Romans 6:15-23
English Standard Version
Slaves to Righteousness
15 What then? (A)Are we to sin (B)because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! 16 Do you not know that if you present yourselves (C)to anyone as obedient slaves,[a] you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But (D)thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the (E)standard of teaching to which you were committed, 18 and, (F)having been set free from sin, (G)have become slaves of righteousness. 19 (H)I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For (I)just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members (J)as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.
20 (K)For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. 21 (L)But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things (M)of which you are now ashamed? (N)For the end of those things is death. 22 But now that you (O)have been set free from sin and (P)have become slaves of God, (Q)the fruit you get leads to sanctification and (R)its end, eternal life. 23 (S)For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Read full chapterFootnotes
- Romans 6:16 For the contextual rendering of the Greek word doulos, see Preface; twice in this verse; also verses 17, 19 (twice), 20
Romans 6:15-23
The Message
What Is True Freedom?
15-18 So, since we’re out from under the old tyranny, does that mean we can live any old way we want? Since we’re free in the freedom of God, can we do anything that comes to mind? Hardly. You know well enough from your own experience that there are some acts of so-called freedom that destroy freedom. Offer yourselves to sin, for instance, and it’s your last free act. But offer yourselves to the ways of God and the freedom never quits. All your lives you’ve let sin tell you what to do. But thank God you’ve started listening to a new master, one whose commands set you free to live openly in his freedom!
19 I’m using this freedom language because it’s easy to picture. You can readily recall, can’t you, how at one time the more you did just what you felt like doing—not caring about others, not caring about God—the worse your life became and the less freedom you had? And how much different is it now as you live in God’s freedom, your lives healed and expansive in holiness?
20-21 As long as you did what you felt like doing, ignoring God, you didn’t have to bother with right thinking or right living, or right anything for that matter. But do you call that a free life? What did you get out of it? Nothing you’re proud of now. Where did it get you? A dead end.
22-23 But now that you’ve found you don’t have to listen to sin tell you what to do, and have discovered the delight of listening to God telling you, what a surprise! A whole, healed, put-together life right now, with more and more of life on the way! Work hard for sin your whole life and your pension is death. But God’s gift is real life, eternal life, delivered by Jesus, our Master.
Read full chapterThe Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.
Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson