The life and work of St. Paul

480 THE LIFE AND WORK OF ST. PAUL.
The life of the Christian being hid with Christ in God, his death with Christ is
a death to sin, his resurrection with Christ is a resurrection to life. The dipping
under the waters of baptism is his union with Christ's death ; his rising out of the
waters of baptism is a resurrection with Christ, and the birth to a new "
life. What
baptism is for the individual," it has been said, " Christ's death is for the race." If
the Christian has become coalescent with Christ in His death, he shall also in His
resurrection. 1 The old sin-enslaved humanity is crucified with Christ, and the new
man has been justified from sin, because he is dead to it, and lives in Christ. This
is the ideal. Live up to it. Dethrone the sin that would rule over your frail
"
nature. Be not ever presenting your members as weapons of unrighteousness,
2
but present yourselves once for all, to God as alive from the dead, and your
members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not lord it over
you ; for ye are not under the s
Law, but under grace." Die to sin, die to
lust, die to your old vulgar, enslaved, corrupted self, die to the impulses
of animal passion, and the self-assertion of worldly desire for Christ too ; died,
and you are one with him in death, that you may be one in life. But
these words, again, raise the ghost of the old "
objection. Shall we then sin,
since we are not under the Law, but under grace ?" and this objection St. Paul
again refutes by the same argument, clothed in a more obvious and less mystic
illustration, in which he amplifies the proverb of Jesus, ' ' Ye cannot serve two
masters." A man must either be a slave of sin unto death, or of obedience unto
righteousness. 4 Thank God, from that old past slavery of sin you were freed, when
you submitted to the form of doctrine to which you were handed over by God's
use an
providence; and then if in condescension' to your human weakness I may
imperfect expression you were enslaved to righteousness. 5 The fruit of that
former slavery was shame and misery its end was death. This new enslavement
;
to God is perfect freedom "
its ; fruit is sanctification, its end eternal life. For the
wages of sin is death but ; the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesua our
Lord."
iv. At this point of his argument the Apostle felt it imperative to de-
fine more clearly, and establish more decisively, his view as to the position of
the Law in the scheme of salvation. Apart from his discussion of this question
in the Epistle to the Galatians, he has already, in this Epistle, made three incidental
remarks on the subject, which might well horrify those Jews and
Jewish Christians who were unfamiliar with his views. He has said
1. That " by the works of the Law shall no flesh be justified
for by the Law is the full knowledge of sin " (iii. 20).
before God :
2. That "the Law came in as an addition that transgression might
abound "(v. 20).
3. That the Christian " is not under the Law, but under grace," and that
therefore sin is not to lord it over him (vi. 14).
1 vL 5, .
3 vi. 13, irapio-Tai/ere . . . mzpaanjouTe. In the New Testament oTrXa is always " weapons. "
Cf. Rom. xiii. 12 ; 2 Cor. vi. 7.
3
vi. 115.
4
vi. 16. The phrase " a slave of obedience " is strange. Perhaps he used uircucoijt
instead of ^uauwravip, because of the two senses of the word, "righteousness" and "justification."
5
vi. 18, 'ESovAwfrp-e. "Deo servire vera libertas est" (Aug.). "Whose service is
perfect freedom." '
\vdp Calvin, following Origen and Chrysostom, renders
"
this I
clause^ require nothing which your fleshly weakness could not do,"