Status Quo
If you are given a second chance, do you accept it and change?
What then are we to say? Should we continue in sin in order that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin go on living in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. For whoever has died is freed from sin. But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. The death he died, he died to sin, once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. - Romans 6:1-11
In today's reading, Paul warns the followers not to depend on grace.
God will grant us grace through Christ who died for our sins, but maybe we shouldn't choose to do wrong just to receive that grace.
Maybe, we should live a good life and learn from our mistakes rather than choose to repeat them.
The active part of the transaction here is our decision to turn away from sin and return to Christ. If we do that in name only, planning on sinning again, we are not sincere and we are undeserving.
Now, here is the catch. We don't need to do anything to deserve God's grace. In fact, it is something we cannot earn. It is freely given. We just have to receive it.
But like the beggar who keeps returning to the generous man for another handout, there is no movement, no improvement in the situation. Until we choose to do better, to be better, we are just maintaining the status quo.
What Christ wants from us is engagement.
We need to want it, not just the grace for sinning, but the life of grace.
Until we step up and choose to change, God will help us maintain our cycle of grace, but once we do step up, and no longer act like the lost sheep, then we will truly be saved.
More to come...