Are You Dying to Live?

ROMANS 6: 1 – 5

Jesus wants to employ the same power by which He was resurrected to awaken the talent, ambition, and joy within you. If you are a Christian the following should excite and challenge you. You have new life in Jesus. It:

GIVES NEW CHARACTER (Vss. 1 – 2)

A caterpillar is in the process of metamorphosis even before it becomes a butterfly.  It changes in nature from a caterpillar to a butterfly inside its outward form before it emerges in all of its new life beauty.

GUARANTEES NEW CONDUCT (Vss. 3, 4)

To illustrate the transition of the old nature to the new, baptism is used.

Literally, baptizo, the Greek word used, is acknowledged by scholars of all faiths to mean literally: to dip, plunge, submerge, or immerse.

Figuratively it means to identify with.

1 Corinthians 10:2 speaks of the followers of Moses and says, “all were baptized into Moses …”  Those who followed Moses were identified with him.

Water baptism is a physical picture depicting a spiritual experience which precedes it.  That spiritual experience is identity with Christ.  Don’t confuse the picture, water baptism, with the reality, trusting of Christ as Savior.

GRANTS NEW CAPACITY (Vs. 5)

In verse 4, “that” introduces a purpose clause.  The purpose of our identity with Christ is that we “should walk in newness of life.” A believer has a new relationship to sin.  Such a one is “dead to sin” (vs. 2) and should not “live any longer in it.”  This means you do not have to live under sin’s controlling influence.

A believer has a new relationship with the Savior.

We share in His resurrected life.  By identifying with Him, we are risen to walk “in newness of life.” Resolve to do it today, then do it one day at the time.

Too many Christians live a life as though they are living between Good Friday and Easter Sunday.  That is, they live a life of despair.  They are not living in the power of His resurrection though they have been redeemed by His death.

Lazarus’s physical resurrection is an illustration of our new life.  He had new life physically.  Christ commanded Him to “come forth.”  He came out bound and Christ said, “Loose him and let him go.”  Christ does not want you bound, but free to love and serve.

Can you imagine Lazarus ever wanting to go back to that grave sight, put on his old grave clothes, and lay in the tomb.  Well, that is how some believers appear to want to live at times. Stay away from your old tomb, that is, old sinful lifestyle.

That is wrong.  Romans 6:5, says “we have been united together…in the likeness of His resurrection.”  “United” means to have been fused together with Him, thus, become one with Him. Such empowers you to walk in newness of life.