Death to Sin and Life in Christ

¹What should we say then? Should we continue in sin, so that grace may abound?

²Absolutely not! How can we who died to sin, still live in it?

³Or don’t y’all know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?

⁴Therefore, we were buried with him through baptism into death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

⁵For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we will certainly also be in the likeness of his resurrection.

⁶We know that our old humanity was crucified with him, so that the body of sin was rendered inactive, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin.

⁷For someone who has died has been freed from sin.

⁸But if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live together with him,

⁹knowing that Christ, being raised from the dead, will not die again. Death no longer lords over him!

¹⁰For the death that he died, he died to sin once for all—but the life that he lives, he lives to God.

¹¹So y’all must consider yourselves* to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

¹²Therefore y’all must not allow sin reign in your* mortal body which leads to obeying its desires.

¹³And y’all must not present any part of y’all’s body to sin as tools of unrighteousness, but present yourselves* to God as alive from the dead, and y’all’s body parts as tools of righteousness to God.

¹⁴For sin will not lord over y’all, because y’all are not under law, but under grace.

Slaves to Righteousness

¹⁵What then? Should we sin because we are not under law but under grace? Absolutely not!

¹⁶Don’t y’all know that when you* present yourselves* as slaves and obey someone, y’all are the slaves of the one whom you* obey, whether of sin that leads to death, or of obedience that leads to righteousness?

¹⁷But thanks be to God that though y’all were slaves of sin, you* obeyed from the heart the pattern of teaching to which y’all were committed.

¹⁸Having been freed from sin, y’all became enslaved to righteousness.

¹⁹I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your* flesh. For just as y’all used to present your* body parts as slaves to impurity and to wickedness upon wickedness, now y’all should present your* body parts as slaves to righteousness for sanctification.

²⁰For when y’all were slaves of sin, y’all were free regarding righteousness.

²¹So at that time, what benefit did y’all gain from the things that you* are now ashamed of? Because the outcome of those things is death.

²²But now, having been liberated from sin and enslaved to God, y’all have the fruit of sanctification and the outcome of eternal life.

²³For the payment for sin is death, but the gracious gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.