| You Are as Good as Dead! - article by Joel Hempel What would you do if a 98-pound weakling were kneeling on your chest? I ask this silly question because that is what we tolerate all too frequently in our lives. In Sunday’s epistle lesson, St. Paul asks: Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Spiritually speaking, our old nature (the nature we were born with that would have had us helplessly living in opposition to God’s will) is dead! Through baptism, our old self died with Christ on the cross and was buried with him. It will never live again. Said differently, sin no longer has controlling power over us! What does it mean that sin has no controlling power over us? Well, it is not like a 1500-pound silverback gorilla pinning you to the floor and controlling you. In this case, you have no control. There is nothing to decide. You are not getting up until he lets you up. Instead, sin and its master, Satan, is like that 98-pound weakling. If we let him, he will pin us to the floor. But any time we decide, we can throw him off by God’s grace and strength and claim our victory in Jesus Christ. Of course, when we are successful in throwing off the weakling one day, it does not mean he will never return. Satan will (see Luke 4:13) and will do so with even greater determination. So, we have to keep our strength up. Later in Romans 6, St. Paul writes that Christ has not only killed our old self and destroyed the controlling power of sin, he has also – and this is the cool part – made it possible for us to walk in newness of life (verse 4). That is, we get to:
- Walk strong in the Lord.
- Walk through life free from guilt and shame.
- Walk with confidence that our eternal destination with Jesus is secure.
- Walk – i.e., live – knowing we can handle anything life throws at us.
If you find yourself doubting this new life is possible or that you believe Jesus intends it, but you have been unable to experience it consistently, then read on. The key to growing in strength, living this new life and experiencing it more consistently is found in the word consider in verse 11 of Romans 6: Consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. To consider is to think carefully, contemplate, reflect on, and deliberate. How we grow in faith, spiritual strength, and confidence is no secret. There is no high spirituality we have to achieve. But there is work (see Philippians 2:12-13). It’s the work of considering: thinking carefully on God’s Word, reflecting on the Gospel imbedded in the hymns we sing, and deliberating on any verbal or pictorial message that presents God’s truth. For further study, see Ezekiel 36:25-27; 2 Corinthians 5:17; Galatians 2:20; Ephesians 4:22-24. | 
