Focus on Christ

Read Romans 6:1-14
Theme: Salvation available to all by faith.
Title in NIV: Be dead to sin and alive to Christ.

The concept of being dead to sin and alive to Christ is a hard one.  It is so hard because we cannot separate our fleshly body from our spiritual body. We try and try to live by the Spirit but we fail and fail. Of course we fail, we are waring against our flesh every day. Our flesh and spirit are in conflict with each other all the time. We can't get away from our fleshly nature.

Our focus is the key. If we are focused on Christ Jesus and baptized into his death, we are dead to sin and alive in Christ.  Since we are united with Christ we also share in his resurrection. We share in the sense that our sin is nailed to the cross. (Christ took our sin and it was nailed it to the cross for us...in our place).   So, our old self, our fleshly nature is nailed to the cross and done away with. So, we are no longer a slave to our sinful fleshly nature even though we have to live with our flesh. Our sinful flesh has died with Christ and we live a new life. Our focus is on Christ and not on satisfying our flesh. We try to satisfy Christ in us instead.

Verse 10 says, "The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God." We should also count ourselves dead to sin and alive in Christ. If we have a focus on Christ, we deny our flesh and do not allow sin to control and master us. Of course we will still sin: gossip, judge, offend, etc. But the difference is we DON'T want to do those thing and we try our hardest to NOT feel those things. We try to be instruments of Christ instead of instruments of wickedness. We allow Christ to be our master and not allow sin to be our master.

Verse 14 gives us a reason to focus on Christ and not our flesh. We have received grace. Grace is the undeserved love and salvation God gives. Focus on grace and not the 'rules'. Grace is something we receive as a gift- for doing nothing at all except believing in Jesus Christ. Some people have a problem receiving such a huge gift for free. But, I have learned that the people who can accept their gift that is held out to them, are more at peace, are happier, are more joyful and are nicer to be with. They seem to have a noticeable non-judgmental attitude, they seem to be more accepting of those who are different, and seem to be more willing to serve.

If you really think about it, you can tell where a person's focus lies just by talking to them. If they are Christ-focused, they will portray the qualities just described. When a person talks to you, what qualities do you want others to see. When you walk away from someone, what do you want them to say about you. Will they say you are focused on Christ and others or focused on yourself and your problems?