Thank You for Your Word, Lord God. I lift up Your Word to You. I lift up this time where we will study this Word together and review the promises, review what You did for us. I thank You for Your Word. Open up Your Word to us, Lord God and reveal the truth—the nuggets—the power of Your Word. Reveal it to us Lord. Let it become life to us—something that changes us, that brings us into Your likeness. Let Your Word do its work. I thank You Lord. I thank You Jesus. Thank You Jesus. Thank You Lord. In Your precious and holy name, Amen.

Romans chapter 6—what a powerful chapter. We could study this chapter for weeks!

I was reading through and looking up key words such as baptism, newness of life, death, resurrection, and the old man; I was cross-referencing what it means to be baptized into Christ—really baptized. You know, when we accept Him, there is the baptism of water where we are immersed in water—there is also a baptism that takes place, one that transforms us. It is not the symbol of our salvation, but it is the life of our salvation lived out before us.

Paul is talking with the Roman believers in chapter 6. He is very concerned for them. He does not want the merging of these doctrines that are starting to spread out in the area to affect these Christians, you know? They are still babes in Christ! Now, Christianity had been around for a couple of decades by then, but they were still babes in Christ and Paul wanted to make sure that they moved from being a babe in Christ into a level of maturity that would prevent these inaccurate doctrines from penetrating.

Paul’s passion is Christ and when he speaks to the people in Rome, when He is speaking to us (and I always read the Bible as though that person is writing that letter to me), we have to factor in what is taking place, historically and spiritually—we have to factor that in as we study the Word of God. But when I read these letters, I think, “Lord, what is it in these letters that You have for me today? Is there something within me that needs to be put down? Is there something within me that I can do to walk into the fullness of Christ, the fullness of what You have for me, the newness oflife? “

What does it mean to walk in the newness of life? In Romans 6:3-5 we read, “Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so, we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection.”

Then, in verse 6 Paul says, “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, and the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.” (Romans 6:3-6 KJV)

So let us go back to the life of Christ because if we are going to walk in the newness of Christ, the life of Christ, the death and resurrection of Christ—which we are being commissioned to do--we need to consider what that means for us today? What does it mean? What type life application are we looking at here? And as I pondered and really prayed over this, I asked, “Lord, what are you saying to me? What are you saying to us?”

He reminded me of what He gave me last year: “Know no bounds.” KNOW NO BOUNDS. And I pondered that, pondered the death and resurrection of Christ. I pondered what it really means to allow myself to be pulled out of the “box” of Christianity, the “box” of this life, the “box” of ministry, and so on. What does it mean to be pulled out of these “boxes” and to really walk in a newness of life?

Let’s look at Christ. When He died on the cross for our sins, He went up to the Throne and He sprinkled His blood on the Mercy Seat. When He did this, He covered our sins—we were baptized into His death. That means we were immersed. If you look up the word “baptism” I am sure that you read that just as a fabric is submerged into the dye, when it comes up, the fabric will have a richer, darker color. Every time you immerse it into the dye, it comes up with a deeper, richer color than before. Depending on what you are trying to do with this fabric, the more times you immerse the fabric in the dye, you will see different color levels and deeper shades.

Think about that. If you were to allow yourself to be immersed in Christ, every time you immersed yourself in Christ you would come up representing a deeper, richer color, a richer representation of who Christ is. If you would allow yourself to be immersed in Him so deeply, each time you would come out representing a deeper and a richer form of Christ.

We were baptized into His death. Nita has shared with us that she is overcoming death. The Lord says I am overcoming death. To overcome death is to face death. There is death of the flesh, there is death of the spirit. There is death that is rooted in our sin that results in our death.

When we allow God to immerse us in His Son, the sin that is upon us dies—it falls off of us. It begins to not matter to us. Its power and its strength loses its grip because the more that we are immersed in Him, the harder it is for the enemy to get his talons into us, so sin loses its power. Paul says, “I die daily.” Daily I take myself to the cross, immersing myself in Jesus, so that death and sin will lose its power over me.

To be continued next week…

Blessings & Love,

Ricci