Daily Devotions
Take Off the Chains!
Reading for November 25th: Romans 4-7
So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus
Romans 6:11
This is the first command in the Roman letter. Paul writes over five chapters, 148 verses, describing the great salvation we have by grace through faith, and the first exhortation given is for us to consider ourselves dead to sin.
What does this mean?
We must give up the slave mentality. We were slaves to sin. We were bound and could not break free. Righteousness was not an option. We had no choice but to be sinners.
But now that we've been set free, we can have a hard time accepting our new found freedom. We're like a young lion cub who has been trained by his master to submit since the day of his birth. He eventually grows up into a powerful beast that could with one bite snap his trainer's throat, but he still sees himself as that little cub who must do his master's bidding.
We're like Otis from the Andy Griffith Show. We go out and get drunk (or whatever our favorite, habitual sin might be) and then voluntarily lock ourselves up in prison. The key is in the door. We're free to leave at any time. But we remain a slave, locked away in the prison of our own choosing.
The first recorded command of Romans is one of the most powerful commands in the whole book. Listen to what Paul is telling you. I can hear him shouting at us:
"The key is right there in your hand. Unlock the door. Take off the chains."
Leave the prison of sin to live as the ransomed soul that you truly are already in Christ, free from sin.
Father, help us to live as free men. Give us faith and confidence in your grace to loosen the old bonds of sin and live in the glorious liberty you have granted to us through your Son's death on the cross.
