Romans 6:19 I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh: for as ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness. 20 For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness. 21 What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death. 22 But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. 23 For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
The apostle Paul was writing under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost. He was not acting independently. The entire Bible is given by inspiration of God. In verse 19 Paul stated that he was coming to them after the manner of men. Paul was directed by God to come to them in this manner. The “infirmity of your flesh” is a reference to the weakness of the flesh. Those who are adults must admit to the fact that we can make plans, and we can make promises, but we also often fail to follow through with what we plan. I am not a supporter of New Years resolutions. I believe it is a foolish thing to get involved in. It is a well known fact that most people who make new years resolutions, give up on them within the first week. Our flesh is weak. The wise person admits to this fact. There are hardened people like our P.M. or Mr. Klaus Schwab, who are quite firm in their positions. They demonstrate the reality of a seared conscience. They have made decisions that are evil to the core. They do not care what others say or think. They are intent on pushing through their evil agenda. The antichrist will be the most ruthless and evil man this world will ever know. This is still an evidence of the infirmity of the flesh. Some people overreact to prove their point. They give themselves over to evil and they become something that even those closest to them never saw coming. They trample on anyone who stands in their way. A decent person cannot function that way. The apostle Paul was challenging those who are saved. He stated that they had yielded their members as servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity. He was directed by God to restate what he had already stated earlier. An example would be from Romans 3, where God describes the natural man. The description there is not uplifting. It is God’s assessment of the natural man. The natural man has nothing good in him. Thus in our text, Paul is talking of the man who is in the flesh (the natural man). The natural man yields his members as servants of uncleanness. The natural man is not capable of pleasing God. His every thought is a selfish and self-centred thought. Life is all about himself. Even when he is trying to help someone else, he does so to feel good about himself. In verse 19 Paul was directed by God to tell the readers to flip that right around and to yield their members servants to righteousness unto holiness. This is expected of those who are saved. Saved people cannot be servants to uncleanness. They cannot be all about iniquity. The word “now” makes that clear. It is still a choice that the saved person must make; however, they must make that choice. The saved person cannot continue on as he did before. In verse 20 we see that the lost person (the one who is the servant of sin), was free from righteousness. It is not that God would overlook their sinfulness. It is that they were not capable of doing anything righteous. God directed Isaiah to write this:
Isaiah 64:6 But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.
You notice there that it says “all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags”. There is nothing a lost person can do that is of any value to God. There is nothing a saved person can do in the flesh that is of any value to God. If I act according to “my righteousness” I have nothing. My fleshly standard of righteousness is far different than God’s holy standard of righteousness. The saved person must conform to God’s righteousness. This is not an impossible task. This is not something that will cripple the person. It is liberating to conform to God’s righteousness when a person is saved. It is liberating, because Christ is our righteousness. We are not struggling at something we can never achieve. We are now yielding ourselves to that which God has promised to provide for us. Before I was saved, my life was miserable. My father had a standard that I could not meet. Moreover, I did not want to meet it. I saw the other people my age in church and in school. I saw how they lived and I wanted that. The longer I stayed at home, the more miserable I became. Eventually, I convinced myself that the only solution was to leave home, and that is what I did. What I discovered when I did that, is that it did not liberate me at all. I thought I was my own boss now, but there were many restrictions put upon me. I needed to work to make money to buy food and clothing and pay rent, and gas for the car, etc. The “friends” that I had were into things I did not want to be a part of and so I did not fit in there either. God continued to work in my heart and He continued to show me that I was a fool for the direction I had chosen. A few months before I was saved, I went home and apologized to my father and mother, for my rebellion. That took some weight off my heart, but I was still a lost rebel. A few months later, I surrendered to God in repentance and trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation. Then I started to make some wiser decisions. As I have stated before, I was not growing as I should have been because the teaching that I was getting was far less than what it should have been. I know that ultimately I was accountable to God for my choices. As a human being, I was looking for guidance from someone. It took another 15 years from that time before I was introduced to some men who actually cared about the spiritual well-being of others. They took the Bible and they taught the Bible. To me, that was so refreshing. That was what my spirit was looking for. It was such a sigh of relief for me. Those who read these devotionals, know that I have no use for New Evangelicalism. That is what I was raised in and that is what I was “discipled” in after I was saved. The Holy Spirit indwelling me would not let me rest in the lies of that movement. He wanted me to yield my members as servants unto righteousness unto holiness. In verse 21 Paul asked the readers to look at their “accomplishments” while they were living in sin. What was the fruit of that life? The answer is, there was none. They were now ashamed of what they had produced. The end of being a servant of sin is death. That is the fact. That is what every lost person needs to be made aware of. They know that in their heart. That is why they fight so hard to get rid of the truth. Why is it that they have pushed public prayer out of the public square. There is no government meeting that is started with real prayer. Who would lead in that prayer. Those governing us are lost people. They would just be mocking God if they got up and invoked His name. They do not want a God-fearing preacher to come and read Scripture and open their meeting with prayer. That would not work as they deliberate on how to entertain the sodomites in their community, or how to make some evil movies more accessible to the people, or how to have a raffle to raise money for some worthless cause, etc. In verse 22 we see the words: “but now”. Things change when a person is saved. The person is made free from sin. Notice again here the word “made”. We do not earn the blessings of God’s salvation. He changes us in our hearts and the indwelling Holy Spirit in the true believer’s heart, changes the course of the person’s life. The saved person cannot continue on the path he was on before. In salvation we have become servants to God. Now we produce fruit unto holiness and the end is everlasting life. Now we want to have a God-honouring Bible study and we want to encourage others to godliness as we read in Hebrews 10:24-25. We want to be in a good church where we can learn the truth and where we can serve the true God. We look for opportunities to witness to others and tell them the good news that we have been taught. Things change drastically for the saved person. In verse 23 we are again reminded that the wages of sin is death. Nothing good comes from sin. The sinner works so hard, but for what? He is dead and he will die physically and face an eternity in the lake of fire. “But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Again we are reminded that the saved person has no bragging rights. He did not save himself. He did nothing to earn salvation. He received a gift. He received eternal LIFE. This life is through Jesus Christ our Lord. Notice again that Jesus Christ is the Lord of the saved person. He is the master. Not just in lip service, but in actual fact. God changes the heart of the saved person. It is not a natural process of humanity. As people get older they mellow out. That wild young person might become a respectable business man. However, without Christ he is still lost and still headed for the lake of fire. When a person is saved, they are changed from the heart outward. Now there are changes that only God can produce. Now there is a different motivation to life. It is about glorifying God. That respectable lost business man may give large amounts of money to charities. He may even help with work in the church. He might give large amounts in the offering. But his motivation is for self-gratitude. The saved person might be materially rich, or he might be a person of meagre means. It is not important how much we have. It is important why we live. The saved person lives for God’s glory. He is motivated to do that because he has been given eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Hallelujah what a Saviour!! Pastor Bartel
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