Book of Common Prayer

Leaving the state of sin through baptism

6 What are we to say, then? Shall we continue in the state of sin, so that grace may increase? ² Certainly not! We died to sin; how can we still live in it? ³ Don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into the Messiah, Jesus, were baptized into his death? ⁴ That means that we were buried with him, through baptism, into death, so that, just as the Messiah was raised from the dead through the father’s glory, we too might behave with a new quality of life. ⁵ For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall also be in the likeness of his resurrection.

Dead to sin, alive to God

⁶ This is what we know: our old humanity was crucified with the Messiah, so that the bodily solidarity of sin might be abolished, and that we should no longer be enslaved to sin. ⁷ A person who has died, you see, has been declared free from all charges of sin.

⁸ But if we died with the Messiah, we believe that we shall live with him. ⁹ We know that the Messiah, having been raised from the dead, will never die again. Death no longer has any authority over him. ¹⁰ The death he died, you see, he died to sin, once and only once. But the life he lives, he lives to God. ¹¹ In the same way you, too, must calculate yourselves as being dead to sin, and alive to God in the Messiah, Jesus.

³³ “We are Abraham’s descendants!” they replied. “We’ve never been anyone’s slaves! How can you say that ‘you’ll become free’?”

³⁴ “I’m telling you the solemn truth,” Jesus replied. “Everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin. ³⁵ The slave doesn’t live in the house forever; the son lives there forever. ³⁶ So, you see, if the son makes you free, you will be truly free.”

Children of Abraham—or of the devil

³⁷ “I know you’re Abraham’s descendants,” Jesus went on. “But you’re trying to kill me, because my word doesn’t find a place among you. ³⁸ I am speaking of what I have seen with the father; and you, too, are doing what you heard from your father.”

³⁹ “Abraham is our father!” they replied.

“If you really were Abraham’s children,” replied Jesus, “you would do what Abraham did! ⁴⁰ But now you’re trying to kill me—me, a man who has told you the truth which I heard from God! That’s not what Abraham did. ⁴¹ You’re doing the works of your father.”

“There wasn’t anything immoral about the way we were born!” they replied. “We’ve got one father, and that’s God!”

⁴² “If God really was your father,” replied Jesus, “you would love me, because I came from God, and here I am. I didn’t come on my own initiative, you see, but he sent me. ⁴³ Why don’t you understand what I’m saying? It can only be because you can’t hear my word. ⁴⁴ You are from your father—the devil! And you’re eager to get on with what he wants. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he’s never remained in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells lies, he speaks what comes naturally to him, because he is a liar—in fact, he’s the father of lies! ⁴⁵ But because I speak the truth, you don’t believe me. ⁴⁶ Which of you can bring a charge of sin against me? If I speak the truth, why don’t you believe me? ⁴⁷ The one who is from God speaks God’s words. That’s why you don’t listen, because you’re not from God.”