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

Questions:
1. Why is death the outcome of sin?
2. Why is it expressed as a wage?

Death the outcome of sin

We see the nature of mankind’s sin described in Genesis 3. Verse 5 shows the temptation was to “be like God”, leading them to decide they knew better than God, with result being separation from God. In verse 8 they, “hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God.”

This pattern of rebellion, of putting ourselves in the place of God, leading to separation from Him and isolation from His wonderful gifts, was repeated with each subsequent generation. Genesis 11:4 shows that in the building of the Tower of Babel, the temptation was to have a tower “that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves.”

As God is the creator and sustainer of all life, mankind’s choice to separate themselves from Him also results in the disaster of physical death, which is completely due to our own choice.

Death as a wage

A wage is what we earn or merit through our own effort.
Death and separation from God are not freely given by God. In fact, we were created to have a perfect life in communion with Him.
But mankind’s effort has been to put ourselves in the place of God and do things for ourselves. And our striving against God simply achieves or earns the result of death and separation from Him.

Slavery

Romans ch. 6 shows another outcome of our efforts, which is the loss of our ability to choose the perfect life for which God created us.

Like a toxic drug, the experience of sin destroyed our righteous sense, and enslaved us to continue to choose sin, in contrast to God’s revelation in his Law of what a righteous life is like.

And that slavery can even lead our best efforts into the sin of putting ourselves in the place of God:

• If we decide things will get better if we make our faith stronger (it’s a gift from God); or
• That we need to reorganise the church with our own management expertise (the church is the body of believers in Christ across all space and time); or
• We can make more converts with a new program we devise (we don’t convert, that is the Holy Spirit);
• And I was reminded today of how some churches try to take on the decision of who is to be sanctified and called saints (that is the work of God – Hebrews 10:10 reads, “we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.”)

But God has provided a way for us to be freed from that slavery through Jesus. It involves no effort or wages whatsoever from us, it is given to us freely in Jesus, we simply receive His righteousness and everlasting life through faith in Him.

Praise God!