Sin's Wages & God's Gift
Lenten Devotional Series Day 39. Today’s meditation is on Romans 6:20-23.
In studying the Ten Commandments, the topic of sin comes up pretty often. Today let’s briefly consider what sin is and what are its consequences.
A common refrain throughout our study of the Ten Commandments has been that each commandment includes both negative prohibitions and positive duties. For example, God’s prohibition against stealing in the 8th Commandment is also a duty to be generous. Likewise, implicit within the 9th Commandment’s prohibition against bearing false witness is the obligation to speak the truth in love.
In a similar way, the Bible teaches us to understand sin both positively and negatively, or as we often say in prayer together, both “things done,” and “things left undone.” Positively, sin is active disobedience to God. Sometimes the Bible describes this in terms of trespassing God’s boundaries, or being a lawbreaker. Negatively, sin is failure, as when an archer missing his target. Something other than God’s ideal is the outcome. In relation to the Ten Commandments, then, sin is both the transgression of God’s prohibitions, and the failure to fulfill God’s duties.
In today’s lesson, Paul explains to the Roman Christians that the punishment for sin is death. He describes this punishment in terms of “wages,” because sin requires compensation. Don’t miss this; it couldn’t be more important. In God’s eyes, all sin deserves the death penalty. Every sin leads to death.
On Good Friday, the righteous God-man Jesus Christ died in the place of sinners, so that sinners might be set free from sin and death. For those who put their faith in Christ, Paul says, God offers eternal life as a free gift. God’s under no obligation to do so. It’s not compensation for anything. Rather, it’s an act of love. For God so loved the world that he gave…
Apart from Christ, we all deserve death, and will undoubtedly experience it. Through faith in Christ, we are declared “not guilty” and promised eternal life. Thanks be to God for his amazing and wonderful gift!
Today in prayer, begin with the Collect of the Day (below). Then confess to Almighty God and repent for both those things which you have done and ought not to have done, and those things you should have done but did not. Give thanks to God for the free gift of eternal life for sinners like us. Then finish with the Lord’s Prayer.
Collect of the Day. Almighty God, we ask you mercifully to look upon your people; that by your great goodness they may be governed and preserved for ever, both in body and soul, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.