Are You Living the Crucified Life? (Part Two)

From the desk of Dr. Robert L. Taylor, Th.D., Bible teacher & expositor. We read, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:1-4). In our passage, Paul expands powerfully on this great truth of living the crucified life! The crucified life means that we walk in newness of life. The crucified life is one of being dead to sin. I remember reading and laughing at a cartoon that I saw many years ago where two women are talking and one woman says, “Well, I haven’t actually died to sin, but I did feel kind of faint once!” I believe that cartoon captures how many believers feel about Romans 6:2, where Paul says that we “died to sin.” Being honest, we’d have to admit, “I don’t feel very dead to sin! Maybe there have been a few times when I’ve felt kind of faint towards it. But, dead? No way!” So when we come to Romans 6, where Paul doesn’t just say once (in 6:2) that we died to sin, but in some fashion he says it in 6:3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11, and 13. That’s because Paul wants us to understand and embrace it! Apparently it is vital when it comes to living a godly (crucified) life. Be encouraged!