Sermon: Truly Unleavened

Are You Clean
#1372A
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Given 11-Apr-17; 75 minutes

I am going to give you a bedtime story to begin with. But please do not go to sleep! That is not the purpose of this. It actually is a story that I hope sets the stage for what I have to say in my main remarks.

Once upon a time, in a land far from here, a little girl lived with a dad, mom, and a little brother named Edgar. They lived on a small farm carved out of a huge forest below some dreadfully high mountains to the east.

The little girl, Emily, was a bit of an oddity in her family. She had beautiful straight blond hair, while her parents and even her little brother, Edgar, all had curly brown hair. Their skin tones were different too. They were ruddy and splotchy in places, while her skin was pale and creamy, and smooth. Emily did not seem to mind at all. In fact, she liked being a little bit different because it made her feel special.

Now, we should not think that her parents (and certainly not Edgar), acted as if she were special. Like everyone else, she woke up before sunrise, and did her chores. She had lots of animals to feed, horse stalls to muck out, eggs to collect, and even cows to milk. Sometimes her father called her out to the fields to help plant, to weed, or to harvest depending upon the season. She did not resent having to work, because she had plenty of time to play as well.

So, the years passed, and Emily grew up into a lovely young woman. Although she would have been surprised that anyone would say it in her presence, she thought she was pretty ordinary, truth be told, especially since Edgar never ceased to tell her she was ugly or stupid or clumsy, like brothers often do.

But on their rare trips for supplies to the closest town, she noticed that people stared at her for some reason. And she thought it was probably because of her blond hair and pale skin. Nobody else around there had hair or skin like hers as far as she could tell.

When she was 16 years old, her mother told her that her father wanted her out in the field. So, she brought her large straw hat, and her hoe, guessing that he wanted her to cultivate between the rows. But when she reached him, ready to work, he did not tell her what she should do. In fact, he did not say much for a long while, as if he were unsure how to say to her whatever he had to tell her.

Finally, he said, “I had you come out here to tell you something that I don’t want your brother to know, at least, not yet.” Emily did not quite know how to respond to that, because her parents had never been secretive with her or Edgar before.

Her father went on: “You know that you don’t look like the rest of us. Well, there’s a very good reason for that. You’re not our natural daughter. We kind of adopted you when you were a mere babe.” It was a shock to her, and not a shock. She had wondered a time or two if her clear differences from them were because she had not been born to them. But they had never treated her as anything other than their daughter. But she took the news calmly, nodding, saying, “I understand. It makes sense of some things that I couldn’t figure out.” Her father smiled down on her, with fondness, saying, “I’m glad you’re not too upset, because I have other news that’s even more shocking than that. I and your mother weren’t always farmers. Before, we both worked in a castle: I in the stables, and she in the kitchens. But there was war, as there always seemed to be among the nobility, and I was asked to carry you away for your protection. We’ve lived out here ever since.”

Emily looked at him with wide eyes! “You mean I’m really some nobleman’s daughter?” she asked. She could hardly believe it. She did not know what to think about that. She always thought of herself as a farmer’s daughter.

The man she regarded as her father, nodded, and said, “And not just any nobleman, but the king himself. You’re a princess, Emily! A genuine, blue-blooded, princess!” Her hand shot up to cover her mouth. “I’m not kidding you!” her father continued, serious as she had ever seen him. “The king just sent word that the rebellion has been put down after all these years, and I am to take you back to the castle as soon as possible to meet your true parents, the king and queen.”

At this, Emily broke down in tears. Her father did his clumsy best to comfort her with soft words and gentle petting, while she cried into his chest. Finally, after a long while, she looked up at him, and said, “I don’t think I can do this. I don’t know how to be a princess.” Her father shook his head roughly, and looked her in the eye, “I know for a fact that’s not true. You may not have grown up in a castle, with all the finery around you, and servants at your beck and call, but I know you, Emily, and even though Edgar can rile you up pretty well, you truly are a princess!”

The purpose of this fairytale-like story is wrapped up in that final line, “You truly are a princess!”

It applies to us as Christians, and it is especially significant during this time of year during Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread. Yes, we are truly sons and daughters of the Great God; members of the divine Family, preparing to marry the King, our Savior Jesus Christ. But in terms of this season of the year, we have to recognize and respond to the fact that we truly are unleavened.

Before we get into that more directly, let us go back and see the instructions on the Feast of Unleavened Bread in the Old Testament, and I do this not just to review it, but also uncover and understand a necessary fact that will play into the remainder of the sermon.

Turn to Leviticus 23. We will need these basic truths about Passover and Unleavened Bread for what is coming up.

Leviticus 23:4-8 These are the feasts of the LORD, holy convocations which you shall proclaim at their appointed times. On the fourteenth day of the first month at twilight is the LORD's Passover. [We did that Sunday evening.] And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the Feast of Unleavened Bread to the LORD; seven days you must eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall have a holy convocation [and we are sitting here doing just that]; you shall do no customary work on it. But you shall offer an offering made by fire to the LORD for seven days. The seventh day shall be a holy convocation; you shall do no customary work on it. [And we will do that next Monday.]

These are the basic facts of Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. The Passover is kept on the 14^th of Abib [also known as Nisan] on the Hebrew calendar. And Unleavened Bread is on the 15^th, 16^th, 17^th, 18^th, 19^th, 20^th, and 21^st. It is seven days long. It is a week-long feast. And the first and last days of that week are holy convocations—holy days—in which we gather together before God to worship Him. During these seven days, we are commanded very strictly to eat unleavened bread. It is all very plain. God through Moses puts that all out there very clearly, unless you have an agenda, like some have done in the past, and still do, they make all kinds of problems for the rest of us. But I think it is very plain as written in Scripture there.

Turn to Exodus 12 and we will read some of the instructions that God gave Moses which he was to pass along to the children of Israel on that first Passover in Egypt, for not only Passover but the Feast of Unleavened Bread too.

Exodus 12:5-8 “Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year. You may take it from the sheep or from the goats. Now you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month. Then the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it at twilight. And they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and on the lintel of the houses where they eat it. Then they shall eat the flesh on that night; roasted in fire, with unleavened bread and with bitter herbs they shall eat it.”

So they have the lamb that they are supposed to kill as a sacrifice, and they are told, then, to eat it on the same evening in which they killed it as the 14^th day begins as we know it, and they were to roast it and eat it then that night.

Exodus 12:11-14 “And thus you shall eat it: with a belt on your waist, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand. So you shall eat it in haste. It is the LORD's Passover. 'For I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night, and will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the LORD. Now the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, I will pass over you; and the plague shall not be on you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt. So this day shall be to you a memorial; and you shall keep it as a feast to the LORD throughout your generations. You shall keep it as a feast by an everlasting ordinance.”

Now, I find this, too, to be very clear. The instructions are just 1, 2, 3, 4, right down the line. The lamb or kid was to be slain on the 14^th at twilight, and its blood was to be smeared on the lintel and the doorposts of the houses, and they were to eat it that night after it had been roasted.

The blood that was put on the lintel and doorposts was a sign to God that they had been set apart for deliverance, or we could say that they had accepted His sacrifice and salvation. And so they were passed over when the death angel went through the land.

With that, they were now prepared to leave Egypt as quickly as they could. They had eaten the lamb in haste, and they were ready to go. They were prepared, then, after having been passed over, after accepting the deliverance of God, they were ready to leave Egypt as God’s people.

Now we understand this from a New Covenant, or New Testament perspective; that the lamb was a type, a symbol of Jesus Christ who was slain, and His blood thus covers our sins. We are forgiven and saved from our past sins when we accept Him and His sacrifice for us. And the penalty for our sins—death—has been paid by Christ; in His grace, then, God allows Christ’s righteousness to cover us. We are covered by the blood of Christ, and He accepts us as holy, and undefiled before Him. We could say that in parallel with the Israelites in Egypt, we are then prepared to leave this world of sin, and follow Him wherever He leads.

Pretty simple. Most of you know that very well.

Exodus 12:15-16 “Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall remove leaven from your houses. For whoever eats leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel. On the first day there shall be a holy convocation, and on the seventh day there shall be a holy convocation for you. No manner of work shall be done on them; but that which everyone must eat—that only may be prepared by you.”

Exodus 12:18 “In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at evening [at the end of the day], you shall eat unleavened bread, until the twenty-first day of the month at evening.”

These are at the day’s end, so we go from the end of the 14^th till the end of the 21^st day, and we do not any leavened bread during this period, but as it says, you shall eat unleavened bread during this period.

Exodus 12:19-20 “For seven days no leaven shall be found in your houses, since whoever eats what is leavened, that same person shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he is a stranger or a native of the land. You shall eat nothing leavened; in all your dwellings you shall eat unleavened bread.”

That is pretty clear, too, I think.

Exodus 13:7 “Unleavened bread shall be eaten seven days. And no leavened bread shall be seen among you, nor shall leaven be seen among you in all your quarters.”

Let us recap Exodus 12 and 13: We have from the 15^th day as it begins to the very end of the 21^st day, no leaven was to be eaten. It really was not even to be seen in all of our quarters. We could say that it could not be seen or be in any of the places over which a person has authority and responsibility. So, that would be his home, his car, his place of work, or wherever he is “boss,” there should be no leaven in that place.

I do not know if you picked it up, but this command was to be obeyed upon pain of death. Finding a leftover sandwich under the spare tire, or the seat of the car, that could be a death sentence according to what was originally taught.

Now there is some confusion because it says in 12:15, “On the first day you shall remove leaven . . . ” and it sounds like you start to remove leaven on the 15^th from your house. But it is really very poorly translated. It should be more like, “Before the first day, you shall remove leaven,” or, “On the first day all leaven should have been removed.” There was supposed to be no leaven in the house, etc., starting with the end of the 14^th. So, by the end of the 14^th at evening it was all supposed to be out. It is very clear what is meant here, it is just badly translated.

To sum up, so that we know the timeline, just to get this straight, I know I have been ponderous about this in going over and over this again, I want you to understand that it is important for what we have coming up next.

The timeline is like this: Passover occurs on the evening of the 14^th as the day begins. That is how we understand it. It is the 14^th at ben-ha-arbayim, the beginning of the day at that twilight period. The 14^th is a day in which we can have in our homes, and eat leavening. The 14^th is not a day of Unleavened Bread, although there is unleavened bread eaten in the Passover service. And so the Pharisaical Jews called it the first of the unleavens because that was the first time unleavened bread was to be eaten. But the day of the 14^th, outside of the Passover service itself, was a day in which leaven could be eaten.

It can be in our homes, cars, etc., on the 14^th, but must be removed before the 15^th day begins that evening. Nothing leavened can be eaten or in our homes between the beginning of the 15^th day until the end of the 21^st day; throughout the whole Feast of Unleavened Bread. This is pretty simple, right? We know that. We have been practicing it for many years. For me, it has been for my whole life. Year after year we do this, and it just becomes ingrained into our minds and routines, that this is how it is done.

I have not told you anything that you really did not already know. Turn to I Corinthians 5. This timeline is very important to the argument that Paul makes in I Corinthians 5. This timeline comes into play in the New Testament understanding of these festivals.

I Corinthians 5:6-8 Your glorying is not good.

Now, let us just explain the context here. If we would go up and read the first few verses of this chapter, we would find out that a man in the congregation, an already baptized member of the church, had married his father’s wife. So, this was his stepmother as far as we understand it. Not his true mother, otherwise it would have said his mother, and not his father’s wife. So he had done this, and the people there in Corinth, very proud of their tolerance, and their love, had accepted this. And Paul had told them, “No, this was not right. This should not be done.” And then he had said that he made a decision, even though he was far away, that they should put this man out of the church, because he wanted him “delivered to Satan,” for two reasons: 1) first to shock him to the point that he would repent, and return to the congregation. We find out in II Corinthians that is exactly what happened. The man repented, put away his father’s wife, and rejoined the congregation. The second reason why Paul did that, being so stern as the Corinthians I am sure thought he was being, was 2) to protect them, because there was this sin that was causing all kinds of problems in the church, and they were not reacting properly to it. And so, Paul had to, as their pastor, shake them up. And so he says:

I Corinthians 5:6-8 Your glorying is not good. [Your attitude toward this is not right.] Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?

Meaning, this one sin they considered to be not that bad, which they were allowing in their midst, would cause greater problems as this attitude affected the whole church, probably causing divisions between those who felt it was okay, and those who thought it was horrible. And then more similar sins may occur and cause more problems.

So he gives the general principle that if yeast in a little bit of dough is put into a batch of unleavened dough, it will soon leaven all that dough too. That is just the way it works. That is nature. The yeast will work on that “new” lump of dough, and it will begin to expand, and things will get puffed up, and pretty soon the entire thing will be full of leaven/yeast/sin. It works the same way with attitudes, sin, and corruption.

This sets the stage: Sin in a congregation of people who are converted, and how it works in that environment, or any environment whether they are converted or not. Sin in any group will cause its problems. The problem here was the fact that this was a church of God, and these were converted members. And so it needed to be pointed out to them to show them their error. So he gets to verse 7, the conclusion and the command stage of his argument:

I Corinthians 5:7 Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened.

Seems like a contradiction! Purge out the leavening, so that you may be a new lump, because you truly are unleavened. How do you “purge out what is not there?” you could almost say. But you have to understand what Paul is getting at: He has the holy days—Passover and Unleavened Bread—in mind as he is making this argument.

I Corinthians 5:7 Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened.

Notice the verbs here. I want you to notice the verb tenses especially.

I Corinthians 5:7-8 . . . since you truly are unleavened for indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

It seems like a bit of a paradox; a bit of a contradiction here to say, “purge out the leaven, because you are truly unleavened.” But he is thinking about these festivals.

Let us take these verb tenses I mentioned a moment ago one by one in verse 7: Therefore, “purge out” is the first verb phrase. I need to give you some Greek grammar so you can understand. Hopefully I can explain it well enough.

Purge out, in English, is present tense imperative, meaning a command. And in Greek it is very similar, but it is the aorist tense, imperative mood, an aorist imperative. Oftentimes you will hear we preachers say that the Greek aorist tense is plain past tense. That is true when it is not imperative mood. If you know anything about grammar, and if you know what imperative means, it means a command. So, you cannot have a command in the past tense. “Did it!” as a command does not make sense. No, “Do it!” “Hiked up the trail.” No. “Hike up the trail.”

So, when an aorist is in the imperative mood, it is a present tense command: You need to do this right now!

He is saying: Now that you know that this is sin, and you know what my judgment is, you need to purge this sin from you immediately. Get it out. Now. It is a present tense command.

The next one is, “that you may be a new lump.” “May be” is the next verb, here. It is present tense subjunctive. If you have taken Latin, you know what subjunctive mood is. Subjunctive is a “possibility,” or even a “probability.” So, it is something that could occur. It may not, but there is a good chance that if you do a certain thing, this other thing could happen. So, a present tense subjunctive implies a probable or intentional outcome.

So then, we have, “If we purge out the old leaven/sin, the most likely outcome is that we will become a new lump. If you get the sin out, you are going to be clean again.” The leaven will not be there, and you will be new and ready to move forward.

That is the present tense subjunctive.

Paul is saying that if the Corinthians would go ahead and do this, if they get rid of the sinner among them, and change their attitudes toward all this, then they would on the other side of it be moldable and shapeable by God, clean again, and ready to take on instruction and move forward.

Then Paul writes, “since you truly are unleavened.” The verb phrase is, “truly are unleavened.” This is present tense indicative. What this means is that the state or condition of the subject, which is “you” in this case, is real, or actual. It indicates something. It is saying that the subject is a certain way. So the state is real or actual, or true. You are a man. You are a woman. That is a true, actual, real state. So, he is saying here that while they are going through this, with the leaven among them, that they need to purge out right away so they could be a new lump, their actual state, the reality of what they are, is they are truly unleavened, even though they have leaven.

It makes it sound contradictory. You have leaven. You need to get the leaven out, but you know what? You are truly unleavened.

Now, it would be very much paradoxical and contradictory if we did not have the next sentence. But the next sentence explains everything. He says, “For indeed, Christ our Passover, was sacrificed for us.” Now where are we? What is the verb there? “Was sacrificed” is the verbal phrase. It is past tense in English. But in Greek this is that aorist again. “Purge out” was aorist imperative, meaning a command; here is aorist indicative; a real, true, actual state of things.

So, this is a real, true, actual state of things that happened in the past. Right here, by saying, “Indeed, Christ our Passover, was sacrificed for us,” he is saying not only that it really happened, but it was a real, true, actual sacrifice for us. It was not a fantasy, it was not something that somebody just dreamed up, it was not something that is applicable to other people, but Paul is saying that you are truly unleavened right now in the present tense even though you have sin in you, because Jesus Christ was sacrificed in the past for us.

It is a past action that truly, actually, really happened. And we know it is a wonderful truth that Jesus Christ sacrificed for Himself, giving His sinless life to pay the penalty for our sins. It is a done deal. It happened in the past; His atonement that He made for us; the redemption that He purchased for us with His own blood—the blood of the very Creator—that is all done. This great sacrifice occurred at a specific time and a specific place in our past. For us, as we heard last Sunday night, it was 1,986 years ago that it occurred. That is definitely in the past—almost 2,000 years ago in the past that deed was done. It is an accomplished work. “It is finished,” Jesus Christ said as He hanged there on the tree. So, it is done.

There is another act that is alongside this, that was also in the past for us. This sacrifice was applied to us upon our accepting it and Jesus Christ as our personal Savior, and repenting of our sins, that happened in the past for us too.

So we have the greater sacrifice that was done 2,000 years ago, and we have the acceptance of it or the application of it to ourselves that happened in the more recent past, but whether 20 or 50 years ago, or 2,000 years ago, it is still in the past. Both of those great things that happened to us, Jesus’ sacrifice and our acceptance of it, and its application to us, both are past activities. They are real conditions that happened behind us in time. And, as he says in verse 7, those acts in the past make us truly unleavened in the present.

These things are real, past events—and that is what is important to us for my purposes today, because you truly are unleavened.

Now we must return our thoughts to the timeline of the Passover, and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which I keep saying is the heart of Paul’s argument. The sacrifice of the Lamb—Passover—comes first. That is what happens first. It gets the ball rolling on all of this. Jesus Christ’s actions come first. God’s actions come first. He is the One who initiates everything; He does most of the work; He calls us; He does this, this, and that, and finally we come on the scene, and our only “job” really is to say, “Yes! That’s right! I believe it! And I’m going to commit myself to changing—accepting this and changing whatever so I can be like Him—like Christ.”

Our job is really little. It might seem like oh so hard, but God is the One that is doing most of the heavy lifting. He initiates things with Passover, with His voluntary sacrifice of Himself—Jesus Christ—sacrificing Himself for us, allowing all these terrible things to happen to Him throughout His passion, all the suffering He did, being lashed, and hanged on a tree with nails through His ankles and wrists, having to die.

He did all that so that the results, the purpose of all that, the effect of all that, is to pay the death penalty for our sins in our stead.

Of course, it does some other things too. But once that death penalty was paid for by the blood of Jesus Christ, then by grace God forgives us of those sins, and once we accept Christ’s sacrifice to cover us, that is what happens. His blood covers us, and then we can come before the Father, before His very throne, as righteous and holy in His sight.

Turn to Hebrews 10 to see this.

Hebrews 10:19 Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus . . .

Otherwise, we could not do it. If we did not have the blood of Christ, there is no way we could enter the Holiest Place, because we are talking about the atonement sacrifice here, and that is the background of Paul’s thought there, too, that the priest could only go into the Holy of Holies once a year on the Day of Atonement, and he had to bring blood with him to cover the mercy seat, covering his own sins, and the sins of all Israel.

And so now, we have that high priest privilege, if you will, that we can go before the holiest of all—God on His mercy sea, God on His throne—because the blood of Christ covers us. It is like He Himself going there. So he says,

Hebrews 10:20 . . . by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, . . .

His flesh was flayed and torn—that veil was rent from top to bottom, and came down—and so now we can go with His blood before the Father,

Hebrews 10:21-22 . . . and having a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

What he is telling us, here, is that Christ did the work to clean us up, and now we are covered with the blood of Jesus Christ, and we can go before the Father, right into His very throne room, as if we were Jesus Christ. We have access to Him, and we therefore have the opportunity of a relationship with Him, because when He sees us, He also sees that we are covered by the blood of Jesus Christ, and we are holy and righteous and pure before Him. And so He says, “Here is someone I can deal with,” because we have had grace given to us. We have had this holiness and righteousness, this purity imputed to us through Christ, or in Christ, if you will.

By His mediation, through His work that is already done, we can be the children of God. And we can come before Him as Paul says in other places, saying, “Abba Father!”

So, in Unleavened Bread terms, as Paul was using in I Corinthians 5:7, we are truly unleavened. That is our state, our status, our condition, before God at all times—as long as we continue in a relationship with the Father through Jesus Christ. We are in a continual state of un-leavened-ness before Him.

Next on the timeline, comes the Feast of Unleavened Bread. And it focuses on the removal of sin from our lives.

Even though the Father looks on us as truly unleavened, He gives us the wonderful gift of a feast that focuses on removing leaven and consuming the unleavened. He knows that this grace we are under is His acceptance of Christ’s sacrifice in our behalf, but we are still human. And being human we are still sinful creatures.

What the state of being truly unleavened does is it gives us a chance to grow. It gives us an opportunity to be unleavened as much as possible as a human being can be unleavened.

Protestant preachers, seeing “we are truly unleavened,” do not get this. They will tell you that Christ did it all for us. That is, once the blood of Christ is applied to us, we are saved for all time—once saved, always saved. They may put it in the sense of, we are sanctified fully and completely at the cross, and there is no need for further sanctification. It has all been done.

Who should carry more weight with true Christians: Paul, or Protestant preachers? Paul says that though we are truly unleavened, we still must purge out the old leaven right away so that we can become a new lump. Who is right? Paul? Or the people who want to make it easy to be a Christian?

Though we are truly unleavened in the eyes of God because He has given us grace, we still must still purge ourselves of sin.

As I have said, here, this is what Paul calls being under grace. Turn back to Romans 6 and we will see this. We are breaking into the middle of the sentence:

Romans 6:6 . . . knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin.

In baptism, which is the major subject here, we die to that old man and are raised to newness of life, coming out of the water; we then stop being slaves of sin, and now we are slaves of righteousness.

Romans 6:7 For he who has died has been freed from sin.

A death pays the penalty for the sin. And so, we symbolically go through a death in baptism where we accept Christ’s death on our behalf. And when we come up, we are freed from that penalty of sin that has been on us, because Christ has paid it. Down to verse 11:

Romans 6:11-12 Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts.

Do not listen to sin! Now that you have been freed from it, now that you are no longer slaves to it, do not listen to it! Do not take orders from it, because you now have a new Master.

Romans 6:13 And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.

Greet your new Master and do what He says. Present yourself to God, saying, “God, I am here to do Your will. My members, and everything I have, all that is “me” is now going to be focused on doing what You want me to do”—righteousness toward God.

Romans 6:14 For sin shall not have dominion over you, . . .

Meaning, it is no longer your master. It is no longer calling the shots in your life. Why?

Romans 6:14 . . . for you are not under law . . .

Once God has, through Jesus Christ, had that penalty removed, then you are not under the law, which is going to kill us because we break it, and bring the penalty upon ourselves,

Romans 6:14 . . .for you are not under law but under grace.

You are now moved into a special category because God has looked at you and accepted you because you have accepted His Son. And so, He puts you in a special category—on a pedestal—My Son’s blood continues to cover you.

Now, because of our gratitude, we are under obligation to do what our new Master says. And as long as we continue trying to do what our new Master says, then we continue to be under grace. And when we sin—which we will do—He will gladly have the blood of Christ cover that sin, because we are continuing to try to do what He says. We are still striving to be like His Son. And so, we can be maintained in that state of grace as long as we are maintaining that relationship and moving forward.

Continuing on:

Romans 6:15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? Certainly not!

God did not give His Son for us to be saved and then for us to continue to sin and sin, repudiating the very sacrifice that was given for us. That is stupid! No! God did not call us and save us, so that we could continue to sin.

Romans 6:16 Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one's slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness?

He sets up two poles here: At one point, you were slaves of sin, and you did what it said, because you were its slave, and it was your master. And that is what slaves and masters do. Masters give orders, and slaves obey them.

But now you have been freed from all that, that has been put away. Now you are over here in a new category, where you are now a slave to righteousness, to what is righteous under the law of God, in the Word of God, or the righteousness as seen in Jesus Christ. We are slaves to God and what He wants us to do! We are in this new category, and we need to obey the commands of our Master.

Romans 6:17 But God be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered.

Again, that is in the past tense. You were delivered from all that in the past, and we can now thank God that He has put us into this new category.

Romans 6:18-19 And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. [We are still slaves; we are still under authority. We are now servants of the Great God.] I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness, and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness.

Put the same amount of effort you had put into your life of sin, and maybe more so, into a life of righteousness and goodness that will lead to the holiness of God. You can at least do that, can you not?

Romans 6:20 For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.

Now Paul flips it over. When were servants of sin, you were free from all of the commands, injunctions, all the standards of righteousness God wants for all. You did not feel compelled at all to obey those things, because you wanted to have fun, to sin, to do whatever you wanted to do. So he flipped it around, and shows it from the other side.

But now, we are slaves of righteousness, and we need to be doing all what righteousness dictates. So he asks: What was the effect?

Romans 6:21 What fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed?

Did you really like the results of being a slave of sin? Did it really make you happy? Did it really produce anything that was good? He is asking us to be serious here and think about the difference in lifestyle and the results of that lifestyle. Which is better for you?

And so, he goes on to explain:

Romans 6:21-22 For the end of those things is death. But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God [which might sound bad that you are still a slave, so he said,] you have your fruit [the results; the end of this] to holiness, and the end, everlasting life.

So, the difference is slave to sin—death; on the other hand, slave to God and His righteousness—holiness and everlasting life! Which would you rather have?

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

That is the difference!

We truly are unleavened because we have made that commitment. And God has honored that commitment by placing the blood of Jesus Christ upon us to cover our sins. And so, we are in a state of, then, where we can obey the commands of our new Master and live for righteousness.

Christ’s sacrifice was so tremendously effective that it is truly, “Once for all!” You can find that in Hebrews 9:12, 26-28. It says there several times that He did it once for all. He does not need to continually give Himself over and over again for sin, because His sacrifice was so costly that it covers all sin for everyone for all time! So, it can also cover us continually from our acceptance of it at our baptism, until we die, just so long as we maintain our relationship with the Father and with the Son.

As long as we keep going to Them and are continually making the effort at growing and overcoming, and trying to do what God wants us to do, then He maintains that covering over us; we maintain our state of grace under Him.

We are under God’s grace, God’s favor the whole time. We are not under the penalty of breaking the law, and therefore we are not under the penalty of death.

But now that we are freed from the penalty, and freed from our slavery to sin, we are equally obligated to live righteously to God. So that means, that out of gratitude to God for what He is done for us, we are required to live the sinless life of Christ. That is what we traded for. We trade our slavery to sin and all of its bad effects, for the slavery to God—slavery to righteousness—slavery to the life of Christ, and eternal life!

Because we are slaves to righteousness we must do as righteousness dictates. That is the deal we made. And this all leads to true holiness and eternal life.

But we are still human, right? And we still sin. That is just a fact of life. It is an unavoidable thing. We are not strong enough. So what happens? Turn with me to I John 1. We will read quite a bit here down through chapter 2, verse 6.

Notice how John opens up his epistle to explain this very fact [we still sin]:

I John 1:1-3 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life—the life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us—that which we have seen and heard we declare to you. . .

He is saying, “Look, I’m an original apostle. And with my fellow apostles we saw Jesus Christ, the Word of life. We saw Him in everything. We heard His words. We touched Him. We had all these experiences with Him in concentrated form for the length of His ministry. And what we are doing now” (what John is doing now is letting you know what the Word of Life is like, and how He lived). “We are passing it along. We are doing our job. That’s why we were witnesses; why He was manifested to us, and we in turn declare it to you.”

I John 1:3 . . . that you also may have fellowship with us; . . .

“We want to be of the same mind; be of the same understanding. We want to all be in agreement—in one accord—and so as an apostle who saw Him in the flesh, and how He acted and what He said, I pass it on to you, so that you know it all too, and we can all agree, and we can all talk to one another, and move forward together.”

I John 1:3 and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.

“In doing this, and becoming part of the church, and all of that, we now join the greater circle, which includes God the Father and Jesus Christ, so that we’re all in agreement now. We all know the same things, we have all had the same ideas of righteousness and goodness manifested to us, we all know what we have to do so we can all be together in one group, church, family—the Body of Christ.”

I John 1:4 These things we write to you that your joy may be full . . .

“If we all know these things, and we all begin doing them, we have boundless joy because of their fruits.”

I John 1:5 This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.

Now, he is setting up these two poles again that God is light, and we need to be moving toward that light. There is no darkness in that light. But where we come from there is a lot of darkness. So, we are on our way from one end of the spectrum to the other.

I John 1:6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.

You are not living the life that was revealed to you in Jesus Christ. If you are in darkness, you need to be moving toward the light.

I John 1:7 But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.

If we are on that trajectory toward the light, then the blood of Jesus Christ continues to cleanse us from all sin.

I John 1:8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

Do not fool yourselves by saying you do not have sin. We do have sin. We just have the “good fortune” of having the blood of Christ covering us. But that still means that in our character, we still have sin we need to get out.

I John 1:9 If we confess our sins [if we are truthful about our sins, and willing to tell God “I’m sorry, I do have sin, I need it covered again, I did this, I did that, I truly don’t want to do it, and I’m taking steps to change my way so that I don’t do it again], He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

He wants to forgive us! He wants us to maintain that state of grace with Him, because He wants us in His Kingdom. And so, He is going to do what it takes to give us all that we need to make it there. And if we slip up, He is willing to forgive us our sins if we admit them; dust ourselves off and move forward.

I John 1:10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.

Trying to say that you are lily white and have no sin at all, then you are lying to yourself, and to God, which is another sin too. Obviously, His Word is not really working in you if you do this as it should.

I John 2:1 My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin.

We do not want to sin, and so he is writing to these people to tell them how to avoid it.

I John 2:1-2 And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.

His atoning power is so much that it covers every sin. So, we can always go before Him. We already have a relationship with Him and can have that sin removed as far as east is from the west.

I John 2:3-4 Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He who says, "I know Him," and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.

Now he is adding things that we understand, things that refer to the Days of Unleavened Bread—keeping His commandments, doing what is right, and living an unleavened life.

I John 2:5-6 But whoever keeps His word, truly the love of God is perfected in him. By this we know that we are in Him [that we keep His Word, and that we are being perfected in the love of God. That is how we know that we are in Him.] He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked.

Because we have been covered by the blood of Christ, and because we are in this state of grace, and because we have a relationship with the Father and the Son, then we ought to be walking that walk. We are not off the hook. We still have a job to do.

Now, allow me to paraphrase very wildly John 2:3-6 (above): John says,

“Alright! What do we do while we’re living under God’s favor? Just live as we always have? No! If we truly know Him, if we have a relationship with Him, we will do our best to keep His commandments. A ‘’Christian’ who does not keep God’s commandments is a liar! In fact, he’s really not a Christian! If we are true Christians we will keep His commandments, His Word. And by practicing the right way of life that They define, that is, the commandments, the love of God will grow and bear fruit in us, which is proof that we truly are in a relationship with Him. In a nutshell, this is living just as Jesus did.”

Paul and John agree! We truly are unleavened while we are living in Christ. We are under God’s favor! But this does not mean that we cannot sin (because we can), and it does not mean that our sins are not counted against us (because they are). We must still make the effort of identifying our sins and purging them from us by seeking God’s forgiveness and repenting of them. That is still required of us even though we are under grace.

God gives us a little leeway to help us understand so that we can continue to grow. We do not get the death penalty immediately, as it were. We are in this special category—His favor.

So, this making an effort to identify and purge our sins, along with practicing God’s way that we see in His Word, is how we grow; how we become perfected; how we are completed by Jesus Christ and prepared for the eternal life in His Kingdom. That is what this state of grace does. It puts us under the proper conditions for growth, and completing what God wants to complete in us within a relationship with Him.

Let us finish and turn to Ephesians 5. Of course, this is in a section we usually go to when we speak about husbands and wives, and their relationship with one another. But here we have this laid out for us to easily see:

Ephesians 5:25-27 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for it, that He might sanctify [there is that word to set us apart to make us holy] and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word [not just in baptism, but through a life lived with God and Christ under grace. Christ gave Himself for us first so that it could happen, then puts us in this state. Why?], that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.

That is what He is working toward. That is why He has set things up in this way so that we can have the blood of Christ placed on us as a past completed action, that also covers us throughout the entire journey so we can end up in this position before God and Jesus Christ in glory, perfect and holy.

This should give us great joy and hope as we move forward in Christ. The greatest sacrifice ever made was done to make us holy and pure before God so that in time we can live forever with Him and the Father in glory.

You are truly unleavened! We owe Him our devotion to remain that way.

RTR/rwu/drm