The question is not whether the bible teaches sanctification, or if Paul teaches it or if the book of Romans teaches it. The question that I want to deal with is whether or not Romans chapter 6 teaches it.

The term sanctification is used in at least two different ways in the New Testament. In the first case it speaks about a new status. The saints, that is the holy ones, are the separated ones who have faith in Christ and are the recipients of the merits of Christ’s once and for all time sacrifice. Heb. 10 v10; 1 Cor. 1 v2, 30. It is clear from 1 Cor. 1 v2 and 3 v1-3 that God is willing and able to call those who have called upon His name holy, saints and considers them to have been sanctified. It is obvious from the context and from the verses just quoted that this sanctification speaks to status and not to any ethical or moral qualities.

The New Testament also uses the term sanctification in regards to an ongoing process that takes place in the believer for their entire lives. 1 Thess. 4 v3; Heb. 10 v14; 12 v14. Some make the mistake of making this process meritorious. Some would meld it with justification and call it "righteousness" which is another error. Some would exchange this process for glorification. They would see some end time super sanctification that requires only a change of body at the coming of our Lord and not a change and complete elimination of the old man at that time. But why would we need to take up our cross daily or to die daily if this process was completed during this life time? To be crucified means to be declared legally dead while simultaneously being alive while impaled to the cross.

Does Paul use the word "sanctification" in Rom. 6? Yes, in v19 & v22. In which sense does he use it? The crux of my argument is this: In Rom. 6 Paul is speaking of status and not of the process.

A pattern that we see in Paul’s writings is what I call the gospel order. First Paul talks about our great problem and our great need. Then he systematically interprets and explains the necessity and achievement of the cross. In the book of Romans Paul then moves into describing our buy in and our appropriate response in terms of receiving and appropriating what Christ has done for us. Only then does Paul admonish us to live up to what God declares us to be. Only then does Paul move into a systematic presentation of the practicalities of living the Christian life and walking the Christian walk. The hinge in the book of Romans is in chapter 12 v1. The last 11 verses of chapter 11 are Paul’s summation of all that has preceded. The "therefore" in 12 v1 means that Paul is shifting gears and is moving into the practical implications of what has been previously stated.

Do we see sanctification in terms of a process in chapters 7 through 11? Some would see the concept in Rom. 8 v13 & 14. But are we seeing a systematic explanation of the process or just a recognition of the reality and the necessity of it? I see the latter.

This brings us the consideration of Rom. 6. But to understand Rom. 6, we must interpret it in light of the case that Paul has been building. In Rom. 3 we saw three metaphors that illustrate how God righteously dealt with all our sins by the vicarious substitutionary sacrifice of His Son. In Rom. 3 we see the judicial aspects and in Rom. 4 we see the relational and covenantal aspects of "righteousness". In Rom. 5 we have seen how Christ has dealt with our need for a positive righteousness.

Christ as the second Adam has in a representative sense regained for God the dominion that was usurped by satan. In a legal sense He justified the entire human race at calvary. The status of righteousness and the gift if eternal life has been made available through the actions of the One Man. But will all be saved, will all have eternal life? No, only those who apprehend God’s grace, and who receive the gift of righteousness will reign in life. Rom. 5 v17. Rom.6 as we will see is the next logical step in Paul’s presentation.

Recognizing the pervasive terminology in Romans 5, 6, & 7 will assist us. The term "death" is used 25x in Rom. and the term "dead" is used 17x. In Rom. 6 "death" is used 8x and "dead" is used 4x. Another key word is "sin". The word "sin" is used 112x in the NT. In the book of Romans it is used 45x. In Rom. 5 it is used 6x, in Rom.6 it is used 17x, and in Rom. 7 it is used 14x. The word " transgression" or "transgressions" is used 6x in Rom. 5. The large number of occurrences of the words "sin" and "death" lets us know that these concepts are fundamental to a correct understanding of Rom.6. One has to deal with sin and death before one can possess righteousness and life. Paul is now going to tell us how to do it.

I need to digress for a moment. What book in the bible is written to unbelievers? The answer is none of them and on the other hand, all of them. How do the unsaved become Christians? They need to hear the gospel preached to them. Rom.10 v13-18. They could also read the book of Romans and get it from Paul himself. My point in all this is that the gospel found in Romans is not only for the believers but for the unbelievers as well. What we are seeing in Rom. 6 is important information that the church, that is the believers, must communicate to the unbelievers in order for them to be saved. We can’t find a specific book in the bible to the unsaved. All the books are addressed to the saints. Nevertheless, they are all in some way to be used for the purpose of bringing unbelievers to saving faith. Paul isn’t now moving from a detailed presentation of how Jesus has replaced Adam in a representational sense to a presentation of the process of sanctification. It would be illogical. No, he is instructing the church and also instructing prospective converts what it means to be a Christian in the first place. Obviously the church in Rome had an inadequate understanding of what it really meant to be a Christian in the first place.

How does one escape the penalty and God’s judgment on sin and the wages thereof which is death? One needs to recognize and repudiate their sin and their relationship to the first Adam. One needs to choose to receive the free gift of righteousness and life. One needs to align themselves with Christ. One needs to with heartfelt repentance turn from their heritage in the first Adam to Christ. God has given us a sacrament and symbol by which we can repudiate sin and simultaneously identify with Christ and align ourselves with Him.

Rom. 6 v2 says "we who died to sin". Verses 3 through 11 explain how we died to sin. We are to reckon ourselves dead to sin. Rom. 6 v11. Does one have enough faith to believe that God has reckoned them righteous and forgiven all their sins; past, present, and future (Rom. 4) if one is unwilling to reckon themselves dead to sin? Dying to sin involves more than a legal transaction. It involves a choice and the purpose of the heart. We do this by uniting with Christ in baptism. We see ourselves as having in some sense died at Calvary. We see ourselves as having in some sense been raised from the dead. Baptism is a personal replication of the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. It is a symbolic interpretation or you could say re-enactment of the experience of Christ. It is a public declaration that we recognize that we have sinned, and are personally in need if justification, forgiveness, cleansing and have made a decision to walk in a new direction in life. God directed baptism has legal consequences. The person who aligns themselves with Christ in baptism has entered covenant relationship with God. A deeper study of the book of Romans reveals that Paul and the product of his theology is steeped in covenantal terms and concepts. All covenants have terms and conditions. As we consider some of the other texts that speak of baptism, we understand that repentance of sin and the recognition of the Lordship of Christ is part of the agreement and mutual understanding. Acts 2 v36-38; 16 v30-34; 22 v16. At baptism, which is near the beginning of the repentant sinners covenant relationship with Christ, an expression of heart, voice and action by the new Christian speaks to their personal choice to forever walk in covenantal solidarity with their Savior and their new Lord and Master.

It is at the very beginning of the Christian life that God bestows on us our new status. It is at the very beginning of the Christian walk that the one who aligns themselves with Christ is freed from the slavery and dominion of sin. A new principle now guides the heart. It is not the letter of the law but the spirit of the law. Love for Christ, not the principle of law controls the heart and mind of the Christian. The change of heart is so radical that Paul uses the symbol of death to describe it. Death isn’t a modification of the old way of life. It is the annihilation of it. We are not talking about a process here. We are speaking about a point in time.

What the church in Rome needed to understand for themselves and for the prospective converts that they were witnessing to was that their initial understanding of what it meant to be a Christian was incomplete. What was clarification by Paul to the church in Rome is now to be used by way of instruction by the church to converts who hear the gospel and purpose to align themselves with Christ. The first half of Rom. 6 is about the outward sign and its theological ramifications, while the second half describes the appropriate heartfelt recognition that the convert must possess in order to truly become a follower of Jesus Christ. It is at the beginning of the Christian experience that heartfelt repentance, a clear and decisive recognition of our new status as slaves of Christ and the principles of righteousness, and the strong and clear decision to be obedient from the heart in submission to the Lordship of Christ for the rest of our lives is made. I am not speaking of the quality of the performance here, only the quality of the desire.

In Rom. 6 v12, Paul says "Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body". The word "reign" speaks of having authority and dominion. The Christian does not have sin reigning or dominating his life. The immature church in Rome needed to be instructed in the very basics of the faith. Paul goes on to say in Rom. 6 v16, "Do you no know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one you obey?’. The point is this, it is incongruent for anyone to consider themselves a Christian if they continually willfully present themselves as slaves to sin. In v20, Paul said, "For when you were slaves to sin, you were free in regards to righteousness". All those in Adam are slaves to sin. Only those in Christ are slaves to righteousness.

What we are seeing here in the last half of Rom. 6 is not a primer on sanctification but a clarification and explanation of what it means to be a Christian in the first place. Paul is not telling slaves of sin to get sanctified. He is instructing the church how to minister to the unsaved outside of and inside of the church. (We know that in the biblical sense that there are no unbelievers in the church).

Many people in the church are perplexed at the actions of the ones of some in its midst. If only we had more teaching on sanctification and exhortation in this area things would be better, they say. But as I see it, the real problem is a lack of true conversions. The first teaching and experience of a convert is critical. What we need to do is to present the law and the gospel together and to spell out the commands and the demands of Christ with clarity. The free gift of a right standing in the presence of God now and in the judgment, the free gift of eternal life is based wholly on the doing and dying of Jesus Christ, our substitute in life and in death. But this free gift is only for those who willing chose to forsake sin. Rom. 6 is speaking about that initial decision and commitment that with the keeping power of Christ and His Holy Spirit can last for a lifetime. Do we continue to sin? Yes we do. For all have sinned and continue to fall short of the glory of God. It is if we carry around with us a rotting putrefying dead body which is the old man. Yet simultaneously, the new man continues to submit himself as a slave to Christ and is continually obedient from the heart. In Rom. 7, Paul continued to sin, but he didn’t want to. Performance isn’t the issue. The heart is the issue. Romans 7 and Romans 8 simultaneously describes the walk of the consecrated Christian. Only those who are absolutely secure in the status provided by Christ and revealed in the gospel can truly repent in a way that doesn’t wallpaper over their sins.

Rom. 6 v6 speaks of the body of sin being done away with, or rendered powerless. Does baptism render the old nature powerless? What renders the old man powerless is the sure knowledge of knowing who you are in Christ. A clear and unequivocal decision to turn from the former way of life to the One Who has earned our love, our respect and our allegiance is what renders the old man powerless. The gospel of His grace to ones who formerly were rebellious enemies is what finally breaks sinful hearts and makes them into fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ. One of our greatest problems in the church is that we do not realize that full devotion to Christ is not only normative but is to be expected at the very beginning of the Christian life.

Paul has gone to great effort to protect the church from legalism and from antinomianism. Nevertheless some might misunderstand Rom. 6 v16, and forget everything that Paul has already said in the first 5 chapters and conclude that our obedience somehow adds to or supplements or results in a subjective righteousness in the meritorious sense. This in itself makes understanding and seeing sanctification as process in Rom. 6 problematic. The benefit and fruit and outcome of sanctification in terms of a process is not eternal life (v22). If it were, how sanctified would we have to be to get it? What Paul is saying here is that the presentation of ourselves to Christ and to the principles of righteousness (which takes place at the beginning of our Christian walk) results in the new status of sanctification. V16, 19. No, the sanctification that Paul is talking about in Rom. 6 is the secure position of a new status that becomes ours at the very beginning of our relationship with Christ. The moment that we biblically identify with Christ in light of what has already been stated, we are freed from sin, enslaved to Christ and possess the new status of sanctification and eternal life. The presentation of our bodies to the principles of righteousness takes place at the very beginning of the Christian walk. It is also at the beginning of the Christian walk that a commitment to live a life of continual service and obedience is made. Part and parcel of the new convert’s commitment is a recognition of the fact that Christ’s expectation for them is to maintain a continued willingness to obey. The crux of the matter once again however would not be the performance but the decision to enter into that commitment to continued covenant solidarity.

In conclusion, Romans 6 is not a primer on the process of sanctification but a clarification and explanation of what it means to be a Christian in the first place. Romans 6 is all about receiving the meritorious work of our Representative. Its all about buying into and identifying with Christ. Its all about aligning ourselves body and heart with the Lover of our souls. Come to think of it, that is sanctification after all!