't have to be

like him that's a scary thing to say in 1st Peter 1 verses 17 to 19 Peter wrote

and remember that the Heavenly Father to whom you pray has no favorites he will

judge or reward you according to what you do so you must live in reverent fear

of him during your time here as temporary residents we're just temporary

we're just visitors passing through for you know that God paid a ransom to save

you from the empty life that you inherited from your ancestors to think

this morning no matter how you were brought up no matter whether or not you

were brought up with plenty of wealth or you have this great spiritual legacy

where people taught you the Bible and they taught you about church you still

inherited an empty life it does not matter what your ancestors did for you

until you accept Jesus Christ and give your life to him and die to sin and die

to the world you have an empty life and it was not pay with mere gold or

silver which lose their value it was the precious blood of Christ the sinless

spotless lamb of God so many people cling to this life man this world and

there's something special about there's something good when God created it he

saw that it was good and so it shouldn't be surprising that we would

want to cling to it but understand this morning when you leave this place

today that God has called you to die God has called you to die especially to

sin you're not gonna be able to die at all the other things that God's called

you to until you're willing to die to sin because we know it displeases him it

separates us from him it is the very thing that Jesus came to bleed and

die for so that we could be free let's pray father thank you for the

opportunity to be here today and to read your word and Lord to just be reminded

once again of the calling that you've put on our lives nobody in this room

is absent from that it doesn't matter whether we're a pastor or on the

worship team or we work a regular job no matter what we do if we claim Christ in

our life we are called to surrender to you and die to ourselves so that your

spirit can fill us more and more and Lord this morning no matter where we

are if we've been saved for a hundred years God I pray that you would help us

to say Lord help me to die to anything that I need to die to don't let me walk

out of this room clinging to anything it doesn't need to be there the Lord if

there's anybody in this room who's never never given anything up never made the

decision to follow you that Lord they would simply say God I don't I don't

understand I don't know what all this means but Lord I feel you working in my

heart I feel you speaking to me and God I just invite you into my life to

help me to begin dying to the sins and things in my life that I know are making

me feel guilt and shame and regret and I don't know why I keep going back to them

because I feel terrible every time but Lord I believe and trust that you can

free me from that so Lord fill me with your spirit and help me to die father we

love you today and we thank you and we ask all this in your precious and

holy name amen