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In Romans 4-5, Paul continues defending his claim in 3:23-24 that: “All have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God, and are justified by His grace as a gift…”. Chapter 6 addresses the response from the religious mind. We’ll consider both the response and the reason for the response. The religious mind rejects Paul’s Gospel claim that people outside one’s religion can have an equal standing with God.

It’s still happening.

It sounds like this: “That’s impossible. Just look around. Some people are horrible murders, atheists, vile sinners. Are you saying God accepts all of them, despite their immorality, in the same way I’m accepted with all my devotion and effort? That makes God unjust. Why don’t we all just party it up and do as we please?”

The idea of “cheap grace” comes from the religious mind’s conclusion that God is unjust if everyone is equal. (Matthew 20:12)

This is precisely the pushback Paul faced:“What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound?” (Romans 6:1) Paul includes this feedback to show that he recognizes the deeper issue behind the objection. As we read his letter, we too will lose our bearings without the Paul’s Christology, which as I’ve shown functions like a dimmer switch. When we say: “Why even try?” or “What’s the point?” we know we have reached the limit of our framework (think Truman Show).

The deeper issue is not justice, but the basis for justice. This is why Paul’s theme has been “Krino–judgement” and “dikaiosune–righteousness/justification“

Religion sees justice as retributive, i.e. “If I do _____ for God, then God will do_____ for me. This framework provides fair or just transactions. Scholars who teach retributive justice, go down elaborate, litigious rabbit trails, turning Paul’s Christology upside-down into a systemic, transactional doctrine of substitutionary atonement, which is appropriated by faith and the work of mortification and sanctification if a person is to receive salvation. While this “Reformation Viagra” holds water textually, it’s predicated on retributive justice.

There’s just one problem…Paul’s Gospel and Christology is built upon Restorative Justice.

JUSTICE IS THE WATERSHED!!!!!

Retribution leads to religion, binary frameworks, and transaction.

Restoration leads to faith, ternary frameworks, and transformation.

Restorative justice is the Gospel’s alternative justice, and once we see it as the Gospel, then the Bible is rediscovered, and the salvation story is reconstructed accordingly. Restoration is the new wine skin Jesus said we’d require in order to live in Christ free from religion (Mark 2:18-22, Matthew 9:14-17, Luke 5:33-39). Like Paul’s audience in Rome, and Jesus’ audience in Israel, we can pick either one, but both are admonishing us toward restoration or endure the retribution of religion, as Jesus point out:

“And no one after drinking old wine desires new, for he says, ‘The old is good.’” (Luke 5:39)

While it appears the outcome of justification is the same, Paul gives a clinic on sin and why we can’t just capitulate to our appetites.

“By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?” (v.2-3)

Some scholars believe that the use of the word (baptizow) is referring specifically to the ritual of baptism. While that is a possibility, I think contextually Paul is referring to the word being defined as “cleansed” or “purified” since he has spent the last two chapters defending justification. Ceremonial washing was vital to the Hebrews. Since Paul is saying all people have been justified, I think it’s reasonable to conclude he is universally explaining how all have been “cleansed” in Christ (v.3). The real question is how did we die to sin? The answer is his explanation in verses 3-11.

“We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Now 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. For 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.” (v.3-11)

Remember in chapter 4 when Paul used the term (logizomai–to count, hold a view, consider) 9 times? I said whether we define it as “counted” or “consider” we have to keep that definition. Well, here we see the interpreters switch (v.11) for convenience. Logizomai (counted) in chapter 4 supported a judicial, legal, penal explanation (thanks ESV), but here, it reflects Paul’s true intent, namely that of “consideration.”

For Paul, the way this works is to hold a view…maintain a perspective…consider things a certain way. This means his explanation of baptism, dying to sin, and newness of life, is a “consideration” based upon the Grace of God, through Christ, and NOT an earned result of pious action or religious observance. Remember, Paul was a virtual Christ follower coming out of religion. So all of this is a mindset which serves as a ballast against the shadow of condemnation which came through religion (law), and his own sinful failures. If we miss this, we will never understand chapter seven.

Consider our metaphor of the Governor and the Amazon gifts from two weeks ago Rome 11. Those who never explored gracious gifts (charisma) given to everyone, held a view (logizomai) or considered the Governor to be unjust and punitive, while those who “got all in” or were “purified” (baptizow) into the gifts, held a view (logizomai) or considered the Governor as generous, loving, and beneficent to everyone.

Awareness sets the course, not compliance. (we’ll come back to this later)

Paul is revealing that the operational headquarters for Faith in the Gospel is found within a persons mind and inner self (6:6-“old man”), and not evidenced by a person’s behavior or religious transaction. Faith in Christ is an internal framework, religion is external framework. Think about it, this would be a huge discovery in Paul’s own life. He couldn’t be driving people unto the Christian religion because it didn’t exist yet. His goal is faith (holding a view/considering) that we are already made alive in Christ, thus salvation is NOT when we are made alive in Christ, for all are justified, salvation is when we realize it has happened for us.

“So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.“

For some, this is too big of a step. How do we go from considering ourselves dead to sin, to actually putting our sins to death?

By missing the Gospel of restorative justice, evangelicalism makes claims such as: “Born again people no longer sin.“, or “God no longer sees our sin.” However, Paul dismantles such claims. Paul’s grasp of sin goes beyond immoral behavior (Like Jesus) by proving sin is first and foremost a malware script within the mind. Sin is not merely the result of breaking God’s moral law (transgressor), but the net result of one’s (logizomai) from not believing we are Good with God (justified). In chapter 14 Paul will show that sin = non-faith . Think about it, if you’ve journeyed in the faith, were your greatest sins before trusting Christ or after? If we say before, then our faith is immature and lacks self-awareness. If we say after, then how do we escape retribution and apostasy?

Restoration solves this.

“Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.“ (v.12-14)

Under retribution, every sinful deed becomes a testimony against us, proving Jesus didn’t really remove our sin, leaving only a hope that God won’t hold it against us, but why should He? That is essentially the faith of an unbeliever, or non-faith. How can religion escape the sin of not loving their enemy?

Paul’s reasoning and life hack frees us from this binary quagmire of shampoo religion (sin, wash, repeat). Awareness via contemplation (considering/setting the mind) recognizes the universality of sin, thus all of us will die for our sins. Faith is not belief and obedience (Satan does that), faith is the graced awareness that all of us are enemies of God and children of God at the same time. As Tim Keller use to say; we are far worse than we can imagine, and far more loved than we have considered.

This consideration that we are both enemies and children, in the same way Christ was human and divine, allows the love and mercy of God to flow through us and out to everyone else because it destroys the walls of hostility (Ephesians 2:15-17).

For Paul’s Gospel, we are not free to sin, nor free from sin, but free in order to see sin at its headwaters in our considerations, where we can do something about it. Salvation is not conversion to religion, it is the moment we recognize ourselves in the worst sinner imaginable while also discovering ourselves in Christ.

When this awareness causes love to displaces our sense of otherness, we can be sure we have finally heard the Gospel.