Week 1, Day 3

Day 3
Romans 6:1-11 & Romans 13:11-14

I've been reading the New Living Translation the last few days, mostly because it was the first translation I came across on the shelf at home, but also because I enjoy it's straightforward language from time to time. It translates Paul's me genoita in Greek as "Of course not!" I like that. Of course we don't go on sinning so that grace may abound. That would be ridiculous.

Dying to sin: Do we really? I mean, do we really kill off that part of us that's "prone to wander" as the great hymn Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing puts it? When we consider baptism, we seldom focus on "dying to sin" or "dying with Christ." These are the texts of the Bible that make we wonder if we're missing something by practicing infant baptism. Sure, sure, I know that the sacrament isn't about us, but rather about God. But, I wonder just when it is that we encourage folks in our churches to die with Christ and be "reborn" for new lives. In our focus on continual conversion, do we miss out on an opportunity to pass out the new clothes that Paul talks about in Romans 13:12?

"Clothe yourselves with the armor of right living, as those who live in the light."

As for the question in the book: How can we put on the Lord Jesus Christ in our lives? I do think that's a question that needs to be asked everyday. How can we embody Jesus and wear him on our sleeve in such a way that nobody would ever doubt whose team we're on? Here are a few quick possibilities, many of them taken from the minds/mouths of other folks:

• Seek first understand and then to be understood
• Spend enough time with Scripture so that its stories become our framing stories/defining narratives
• Be peacemakers
• Judge not, lest ye be judged
• Live simply so others may simply live

Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving everyone.