Are You Living to Die, or Dying to Live?

 Romans 6:3-11

Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?    Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin.  Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him.  For the death that He died, He died to sin, once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.  Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

Sermon for the Sixth Sunday After Trinity                                      7/27/25

Are You Living to Die, or Dying to Live?

My Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

Shakespeare once wrote that the coward dies a thousand deaths, but the brave man dies but once.  Of course, he was talking about the way fear works on a person.  If you are a coward, you imagine that death over and over again.  A brave man only faces death when he actually faces it.

But we can die more than once.  Many do and will.  First, there is the death of the body.  Everyone gets to do that one.  The Bible speaks of "the second death" in the book of Revelation.  By that, Scriptures mean eternal damnation.   There is one other death we could add in here, the death our text speaks of, the death which is "in connection with Christ Jesus." That is a death which every Christian – and only Christians – die.  But that death is really already past for those who believe and have been baptized.  So the only question is, are you living to die or dying to live?

On the face of it, the question sounds silly.  If you were already dead, it seems that you would not be here listening to the sermon and taking part in the service.  Even if you were going to ask that question, you would probably reverse the two clauses and ask if someone was going to die, first.  The reason the question applies is that the text talks about dying with Christ in Baptism – or literally  hav[ing] been buried with Him through baptism into death.  The latter, Paul writes about how we have been crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with.  That was accomplished by our Baptism.

Now in a sense, we each face two deaths.  We will all die physically, unless the Lord returns first.  But the death of the body for the Christian is a release from this world of corruption and pain into eternal life, not actually death at all, if we are to believe what the Bible teaches – and we are!  So we who have died with Christ by means of Baptism have done our dying.  Our death is in the past in every important sense, except in the sense for which we hold funerals.  Those who do not believe and will not be baptized still face death of the body, and the second death, as future realities of tremendous significance and power, for the second death means eternal death and hell for he or she who does not believe.

Our text addresses what theologians call the Mystical Union – although Paul never used those words in our text..  The Mystical Union is our union with Christ through Baptism.  It is called "mystical", which, according to the dictionary, means it deals with A) things not open to human sense, B) a spiritual event, and C) it refers to contact and communion with God.  That is the sense of "mystical" we intend when we talk about the mystical union.

In our Baptism, we are connected to Christ.  Our union with Him is as real as the pew you are sitting in, but it is not as tangible.  Whether you know it or not, your Baptism linked you to Jesus Christ.  What is true of Jesus as true Man is true of you, although not in the same way necessarily.  We share in His holiness, His death, and His life – and in a way we cannot clearly define or perceive.  We also share in all that He has done and will do.

For example, we are united with Jesus Christ in connection with His death.   We died with Him and were buried with Him, although we did not die physically, yet.  It is a very real thing – Paul writes that our old self was crucified with Him.   And yet we do not feel it.  That is part of the glory of the Gospel.   That is also part of what we mean when we say that Jesus died in our place.  The death He died was our death - actually our death because of the Mystical Union.

And we are united with Him also in connection with His resurrection!  Our spirits have already died and been "born again" – yes, that is what the term means, not some human decision, but a real death and a real re-birth.  We have eternal life already, but we still wait the physical, bodily sharing in the resurrection.  It is this Mystical Union which makes the resurrection of our bodies so certain!  The body of those who have been raised from the dead in connection with Christ cannot remain in the grave!  It too shall rise!

Our Baptism unites us with Jesus in connection with His life!  Because He lives, we shall also live.  We have been linked by Baptism in the Mystical Union with Christ.  When He died, we died.  When He rose from the grave, we rose also.  As long as He lives, we must also live.  This is the Gospel promise.

It is also, in part, how forgiveness works: we should no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin.  When you die, sin no longer has a hold of you.  Since you died with Christ, in your Baptism, your sin is gone.  Jesus took it.  You have died and those sins have no further claim on you for death or hell or anything.

This Mystical Union is the mechanical description of how the Gospel works.  We live in union with Jesus Christ.  It also has certain implications for us.  It means some things about our lives and how we live them, and how we cannot live them, for we are united with Jesus Christ and we cannot be and cannot do what Jesus cannot be and what Jesus cannot do.

First, we live in newness of life, according to our text.  That is the result of being united with Christ.  We are no longer slaves of sin.  We cannot be, for we are united in connection with Jesus Christ who has conquered sin, and is freed from sin.  No matter how it feels, the reality that the Word of God reveals is that we are no longer slaves to sin, ergo, a newness of life.  That slavery was broken in our Baptism.  Verse 14 says plainly,  Sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law, but under grace.  You may have noticed the lack of weasel words here.  It doesn't say that sin should not be master, or may not be, but sin shall not be master!

Secondly, we have been set free from sin.  Although it sounds like I am saying the same thing again, I am not.  We have not only the power to resist sin through our Baptism, we have been set free from the power of sin to accuse us and condemn us, as I mentioned earlier.  That is the very Gospel!  Again, this is part of that mystical thing - meaning it doesn't always feel like this.  That is why Romans 6:11 says to consider yourselves to be dead to sin.  That means to count yourself dead to sin, even when it doesn't feel like you are.  It will feel quite the opposite.  But when we allow ourselves to sin, particularly deliberate sins and on-going, life-style sins like stealing, adultery, homosexuality, grumbling, and gossip, when we surrender to sin, we are doing something unnatural and potentially very deadly to our new life in connection with Christ, for we cannot force Christ into sin again.

Our union with Christ also means that we are alive forever already – death is no longer master over Christ, so it is no longer master over us!  As long as we live in connection with Christ -- and that connection was established for us in our Baptism -- we shall not die.  We cannot, even though our flesh – our bodies – will surely die one day.

Of course, all of this good news is predicated on the Mystical Union with Christ which God established in our Baptism.  But this is not to teach, nor do we believe, any doctrine of eternal security which says that once you have a relationship with Jesus, you cannot possibly fall away.  There is no ‘once saved, always saved." All of this applies only to Christians.  Either you are a Christian, or you are not.  Wishful thinking, feelings, and personal proclamations have no relevance here.  Many people like to fool themselves about this.  They don't believe anything in particular about Jesus, or their relationship to Him, but they like to think that somehow they are still Christian.  Some don't go to church, but they think they have some sort of indelible stain of Christ on them.  Some people go to church all the time, but it has no effect on their lives or their behavior.  They think that it is all about going.  Their sacrifice for Christ is that hour or two on Sunday.  The truth is, either you are a Christian or you are not.  Christians are in connection with Christ, and all others are not.  It really isn't that hard to tell – you trust God, you hope in Jesus Christ you live in repentance and forgiveness – or you just pretend something.

Which brings us to the question of your death.  Are you living to die or dying to live?  Our text says that either you have died with Christ or you will surely die in sin.  Now, none of us is perfect and without sin, even as Christians.  But those who have died with Christ have also risen with Him to walk in newness of life.

Either you have died to sin or are dead to God.  Since Adam and Eve, we are born naturally dead to God. Dead to sin, on the other hand, is a matter of faith and trust and life.  Living comfortably in sin of any sort, from murder and fornication to grumbling, gossip, and foul language, any sin will surely mark you as one who is not dead to sin.  We can be at peace about former sins of which we have repented, for they have been forgiven, but we cannot afford to even be casual about present sins and temptations and lusts.  That is why Christians are always struggling to put to death the deeds of the flesh, to do all that we can to be sure that sin has no power over us and that our lives are controlled by Christ, that we remain in connection with Christ, and not under the control of our sins and lusts.

Either you walk in newness of life or you are dead even while you live.  It is fair to say that a Christian lives like a Christian, behaves like a Christian, or they are not Christian.  This type of behavior is that life of repentance that Luther wrote about in the 95 Theses.  It is true that the behavior and the works do not make us Christian, or save us, but we cannot happily live on in sins – ignoring the Word of God, for example, or regularly choosing not to gather together with the body Christ, or doing that which we know God has condemned – and remain a Christian.  It may work for a short while, but living as a slave to sin will destroy faith and mark you as one who is dead to Christ and alive to sin.

Christian virtues and Christian goodness are signs of the life of Christ within us.  The good works a Christian does are evidences that he is alive, and in connection with Christ Jesus.  Every sort of life, be it physical or spiritual, is invisible and intangible in and of itself, but it always shows itself to be present by a thousand activities – hair grows, it breathes, it moves, it does things – activities which are all absent in death. 

To sum it up, either your death is past or your death is future, so, are you living to die or dying to live?  The Christian has already died – in connection with Christ s death.  Only the unbeliever and the hypocrite has a real death, filled with horror and pain, ahead to look forward to.  Like the brave man in Shakespeare, we who believe only die once.  We who have been Baptized into Christ know that we have died with Christ and have eternal life even now.  Our death is past - and this life in connection with Christ is our future forever.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.

(Let the people say Amen)