I'd like you to turn with me to one of my favorite passages of Scripture. Tonight we're going to be in Romans chapter 6, first few verses of this chapter, just to make sure that we understand the finished work of the cross and how honestly it is from his death to a finished work to done to what was necessary for each and every single one of us. We have been just singing one of my favorite new worship songs in the last few years. I absolutely love that song because of how gospel-centric it is, how I feel like it just fills in all so many gaps for so many people.
And we just think about how the merit of Jesus is all sufficient, that everything needed for our salvation has already been accomplished. Nothing at all needs to be added to his work, but something is meant to change our lives. I hope you know that. Just because the cross doesn't just forgive our sins, it's supposed to put them to death.
And that's one of the things that sometimes we miss. The question is not whether or not Jesus has finished his work. The question is whether we're still holding on to what he died to end. We look at our lives, what would we think of?
Romans 6 is going to pick up where that song just left off. Because if Jesus has done everything necessary to save us, then what does that mean for the way that I live and the way that you live? Many of you probably grew up in church. And if you grew up in church, you probably had someone around this time of year ask you the most famous evangelistic question of my generation.
You ready for it? If you were to die tonight, where would you end up? How many of you were ever asked that question? Raise your hand.
How many of you ever asked that question to someone? If you were to die tonight, where would you go? Would you be in heaven or would you be in hell? It's a really great way to accelerate your relationship very quickly.
He'll say, okay, hey, I just met you, by the way. If you were to die, get hit by a bus, whatever it may be. Where are you going to spend eternity? Just, you know, I barely know your first name.
But let's just go ahead and start at the basics, right? Let's figure out where it is. If you were to die tonight, where would you go? And I think that that message really does come at Easter.
It's important for us to consider that question. It's not a bad question, by the way. If any of us were to die tonight, where would we go? But there's a follow-up question this passage is going to answer for us as well.
If you are to live tomorrow, what should you do? It's one thing to say, if you were to die tonight, where would you go? But the question is, if you and I do get the opportunity to wake up tomorrow, so what? What then?
How should we live? What should we be a part of? What should we stop doing? What should we continue doing?
What does that look like? And so this is the question I want us to look at tonight. If we look at Romans chapter 6, look at verse number 1. What then should we say to these things?
Should we continue in sin so that grace may increase? Absolutely not. How can we who died to sin still live in it? Or are you unaware that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
Therefore, we were buried with him by baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in the newness of life. It's very interesting as the Apostle Paul is continuing to write this amazing theological work here in the book of Romans. He's worked through to see how only righteousness can come through Christ. And then it's so much a gift of grace and an unbelievable way for us to consider how amazing it truly is.
He gets to a chapter and wants to go ahead and answer a question just in case any of us rebellious folks are thinking, well, if God's grace is so big, does that mean I get a free pass? If God covers my sins, past, present, and future, when I receive the gospel, does that mean I can do whatever I want to do? And he answers the question very quickly when he says, what should we say these things? Should we continue in sin so that grace may increase?
He says, absolutely not. May it never be. In fact, that Greek phrase, actually, if it was translated outside the Bible, sometimes it's a little more emphatic, but I can't even read it in church. It is a very, very firm phrase.
Make an end point. Absolutely not. Are you kidding me? Why in the world would you continue to sin so that grace may increase?
Don't you understand what this costs? There is no way possible that in your conceivable mind that you would take the grace of Jesus Christ as a free pass to continue in sin. Never mistake God's forgiveness as permission to keep sinning. Never, ever mistake that somehow the forgiveness of God is a free pass for you to do whatever you want to do.
That's not exactly how this is supposed to be. I was on a mission trip when I was in high school, and I can remember being in a restaurant in Colorado. It was one of those restaurants that people would write on the wall, write their names, and say that they were here on certain dates and whatnot. And I'll never forget that someone had scribbled a poem.
They realized that we had such a prolific author in our midst somewhere in that restaurant. But they had written this down, and I'm not going to tell you what the first word is. I'm just going to say blank, okay? But this was the poem that they came up with.
Blank is evil. Blank is sin. God forgives. So let's begin.
This is the mentality. Yes, we know it's sin, but if God's grace is that big, then can't we just do whatever we want to do? I want to make sure you understand what the apostle Paul is saying. Never, ever mistake that God is able to forgive you all of your sins, as somehow it is a free pass to continue on in them.
The grace of Jesus is free, but it is not cheap. And we must understand the difference tonight, or else we're never going to really understand what he died to free us from. I don't know if you're one of those who loves to study what happens during the holy week. But if you follow from Sunday to Sunday, there were a lot of things that transpired in the life of Jesus.
He started out on Palm Sunday, the first time he'd come back into Jerusalem after Lazarus had been raised from the dead. And so to say that there was a lot of excitement when he came into the city was an understatement. As he came in on the back of a donkey, people began to lay their palm branches down on the ground and say, Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. And there was so much celebration about his arrival, and people were wondering, was this the one we've been waiting for?
And on Monday, Jesus decides to go into the temple, and with all the celebration and jubilation that surrounds his entrance there, he decides to make enemies very, very quickly, because he goes into the temple. And he sees how there are people who are making a profit in the name of God, and how they were excluding people of different ethnicities. And he began to do something that if it happened here, we would call our security team. He began to turn tables over and run people out of the place of worship.
Can you imagine the chaos that was in there? Jesus had had enough. And he drives the people out and says, my father's house is not a place where you profit. It's to be a house of prayer.
He comes back in on Tuesday, and all the chief priests and the scribes who are ready to confront him, he goes straight to them and confronts them, and tells them they have no authority over him. If Jesus is having a long-term strategy, he's running out of time. And he knows exactly what he's doing. That evening, they decide, enough is enough.
Let's put a plan together to kill him. On Wednesday, where would Jesus be? Not in the temple anymore. He goes into the house of a leper.
Now that says a whole lot, doesn't it? He goes into the house of a leper, and dines with people that are just your normal, everyday folks. And in that place, Mary breaks up her alabaster box, and the whole entire house is filled with the aroma of this expensive perfume that was supposed to be reserved for something significant in her life. And she goes, I know.
She puts it all out there. And in that moment, Judas just completely loses his mind, because look at this waste to be spent on Jesus. So he leaves that night and finds those chief priests and scribes and does the deal with them. On Thursday, he gathers his disciples together in a room, and they observe the Passover, where they remember how God had rescued his people, and he even takes the moment even further.
And he comes to the table, and he breaks the bread, and he passes the cup and says, something's about to happen in the next 24 hours, and I want you to pay attention. I know exactly what's going to happen, and I'm not running from this. After he washes their feet, he brought them to the Lord's table. They took the bread, and they took the cup.
And Judas leaves from this place to start everything in motion. Jesus goes out to the Garden of Gethsemane, and he begins to be so overwhelmed that he's experiencing something that medically people would later say is called hematidrosis. He was under such stress that his blood vessels were actually popping in his body, and it was actually pouring out blood from his sweat glands. As he said these words, Father, if there's another way, now would be the time to show it.
But not in my will, but what? Yours be done. Completely different from the first Adam, who said, God, not your will, but mine be done. Jesus tells his best friends who should have been awake with him praying, get up, nap time's over, my betrayer is at hand.
And here comes Judas. Greetings, Rabbi. The problem with Judas is that he kept Jesus at Rabbi's status and never Lord's status. And he kisses him on the cheek, and the mob just completely overwhelms Jesus.
Chaos ensues. Peter tries to take off someone's head, only gets an ear. Jesus picks up the ear, puts it back on, and said, If I wanted to get out of this, my Father would bring down legions of angels. I came for this moment.
They take him in. They have to lie to come up with a case about him, because no one can really find anything wrong that he's done. Except for, he claimed to be the Son of God. But his actions confirmed it.
And so they had witness after witness who tried to concoct this whole ordeal about him. And they finally said, complaining with two groups of enemies, the Roman government and the Jewish leaders, to get this man crucified. They beat him to the point where he's almost near death. Forty minus one lashes means I'll beat you to the point of death.
You're on the edge. And then they get him to take up his cross. Go all the way to a place called Golgotha, the place of the skull. And there he's crucified.
He's stripped of his clothes. He's barely hanging on because he's lost so much blood. And in the midst of this, in the midst of a sinner on one side of him on the cross, and another sinner on the other side of the cross, and leaders all around mocking him and saying, if you've got all these wonderful traits, just show us one more. Get off the cross, Jesus.
And this is what he says. Father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing right now. He continues.
They want to offer him some wine that actually has some kind of sedative to it so it can kind of remove some of the pain for him. And he spits it out. I don't want that. Later, they give him sour wine.
And he goes, give me that because he's so dehydrated at this point. He cannot get out what he needs to so that people on that field that day can hear this. So he says, I just need something to kind of get this a little bit stronger so I can say final words. It is finished.
And it said he gave up his spirit because nobody took it from him. He surrendered it. And when Jesus said it is finished, he was saying not only has he taken on God's full wrath for you and I, if you have trusted in Jesus Christ, but can I also tell you what he was saying? It is finished.
Our former way of living. It is dead. It is done. And why would we resurrect it?
This is what it says in verse 3 or verse 2. How can we who died to sin still live in it? It's finished. Don't bring it back up.
Verse 3. Or are you aware that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his what? To his death. So this is a picture.
That's what's happening here. Is that there is a spiritual baptism that takes place when you receive the gospel. To show what's already taken place on the inside. And it is this.
You once were dead, friend. You were spiritually dead. And you didn't need some type of small intervention. You needed a resurrection.
So this is what this spiritual and even physical baptism is supposed to symbolize. Baptism is your way of saying my old life is done. My new life has begun. When you go down into the water and you come back up again, it is a symbol of what's taking place on the inside.
I was spiritually dead. And you know what dead people do to save themselves? Nothing. They have to have someone with the power to resurrect them.
So this is a picture that we were once in our sin and we were dead in our trespasses. But thanks be to God who brought us back to life through Christ Jesus. He says we were baptized into Christ Jesus. We were baptized into his death.
So when he's on the cross, what is taking place is the life that he is offering us. He's given and saying the old way can be put to death. Simply as I can say this, friend, it's time for us to stop playing with dead stuff. It's time for us to stop playing around with things that would put Jesus on the cross or ruin our lives or make us spiritually dead.
It is time for us to stop trying to resurrect things that should have never come out of the tomb. I know that right now, every single one of us, I don't care how church you are, how polished you may be in this moment, every single one of us, we still have the sin that so easily entangles us. We have the things that trip us up. And you have been living in your life to sin.
But Jesus is saying it's time to put it to death. You may have been living in anger and resentment and wrath. It's time to put it to death. You may be living in flirtatious ways and seductive patterns and womanizing and whatever it is.
It's time to put it to death. You may have been using your speech to tear people down and to bully people and to manipulate and to get your way. It's time to put it to death. You may have been using your money for things that do not satisfy.
You may have been completely gambling on all kinds of aspects of life. It's time to put it to death. You may have been trying to focus on other people and not loving God and loving others. And I'm trying to tell you something, friend.
Jesus died not just to forgive your sins, but to get them removed from your life. You don't have to be entangled with him anymore. See, verse 4 says, I can remember a few years ago, a dear friend of mine was, I will just say, later in their life, before it was time for them to be baptized. And fear of always being in front of people and water was something that had kept this person from wanting to be baptized.
And I had taught them ceremonially off the ledge. And this is how I said it. I've never left anybody down there, okay? Never once.
I've never forgotten about them. I've never had anybody. I can't get back up again. I promise you, everything is going to be just okay.
And as all the fears were calm and we prayed about that it was time to take that step, I go down the hallway and Pastor David sees my dear friend. And I say, guess what? They're going to get baptized on Sunday. He goes, oh great, Pastor Travis is going to hold you down extra long, okay?
And we started again at place number one. This symbol, though, if you've never been able to be on the viewpoint of me where you were taking someone down, and you bring them back up and the water's parked over them, the Red Sea just pops into my mind. Do you know what I'm coming up? I have a water for a second chance.
It's coming out of my mind. The water's being moved back when there was nothing on this earth. We don't have an inhabitable place for us to live. It comes to my mind.
All the different oceans and seas and shipwrecks that should have happened and the stillness of the water comes to my mind. As I see someone who is ceremonially, now symbolically, is spiritually dead. But Jesus Christ has brought them back to life. This is what verse 4 tells us.
This truth is so amazing. We were buried with him by baptism to death in order that justice Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father. So we, too, may walk in the newness of life. Friend, if you're still living in what he died for, you've missed what he died to give.
If you're still today somehow living in what he died for, you've missed what he died to give. Tonight is not a night for you to feel good that your sins are forgiven and now you have a free pass to do whatever you want to do. Tonight is a night to celebrate that your sins are forgiven and there's a better path. He's died to free us from the patterns, addiction, of sin.
Will there be anybody in this room that will somehow get to a place where you are perfect without sin? No. Not in this life. Because as soon as you think you have, you've gotten prideful, you're lying, and you're just in sin all over again.
But I can promise you this. You can walk in the newness of life. So I'll ask you yet again. If you died tonight, where would you go?
And if you wake up tomorrow, what are you going to do? Because he has set us free from the old ways so that we can walk in the newness of life. Can we pray together?