The Master‘s Class, LifeChange Church Wichita

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT SIN? (Romans 6:6-10)

What value is a promise made to you if you do not believe it and appropriate it in your life?

God has said in His Word that believers have victory over sin and death.  This is God’s promise.  But what good is that promise if we do not believe it and appropriate it in our lives?

The problem is that many of us do not feel like we have died to sin.  Sin is still a problem in our lives.  We are still allowing sin to dominate our lives.  We feel like we are alive to sin.

How we feel is important to us, for it can make a real difference in our performance.  For example, God has given me the task of speaking in front of various groups of people, on both secular and Biblical issues.  When I feel confident about the subject I am going to be speaking about, I perform better, I am more relaxed, I am not worried about making a fool out of myself.  My voice projects, it is stronger, and my whole attitude is one of confidence in what I am speaking about.  In other words, I am victorious in performing the tasks that God has given me.  

However, if I were to get up and speak on something that I know nothing about, and that I have had no time to prepare my thoughts, then I would feel nervous, my words would be halting, and the word “UH” would be repeated over and over.  When I feel less confident, then I am likely to fail in the tasks that God has given me.  My feelings impact how I conduct myself.  

Now somebody might say, Well the Bible says that if God asks you to do something, He will empower you to do it. 

And I would say precisely.  I am allowing my feelings to impact my performance in my obedience to God.  God tells me in His Word that He will provide, but when I allow my feelings to guide me, I am saying that I don’t believe God.  

The same thing applies to how we deal with sin.  If we are confident in our knowledge of the Word of God, then we are victorious in dealing with sin.  Paul has said that we are dead to sin, and that we are to be totally unresponsive to it, but how can we do that?

By putting our feelings aside, and believing what God tells us and applying it in our lives.  This is what our lesson is about today.  Knowing that not only have we died to sin, but that we have also been raised to walk in the newness of life, victorious over sin and death.

HOW CAN YOU DEFEAT SIN? (Romans 6:1-5)

As a believer, would you say that you are in a constant battle with sin in your life?  

Every Christian should answer yes to this question, for Satan has never given up on destroying you, especially once you became a Christian.  But the wonderful good news that God has for us is that each believer has the power of the Holy Spirit of God to defeat sin in their life.  They can be victorious against sin.  

The process of sanctification is the ability of God to make sinners, whom He has declared righteous, actually righteous.  Paul will tell us that the justified sinner cannot continue in sin because he died and rose again in Christ.  This does not mean the believer will not sin, but it does mean that they will not continue live in sin.

To continue in sin leads to slavery.  Believers have been freed from the slavery of sin.  There is no reason for them to go back to it.  The believer has a new nature now, and he is to obey God.  

Union with Christ in His death and resurrection means that He is now our Lord and our Master.  He gives us freedom, but that freedom is not a license to live in sin.

Today, we are going to begin a series of lessons that talk about the power that we have, as Christians, to be freed from slavery.  The slavery that a lost person has to Satan and sin.  We are going to see how the power of God frees a believer from the dominance of sin in their lives and empowers them to live a victorious Christian life.