Romans 6:5-10 - Baptism - We’ve been resurrected with Christ – traditional baptism clothes, funeral clothes

When you’re cold and wet and muddy, nothing feels better than to get warm and clean and dry. It’s been that kind of week this week. The kids are outside, having fun, playing in the snow and water and mud. It’s great while it lasts, but after a while, the water has soaked through the snow pants and the gloves are dripping and the noses are dripping and it’s time to come in.

And they walk through the door and strip down. There’s a towel to dry them off. They put on some nice dry sweats with some warm socks. And the cold wet yuch feeling starts to go away. When they get the old clothes off and they put the new clothes on.

This is a taste, just a taste of being united with Jesus in His death and being united with Him in His resurrection. We’ve been out playing in the world for too long. We’ve had our fun but now we’re starting to feel the effects. The fun isn’t as fun anymore. The cold of the world is starting to sink into our hearts and we’re becoming hard and cynical and jaded. We don’t trust as much. We’re more self-sufficient because we are the only people we can really trust. Everybody else lets us down. We’re tired of the world. It hurts more than it used to.

It’s time to come in. It’s time to get warm. It’s time to get cleaned up. It’s time to leave the world. And we remember how we leave the world, right? We die. That’s the only way to leave. We die to the world, we die to our sin, through baptism, through faith, says verse 4. When we were baptized, through faith, we stopped being part of the world. Of course, we continued to go back. We kept dabbling. We had our fun.

Now, once again, it’s time to leave. We go back to our baptisms, we turn over our lives, we quit trying so hard, because we’re never going to do this ourselves. We turn ourselves completely over to God. We are as helpless as our little baby at the font.

When we’ve become that helpless, when we’ve grown that aware of our failure, then we’re getting to where we need to be. We’re withdrawing from the world. We’re dying to ourselves and to everything else. And when we’re dead, then we’re ready to live. Verse 5:

Think a moment about how dead Jesus was. He was not breathing. He was not moving. His chest did not lift. His body hung limp. His brain was not functioning. His heart was not beating. He was completely dead.

Through faith, in baptism, our connection to this world, the influence of this world is that dead. We are united with Him in His death. Temptation has no influence. Nothing can touch us anymore. Nothing can effect us. We’ve died.

And that’s when life begins. If we’ve been united with Him in His death, I love how Paul writes this:

For the world, it goes like this. First you live, then you die. Everyone knows this. Except Christians. For us, because Jesus died, because He rose again, first we die, and then we live.

And oh, how we live. Verse 6:

We are no longer slaves to sin, in the same way Jesus is no longer a slave to sin. How much is Jesus controlled by sin, do you think? Right. Not at all. Sin has no effect on Him. Sure, He’s sad at the effects of sin on His world. He grieves at the pain that comes from the wounds of sin. But Jesus Himself is not hurt. Jesus is not tempted.

And neither are we. Don’t think too small about sin. When Paul says that we are no longer slaves to sin, he means that we are free on so many levels. On the first level, we don’t have to sin anymore. I know that a lot of people think that God tells you you can’t sin anymore. Don’t sin anymore. The true gospel of Christ says that you don’t HAVE to sin anymore. You’re free to be healthy. You don’t have to treat your body poorly anymore. You’re free to be satisfied with what God has given to you. You don’t have to scrounge around in greed, coveting what everyone else has. You get to be in loving, respecting relationship with your family and friends. You don’t have to hold a grudge anymore. It can be gone. You’re free from the slavery of sin.

And that’s just one level. On another level, you’re free from the effects of sin from others, just like Jesus is. This is going to sound impossible, but all we need to do is look at martyrs to see how this can be. From Polycarp to John Hus to Rachel Scott in the Columbine High School in 1999, we see people confront the most violent sin and come through in a powerful, holy way. Sin couldn’t drag them down. It had no effect on them. They were free from the slavery of sin, because, verse 7:

We don’t have to respond to sin with sin. We don’t have to fight fire with fire. When someone hurts us with words, with actions, this is how we are actually able to turn the other cheek. This is how we are able to forgive. This is how we move on with our lives, even when the other person is still acting stinky.

This is how we leave behind the evil done to us in our past. When mothers and fathers acted in ungodly ways, we are freed from the slavery of sin by being united with Jesus in His death. When memories of the actions of other people are so strong, so real, so now, we go back to our burial with Jesus, through baptism in faith, and we find that we’ve already died. And then we live. We live without the burden of those memories. We might still remember them, but they won’t pull us down. We’re free from the slavery of sin.

And then, we are freed from the slavery of sin on the eternal level. Verse 8:

Again, if we were buried with Christ, if we joined Him in His death, if we left our old life in the ground…if our own personal dreams have died, our own expectations for our life, our own capabilities…if all of that is dead, then we will live. We will live forever. We live the same life Jesus does. Is it conceivable that Jesus could ever die again? Is that even a thought in our minds? Then just as certainly, we will not, we can not die. Verse 9:

We already died. You can’t die twice. People have near death experiences. Their hearts may stop for a moment. But they have not completely died.

Our death was complete. We were buried, remember? We don’t have to do it all over again. We cannot die. Sometimes I wonder if we know what we are saying. We will use the words, "I have eternal life", right? That sounds normal. But then we act like we’re still going to die. How can you have eternal life and still die? That doesn’t make sense.

So as we get older, as believers we are not coming closer to the end of our lives. Our lives can’t end. We can’t die, anymore than Jesus can die. We are coming closer to seeing our Lord. We’re coming closer to being freed from a world that is drenched in sin. We’re coming closer to the full experience of eternal life, seeing Jesus face to face. And we can not die.

And when we go in to talk with the doctor and look at the results, its not a matter of life and death. It’s a matter of life and more life. I’m not saying you won’t feel scared, but knowing you’re invincible, you can’t die, that will give you strength to face your future. You’re future is life, just like Jesus.

You won’t hear this from anyone else, other than scripture. Only God is going to tell you the truth. Everyone else is going to say that you will die, that every one dies. No one else will tell you about the new life you’ve been given, the life of Christ. That’s because those who don’t know Jesus don’t know this life. They don’t know any different, so they’re idea of truth will be different from yours.

Don’t listen to them. They don’t know what they’re talking about. With all the death in movies and tv shows, on the news, it’s tough to remember that you’re immortal. What a sad way to go through life, being immortal but thinking that you can still die. Next week, we’re going to see what we can do with this immortal, eternal life that we’ve been given. We’ll see the possibilities. We’ll live incredible, secure, obedient lives of service and wonder.

But only if we remember. We’re not going to just remember. There are too many voices telling us untruths. There’s too many distractions. And when we get distracted, when we start listening to those voices, we’re going to sink back into the despair, back into temptation and sin, back into that old life. We will become affected by the sin of others, and get dragged down with it. We will like sin a little too much, and we’ll spend our time flirting with it. The past sins, our own past sins, the past sins of others, will rule our lives and we’ll spend all our time thinking about that nastiness.

So, when your life doesn’t seem like the kind of life Jesus would live, when it’s less than what it could be, when you’re feeling tired and beat up, when life seems pointless or confused, when you want more, go back. There’s no way to remember the life we’ve been given unless we remember the death we’ve experienced.

It’s tempting to jump over the death, to have the best of both worlds. It’s just not possible. We can’t hold on to our lives and want what we want, have our own dreams and expectations, have our own demands for our future, and then enjoy the kind of life that Jesus offers. We either die to live, or we live to die.

So in order to get back to the life we want, the eternal life, we need to get back to the death we’ve died. Go back, and remember that you were united with Him in His death. When fears start to build up in your gut and it feels like you’re going to drown, remember, you died already. Those fears can’t do anything. Does Jesus ever get afraid? Then you don’t need to either. You are joined with His life like you were joined with His death.

When the memories crowd back into your minds, the memories of the things you’ve done, the memories of the things others have done, go back to your death with Christ. You are free from those memories, as free as Jesus is. They don’t have to control your life anymore.

When you’re finding yourself trapped by sin, and the same sin just keeps repeating, go back to your death. Jesus is free from sin, that goes without saying. But we need to say it for ourselves. We are free. He freed us. We are free. He makes sure of it.

If you can’t remember, if it doesn’t seem like you have this kind of life, go back. Look at your baptism. It’s there to remind you, it’s there to convince you that you’ve died. Remember the actual date, what day, what month were you baptized. Your death with Christ will be more real and your life with Him will be more real as well. When you see the font up here it’s a reminder of your death, and your new life. If you need to, touch the water again. Feel it’s wetness, and know that you’ve already died. Get away from the world for a while, shut everything down and spend some time with Jesus. Remember, you were buried with Him. Remember, you were raised with Him. Verse 10:

That’s your life, too. Live the life of Jesus. Life to God. Live.