“Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace?” (Romans 6:1)
Romans 6:1 is that passage that should caution the ‘once saved forever saved folks’ that where they are heading for is doom, but they have turned it into a weapon. Their argument is that ‘Paul preached grace so much that he had to say such.’ And they would add ‘have we preached grace to as much as Paul?’ If you are hearing that line of defence for the first time, you will know it is nonsense but when you hear it repeatedly, you will start thinking that it actually makes sense.
If verse one of Chapter six could start like that then something must have led to it from Chapter 5.
“God’s law was given so that all people could see how sinful they were. But as people sinned more and more, God’s wonderful grace became more abundant.” (Romans 5:20)
At first, take note of the tense of that speech, it was all in the past tense which means that before Jesus came, there was a saving law, people broke those laws so God was sending grace (pardon) in different forms till He eventually sent Jesus Christ who brought the saving grace. That is, God responded to man’s many sins with grace.
But Chapter 6:1 is written in the present form. It says: “Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace?”
Now that we have received the saving grace, shall we continue to live in sin so that God will keep giving us grace (pardon)? Paul says, it shouldn’t be, because we are no longer under the law but under grace.
It is like saying, you are not admitted through JAMB, it is those who are admitted through JAMB that try to cheat during exams but you are not supposed to be cheating. Paul went further to say, but if you choose to cheat in the exam hall then you have become a slave to sin (examination malpractice) and that will lead to expulsion from the school. In essence, believers who live as slaves to sins will be sent to hell. In verse i6, he says, “Don’t you realize that you become the slave of whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to sin, which leads to death, or you can choose to obey God, which leads to righteous living.”
When you submit to examination malpractice (sin), it will lead to death and eventually eternal death which is hell but if you choose to shun sin, you will live righteously (v19) and become holy which will earn you eternity (v22). Brethren, you have to work for that part.
Let us go back to why Paul preached so much grace and we are not doing so today. Sorry to burst your bubble, Paul preached so much about saving grace just because there so much preaching about saving law through circumcision. We don’t have such problem today. Paul didn’t preach so much about gay, pornography, drugs, masturbation and abortion because it wasn’t an issue back then but it is an issue today.
One beautiful thing about the Scripture is that we can use those same scriptures Paul used then to correct our present current societal ills. I mean, I can use the same rod that was used to beat a stubborn child to beat a lying child. Different problems, different emphasis, same tool.