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Oneness with Christ • Oct 21st 1987

Romans – The Play Part 2: Oneness with Christ — Dead to Sin, Alive to God

New Testament Paul the Apostle The Epistles

One of the most profound truths in the Christian life is the believer’s union with Jesus Christ. In this powerful teaching from Romans 6, Gene Edwards explores what it truly means to be “in Christ” and why the gospel offers far more than forgiveness of sins.

Many believers struggle with guilt, condemnation, and an ongoing focus on personal failure. Yet Paul presents a radically different perspective. Instead of motivating Christians through fear, law, or self-effort, he points to a spiritual reality that occurred at conversion: believers were united with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection.

Drawing directly from Romans 6, this message examines Paul’s startling response to the question, “If salvation is by grace, why not continue in sin?” His answer is not a list of rules or religious obligations. Instead, he reveals a deeper truth: those who belong to Christ have died to sin because they have been made one with Him.

Gene carefully explains the biblical concept of union with Christ, emphasizing that believers were immersed into Christ Himself. When Christ died, believers died with Him. When He rose from the dead, believers rose with Him. This new identity fundamentally changes a Christian’s relationship to sin, guilt, condemnation, and spiritual growth.

This teaching also addresses the difference between conviction and general guilt, helping believers understand the freedom that comes from living in Christ rather than under constant self-accusation. Through vivid illustrations and practical application, Gene shows how faith accepts spiritual realities that cannot be seen with natural eyes.

If you have ever wondered what it means to be dead to sin, alive to God, or truly free in Christ, this study offers a life-changing perspective on the believer’s identity and inheritance in Jesus Christ.

This session is part of the Romans series and provides foundational insight into grace, justification, Christian identity, and the believer’s union with Christ.

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Hated – the corpse didn’t know it.  Beaten – the corpse didn’t know it.  Despised and cursed – the corpse didn’t know it.

Madame Maintenon don’t live here no more. Death had severed her from all of those things.

So here we are now – dead to sin.

Now that’s sin’s view. Sin cannot find you to enslave you. But from yet another view: you’re walking down the road, being pulled by sin, and you look up and see a cross. And something radically changes. And you turn around and you see a grave, and the grave says:

“Here lies sin and its power.” You are freed from sin. And you look up and you see the One who died on the cross—and you yield to Him.

From sin’s viewpoint, you’re dead. You’re in the grave. Sin cannot locate you. It looks everywhere—and you are gone. You have died. Sin cannot find you.

And from your viewpoint, sin has gone into the grave and died. And you have risen into a new realm. And there is a new master: Christ.

Once you had yielded these hands to sin. Once you had yielded these eyes to sin.

Yield them again to a new master. Yield them again to a new master.

Up until this point—I tell you, this is all that is required of that one who, like Abraham, has believed on that which he cannot see and cannot even fully understand, except he believed that his seed would live. Though he was dead, he believed he would live. Now will you just believe that you are dead, and that you will live, and that you have risen from the dead, just as Abraham’s body rose from the dead and a seed was in it?

Now believe, and all that you do now is you do the same thing you used to do—just yield to a different person. How could you, who are one with Christ, dare to even consider being again a slave to sin?

And dear brother and sister, I am 55 years old, and I am telling you. I have watched believers. And I’m talking about believers who believe. Believers who love. Believers who love Him. I have seen them leave the church. I have seen them leave this and that and the other. But I want you to know: most of those that I have run around with in my lifetime have never returned to being a slave to sin.

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