Extreme Soul Makeover

6/10/07 | Jeff Williams | Romans 6:19-23 | Listen
Series: Getting into the Good News

As Americans we love “before and after” stories. Television shows such as “What not to Wear” and “Ten Years Younger,” capitalize on our fascination with dramatic personal change. Episodes of “Flip that House” and “Clean Sweep” teach us that order can come from chaos with a little know-how and hard work.

Ty Pennington has taken this concept to new level in the show “Extreme Home Makeover.” A needy family is selected, the team races against the clock to do their makeover magic, and the “before and after” will leave you in tears. The only problem is, while they can change everything about the house, Ty and his team can not change the human hearts in that home.

All of these shows do a good job at external change but none of them can truly change a person from the inside out. As exciting as these before and after stories are, they are no comparison to what God can do in a human soul:

This morning, we will see that God wants to offer you something far better than a new wardrobe, a clean garage, or a new walk-in closet. God offers a free “extreme soul makeover” to whoever will accept it by faith.

Changed lives change lives.

Loose Change to Loose Chains

According to AmazingChange.com, there are twenty-seven million people trapped in the bondage of slavery this morning and fifty percent of those are reported to be children. These statistics were too much for a seventh grade student in Michigan named Zach.

At the age of twelve, Zach Hunter, a committed Christian, became passionate about finding a way to stop the modern day practice of slavery in Sudan and other countries. He started an organization called, “Loose Change to Loose Chains” that collected spare change to raise money and support for his anti-slavery efforts. Now, at the ripe age of fourteen, Zach has written a book called, “Be the Change” in which this twentieth century William Wilberforce makes an impassioned plea for students to rise up and “do something” to stop human slave trade.

His goal is “to see slavery wiped off the face of the earth in his lifetime.” What drives him? He said that “if he were a slave he would want someone to try to rescue him.”

God has gone to even greater lengths than Zach. He sacrificed His own Son on the cross, in our place, for our sins.

Jesus said it Himself:

“For God so loved the world that He gave his one and only son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16)

God’s goal was to free us from the slavery to Satan, sin, and self. This is Paul’s message in Romans 6.

Two Masters: A New Position

I want to concentrate our study this morning on verses 19-23. Before we get there, let’s look quickly at the proceeding verses to understand where Paul is going.

“Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.” (Romans 6: 15-18)

In Paul’s day, slavery was a common practice and there were literally millions of slaves through the Roman Empire. By using the language of the slave market, Paul was not condoning the practice. He was merely using an imperfect word picture that his readers would be very familiar with to make his point. In fact, if you skip ahead a few verses, he actually gives a parenthetical apology for using an analogy that doesn’t quite give the whole story:

“I put this in human terms because you are weak in your natural selves.” (Romans 6:19)

The point Paul is trying to convey to his readers, and to us, is that there are two masters we can serve. We can offer ourselves to sin, which leads to death or we can offer ourselves to obedience which results in righteousness. Human beings are not neutral and we can not survive in a moral vacuum. We will either be slaves of sin or slaves to obedience. Regardless of what modern day philosophers say, we are not, nor ever have been independent creatures. We will serve a master; it just is a matter of which one. Jesus said,

“ No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other or he will hold to one and despise the other.” (Matthew 6:24)

John Piper puts it beautifully, especially in light of the current interest in pirate movies:

“Becoming a Christian is to have the sovereign captain of the battle ship of righteousness commandeer the slave ship of unrighteousness; put the ship captain, sin, in irons; break the chains of the slaves; and give them such a spiritual sight of grace and glory that they freely serve the new [captain] forever as the irresistible joy and treasure of their lives.”

God freed us from our former master “sin” that promised us freedom but delivered only death in order to allow us to be his “slaves” in order to grant us the grace of real freedom.

Just a few verses before these, Paul gives us really good news:

“For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.” (Romans 6:14)

The real question this morning is who or what is your Master?

Peter wrote these powerful words, “…for a man is a slave to whatever has mastered him.” (2 Peter 2:19)

Point to Ponder: Have you been mastered by sinful habits or are you a slave to the Savior?

Paul’s next point is that our liberty should change our lifestyle.

Two Lifestyles: A New Practice

Paul continues his directives:

“Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness.” (Romans 6:19b)

Again, we see the “before and after” language Paul is using to make the point that our position in Christ should lead to different lifestyle practices.

When we were slaves to sin, we “offered our bodies in slavery to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness.” The word “offer” means to “present one’s self for service.” What did we present ourselves for service for? Paul uses two very interesting words, “impurity” and “ever-increasing wickedness.”

Impurity is the inward disposition of the heart bent toward evil. Wickedness is the outward actions of a life lived without regard for God. This verse paints a perfect picture of a person who is totally committed to living his or her own way apart from God.

That is the “before” of salvation. Paul paints just as vivid a picture of what we should do “after” our salvation. He says, “so now offer [the parts of your body] in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness.” There is an interesting shift in the tense of the verb “offer” in this part of the verse. It is a strong command to do this now and conveys a sense of urgency.

What Paul is saying is that just as you used to sin with gusto, now go after holiness with the same energy and zeal. He is calling his readers to total obligation, total commitment, and total accountability. Just as our pursuit of sin leads to more and more wickedness, our pursuit of holiness leads to more and more purity. He is describing a radically changed life.

Good vs. Evel

I grew up watching a dare-devil motorcyclist who tried to jump lines of buses, boxes of mountain lions, and even the Snake River Canyon. His name is Evel Knievel. Evel was known for his wild, sinful lifestyle as much as he was known for his death-defying stunts. Recently Evel came to faith in Jesus Christ. He said that “he always believed in God but he refused to accept Jesus Christ as Lord because he couldn’t walk away from the gold and gambling and the booze and the women.”

Speaking at a large church in California on April 1, 2007, Evel said, “"All of a sudden, I just believed in Jesus Christ. I did, I believed in him! … I rose up in bed and, I was by myself, and I said, 'Devil, Devil… you get away from me. I cast you out of my life.' … I just got on my knees and prayed that God would put his arms around me and never, ever, ever let me go.”

After sharing his testimony and then being baptized, Christianity Today reported, “In a spontaneous response described by some worshipers as one of the most spiritually significant events they had ever experienced, an estimated 500 to 800 people came forward for baptism and to commit or rededicate their lives to God.”

Evel was transformed by God’s goodness and it has affected others.

Changed lives change lives!

Point to Ponder: Do you hunger for holiness with the same passion in which you used to serve sin?

Two Benefits: A New Perspective

Let’s continue by looking at verse 20:

“When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. (Romans 6:20).

Notice Paul makes a sweeping assumption – “when you were slaves to sin.” He has made this point before in chapter three, “for all sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23) At one time, all of us were slaves to sin and were free from control of righteousness. As I have said for years, cows do not lay eggs! Sinners sin because they are sinful!

Righteousness can be defined as “right character before God and right actions before men.” At this point, when we were slaves to sin, righteousness was not as attractive as sin. Righteousness had no power to sway us or control us. Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.” (John 8:34)

Let me say it as plain as I can. You may be a moral, law-abiding, nice, or even religious person but without the saving power of Jesus Christ you are a slave to sin. You see, we are either God’s servants or the devil’s slaves. Even if you wanted to be “righteous” you couldn’t do it. Even your best efforts were tainted by wrong motives and selfish attitudes. Isaiah words couldn’t be truer:

“All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.” (Isaiah 64:6.)

Because it is only by the power of the Holy Spirit which resides inside a Christian that she can do anything good.

It’s funny, isn’t it? It is those who stand outside of the church that claim to have the most freedom. They have the freedom to do whatever they want without having to feel guilty. But this freedom is no freedom at all it is slavery. It is only when we become slaves to God that we are truly free to be what God has created us to be.

Shame on Me

Now look at Verse 21:

What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! (Romans 6:21)

Paul asks his readers to take a trip down memory lane and remember what it was like before they were Christ-Followers. He assumes they are ashamed of they way they used to act. This word can mean a painful feeling, fear of exposure, embarrassment, or feelings of guilt.

One of the surest sign of salvation in a person’s heart is the shame they feel toward their actions before Jesus. It embarrasses me to think of all the “impurity and ever increasing wickedness” I committed as a teenager enslaved to sin.

At one point in my effort to aggravate my believing brother, I invented a religion based on Winnie the Pooh – and Tigger too! The fact that God did not strike me down on the spot is still amazing to me.

I’m embarrassed by this story but there are certain memories that I can hardly even entertain without feeling the flush of shame sweep over my soul. John Calvin wrote that this feeling of shame can make us more teachable and “willingly humble before God.”

Free at Last

Verse 22 is good news.

But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.” (Romans 6:22)

It’s so rich I want to look at several key phrases.

“Set free...” Paul says we have been set free. This is in the past tense. It means we are not just set free from the penalty of sin, justification, but that we are set free from its power over us.

“from…” The word “from” though small is very descriptive. It means “to separate one thing from the other.” It is the picture of the believer being detached from sin and death. God has set us free from sin to enslave us to Himself.

“slave…” The word “slave” means “enslaving an enemy defeated in battle.”

“holiness…” Instead of reaping shame and death, believers now produce the fruit of holiness. Holiness is the word sanctification – the process by which God makes us more and more like Jesus. The result is not eternal death that sin brings but eternal, perpetual, everlasting, abundant life.

Conversion changes a person completely. It changes our perspective, our position, and our practice. It changes the direction our lives are headed. This does not mean we will not sin anymore or that we will not slip back into sinful patterns. What this means is that the process of sanctification has started, there is no turning back.

Paul encouraged the church at Philippi with these words:

“...being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” (Phil 1:6)

For the first time in our lives, we have the freedom not to sin. The term “sanctification” has duel meanings. It is a point in time and a process. It is a possession and a practice. It is positional and progressive. It is involves your effort, your obedience, but depends on God’s enablement.

Paul explains it this way:

“…continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose.” (Phil 2:12a-13).

In other words, you are not what you used to be but you are not yet what you will become. Can I get an “Amen” for that?!

Do you get the picture? You are either a slave to sin or to God. You are either on the road to eternal life in heaven or to eternal death in hell. You are either becoming more and more wicked or more and more holy. The thing that is obvious is that it is, or should be…obvious!

A great, and simple way to share your faith with someone is to simply tell them what your life was like before Christ, what event(s) brought you to Christ, and what your life has been like since you surrendered to Christ. In order to put some “skin” on these concepts, I’ve asked Milt Hanson to share his story.

Milt please describe your life before Jesus.

I grew up in what I assumed was a normal home, mom and a dad with brothers and sisters. When I was about twelve years old, my parents were getting a divorce and I was asked who I wanted to live with, and of course as a boy, I wanted to be with my father. But after the divorce, I was told that I needed to stay with my mom. Without a father at home, I started to run the streets and was arrested for the first time that same year. I grew up from that time with a hard heart and learned that family was not real important for me and I just did what I wished. My mom was remarried soon after her divorce and I moved in with a new family. This new man in my mom’s life and I did not see things the same and so it became a war of wills. There was always fighting in the house, and I had no problem doing whatever I wanted to do. Because of that, I gave up my virginity at twelve years old and started to get in more trouble with the law. Getting into trouble was more of a badge of honor then shame. I tried running away because I thought it would bring me freedom but instead I only got into drinking and drugs and all kinds of immorality. I started to get concerned about where I was headed. I was on my way to like prison if I didn’t change my ways. I thought that if I enlisted in the military they would help me get my life straitened out, but instead it opened more doors of sin in my life. I kept doing the things that made me forget what I hated about myself and what I had become. During the time I was in the military I lived a reckless life, got deeper into drugs, watched my friend die of an overdose and came near to that myself twice, and I still did not change my ways. After I left the military, I hitchhiked around the country and I decided to stay in Champaign because it was a “party town. After some time, I met Michelle in a pool hall and soon we were living together. I had come to the point where I never wanted to get married or have any kids because I never wanted to live like my mom and dad did. I kept girls at a comfortable distance. If they got too close, it was time to for me to fly! Michelle must have known this because we lived together for four years and she was able to show me that not all relationships had to be like the one I came from. We were marred in 1979.

After all of that, how did you actually become a Christian?

During the time we lived together, some people had shared Christ with me but I had no idea who this Christ was and what He meant to me. After a bad car accident, both Michelle and I said that there must be a God because we survived when we should have died. During that year, we went to see a friend and we were hanging out at his house smoking some pot when we heard some music coming from a church down the street. We wanted to check it out, so the four of us went to the church and sat in the back high as a kite. The pastor spoke of a God who loved us and if we would surrender our wills to Him, He would save us from hell. That was kind of scary, but it touched my heart, because I knew I was going nowhere fast. We left the church and about twenty minutes later two ladies from the church came to the door and asked if there were any questions they could answer from the Bible and I said, “yes there was.” They talked about God’s love for us and how Jesus died on the cross for my sin and He was the only way to have a relationship with God, I finally “got it” and it all came together. God had been chasing me all this time and I just didn’t see it. Right there, both Michelle and I committed our lives to him.

What has happened after this event twenty-five years ago?

After we got home, we started talking about what it means to believe in Christ and we realized we had no idea what it meant. We called Michelle's brother for some help. He said we needed to buy a Bible and to start reading it and to look for a church where we could learn more about God. We started attending PBC in 1980. That’s when we started to grow in our relationship with God. I had been a drug user for ten years along with other stuff I had been doing for most of my life, and slowly God helped me to throw away the stuff that had been holding me down all these years. Through small groups, I kept growing and learning in what it meant to be a good father and husband and a man after God's heart. Because of the changes in my life, I wanted to serve Him in some way, so I got involved in Awana working with kids. Eventually I found my way to high school ministry were I have stayed since 1983. I have also been a deacon and I have served on the elder board since 1994. If I had never surrendered my will to God and stayed on a path that helped me to grow in Christ, I hate to think of the person that I would have become and the life I would have messed up. All of my children are believers and our marriage is the model for the whole extended family. I have been a Christ-follower for 26 years and I’m not near perfect. I still have a lot of things to work on and as long as I have the time I’ll do just that.

Changed lives change lives!

Not everyone will have such a drastic difference in their before and after story. Some of you don’t have a laundry list of sins that you committed before surrendering your life to Christ. In fact, there are people in this auditorium that can not remember a time they didn’t love Jesus. That does not change the fact that there was a point at which you stopped being a slave to sin and started being a slave to God. If you are a Christian, there is a certain point in time when you were set free.

Point to Ponder: Can you point back to a time (does not have to be a specific date) when God started the process of making you into His likeness? Is the change in your life obvious to those around you?

Two Outcomes: A New Promise

Paul finishes chapter six with one of the most recognized and memorized verses in Romans. We are quick to quote this verse to unbelievers but, in it’s context, these words are written to believers at Rome:

“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23)

Paul sets forth three parallels in this verse – sin/God, wages/gift, and death/eternal life.

* Two masters. Remember that there are only two masters that we can serve. We are either slaves of sin or servants of God.

* Two methods. The word “wages” was a military term that denoted “whatever is to be bought to be eaten with bread” such as corn, meat, or fish. It was the rations that a soldier would receive for putting his life on the line for the king. If sin is your master then the wages he provides is death. He may promise something else but, in the end, what you get for all your troubles is eternal separation from God.

God, on the other hand, does not give a wage but a gift, an absolutely free gift. In His grace, God sacrificed His Son on the cross, for our sins, in our place in order to rescue from the dominion of darkness and transfer us into the Kingdom of light. We did nothing to deserve it. I love the way Eugene Peterson paraphrases Paul’s words in Romans 5:6:

“But God put His love on the line for us by offering His Son in sacrificial death while we were of no use whatever to Him.” (Romans 5:6, The Message)

* Two aftermaths. The wages that sin gives is death. It’s the only currency hell has to offer. This denotes not only physical death but also eternal death, the final, awful separation of human from heaven.

God gives the best, most amazing gift of all – eternal life. It is incredible to think that it will literally take eternity for Him to exhaust, if that were possible, His goodness and kindness towards us. What’s more indescribable than that is the fact that eternal life doesn’t start when you die but when you are born again. Notice that this gift is for those who are in Christ Jesus our Lord. Jesus came to bring life and life abundant (John 10:10).

Pastor David Dykes reminds us that Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on September 22, 1862. Although this document declared all slaves on American soil were free, it wasn’t until December 18, 1865 that Congress ratified the Thirteenth Amendment prohibiting slavery. Many slaves walked off the plantations as free people singing, “Free at last, Thank God Almighty, I’m Free at Last! Sadly, thousands of slaves never left their masters and died in slavery because they refused to accept the free gift of liberty they have been given.

It is just as sad, when Christians who have been set free still chose to live in bondage and defeat. Chained to their past, imprisoned in their impurity, and held captive by their fears, they live as though the cross never happened.

Christian, if the God of the universe on your side who can be against you? You do not have to live in defeat, discouragement, or doubt. If God can raise Jesus from the dead, is there anything in your life too hard for Him to help you with? Is there any besetting sin so strong that God can not give you the power to live in victory? By counting yourself dead to sin and alive to Christ, by yielding your bodies to be an offering of righteousness, by reaping the benefits of holiness by living in obedience to God Word and God’s ways, you can experience the abundant life that Jesus promised to us.

Point to Ponder: Have you accepted the free gift of eternal life that God offers or are you still working for sin’s wages? If so, are you living in freedom or as a victim?

I Will Never Be the Same Again: A New You?

Can you point to a definite “before and after” moment in your life? I recently had the opportunity to ask that question to a father of one of our students. He thought he was a Christian, but after inspecting his life, he came to the conclusion that he was probably not a Christ-Follower after all. He recognized the fact that Christ had not transformed him. He had habits that were still haunting him. He acknowledged his need for an “extreme soul makeover” and surrendered his life to Christ.

By the way, since that decision about two months ago, he has read the books of John, Esther, Mathew, Mark, and Luke. He’s not what he was, but he’s not yet what he will be!

Changed lives change lives!

Point to Ponder: Are you a Christian? Have you submitted yourself to God’s extreme soul makeover process?

Paul wrote this sober directive to the believers at Corinth:

“Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you–unless, of course, you fail the test?” (I Cor 13:5)

I meet people that claim to be Christians but do not feel the need to go to church, who do not have a love for God’s Word, who think worship is boring, who do not see the need for accountability or fellowship, and who live in pervasive and persistent sin. When I try to attempt to point out the inconsistency of that lifestyle, they just shrug their shoulders and insist that they are indeed Christians.

Let me repeat my question to you again, are you a Christian?

Here are some good questions for you to consider.

As you read these questions, it may occur to you that you may not be a Christian at all. Or maybe, you are sure you are a Christian but you recognized that you have not been living like one who has been set free.

We are going to end this morning with a song that is really a prayer. During this song, pay attention to the words. Are they a reality in your life? If they are just words, cry out to God for his transforming power to be unleashed in your life, right now, right here.

I Will Never Be

Darlene Zschech -

I will never be the same again, I can never return, I've closed the door. I will walk apart, I'll run the race And I will never be the same again. I will never be the same again, I can never return, I've closed the door. I will walk apart, I'll run the race And I will never be the same again. Fall like fire, soak like rain, Flow like mighty waters, again and again. Sweep away the darkness, burn away the chaff, And let a flame burn to glorify Your name. There are higher heights, there are deeper seas, Whatever you need to do, Lord do in me. The Glory of God fills my life, And I will never be the same again. Fall like fire, soak like rain, Flow like mighty waters, again and again. Sweep aways the darkness, burn away the chaff And let a flame burn to glorify Your name. I will never be the same again, I can never return, I've closed the door. I will walk the path, I will run the race And I will never be the same again.