The Human Heart
Pastor C. R. Stan
December 3, 1967 marked a milestone in medical history. Dr. Christian Barnard of Cape Town, South Africa successfully performed the first human heart transplant. This was followed a short time later by a similar heart transplant by Dr. Michael Debakey of Houston, Texas. These early transplants were only moderately successful because the patients' natural defense systems began attacking the new hearts as foreign invaders. With the use of trial and error, advanced technology, and better anti-rejection drugs, the outlook for heart transplant patients improved. Meanwhile, the heart surgeons who were icons in the medical community now became media superstars and they used that publicity well to raise funds for their heart clinics.
While being interviewed on a nationally televised talk show, Dr. Debakey told of the intricacy of the human heart and then added, "Only God can create a human body." While these doctors were catapulted to almost god like status, they had to confess that there was much they did not know about the heart and could, at best, only promise their patients a limited number of quality years.
God and Man's Heart
As we read the pages of the Holy Bible, we soon learn that God Himself also specializes in heart surgery. While He created the physical heart which pumps the blood that keeps us healthy, as the Great Physician, He is much more interested in implanting a new heart in man which will be humble and submissive to His will and which will also bring an eternity of great fulfillment to his soul.
As we search the writings of the Apostle Paul for us Gentiles, there is one passage of Scripture that deals systematically with the mechanics of spiritual heart surgery. Romans chapter six is the "how-to" of the Christians life. Although Paul centers on Christ's crucifixion and resurrection, he does not deal with initial salvation from the punishment of sins which results from forgiveness. He dealt with that previously in Romans 3:21-5:11 with the great themes of sin, judgment, God's love, faith, grace, redemption, justification, and reconciliation. Here he begins to teach on the issue of the believer's sanctification (or separation) with the view to produce fruit unto holiness. It answers the question, "Now that I am saved from the penalty of sin and have eternal life, how can I live a life pleasing to God?"
The answer is nothing short of radical heart surgery. The heart (or "kardia") in Scripture is used to stand for man's entire inner personal life and includes his mental, moral, and spiritual activity. It covers his intellect, emotions, thoughts, desires, conscience, and will. It is the seat of man's sinfulness but also the sphere of divine influence. There is a pure heart and an evil heart of unbelief (2 Timothy 2:22; Hebrews3:12).
Although Paul does not write in terms of the word "heart" in Romans 6, the teaching is surely there in force as he writes of indwelling sin (the old heart) as well as partaking of Christ's resurrection life (the new heart). He begins by raising a rhetorical question which is really an objection raised by his critics concerning what they thought was the "fatal flaw" of his teaching of grace. "Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?" People always raise this question when they begin to grasp the teaching of grace. But instead of rejoicing in it they jump to a wrong conclusion. They think grace teaching takes a soft stance on sin or even gives people a license to continue in it. Paul had written, "But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound" (Romans 5:20). The leGalatiansist reasoned something like this, "Paul, if it is true, as you say, that God's grace increases much more to deal with man's sin, why not continue to allow sin to run free in order for God's grace to shine through even more gloriously." Paul answers with the strongest "No!" in the Greek language. The King James version translates it as "God forbid!" Today we might say, "No, no way!" God protests sin as it is against His holy character. Then he asks his own challenging question, "How shall we that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?" He is not expressing the impossibility of living in sin but rather how illogical and contrary to God's purpose it would be for believers to do so since we have died to it. The reason for the Cross was especially to separate man from his sinning.
The Baptism that Counts
"Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?" How this passage has suffered from the intrusion of a water baptism ritual, thus losing the full force of its teaching! Water is not mentioned in these verses but "read into" by the minds of many. Actually, the word "baptism" in verses four and five means "identification with" or "initiation into" something---in this case, Jesus Christ. To be identified with Christ means that we become one with Him. To be initiated into Christ means that we are united to Him as our Source. This must be a spiritual baptism since a water ceremony could not place us into Christ or be the source of holiness. It is not a baptism into water or a church denomination that makes the difference but a baptism into Christ Himself.
In Bible times, when the color faded from a piece of cloth, they would send it to a fuller and he would dip or immerse the cloth in a dye. After a time, it would be removed and hung up to dry. In the process, the cloth would take on itself the color of the dye and become one with it. Spiritually speaking, we can apply this in a similar way to our baptism into Christ. If one insists on immersion as the definition of baptism, then it is an immersion into Christ. by the Spirit, thus, making us one with Him (1 Corinthians 12:12-13).
This "oneness" extends beyond His death to His burial. and resurrection for verse 4 goes on to say, "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." When Christ died, there is a very real sense in which we died with Him. When He was buried, we were buried with Him. And when He rose from the dead we rose with Him. This actually happened almost 2000 years ago when Christ died and rose again, but it is not made a part of us personally until we believe the gospel of grace.
This is where it starts to get deep because we cannot appeal to human experience to prove this. We do not feel it or perceive it with our senses. The only way that we know about it is by reading about it in the Word of God, and that takes faith. I do not know how God put me to death with Christ two- thousand years before I was born, but I believe it because He said it. The problem is our perspective. We live in the present; God inhabits eternity. We see a little sliver of human history; God sees the end from the beginning. There is nothing too hard for God. Our union to Christ is what Bible teachers refer to as "positional truth." All believers have a present position in Christ as being united with Him in His death, burial, and resurrection.
Perhaps a better word for "buried" in verse four is "entombed" as Christ was not buried under ground but placed in a sepulcher from which you could walk on level ground. This positional truth is more than just theory because Paul takes it and teaches us how we can translate the position into everyday, practical living in righteousness.
The Root and the Fruit
In Romans chapter six, Paul does not address "sins" (plural) but "sin" (singular). "Sins" refer to acts of sin that people commit. (Paul dealt with this in chapters one through five). "Sin" deals with the root source within us that causes us to commit acts of sin. Many Bible students find it helpful to think of sin here as "the sin nature" or as verse six says, "our old man" (self). Sin is the root; sins are the fruit. It is truly wonderful to know that God saved us from the punishment of sins by forgiving our sins (plural) through the blood of the Cross. Now He wants to save us from the power and dominion of sin (singular) in our Christian lives. Christ not only died "for sins," but He also died "unto sin once," thus breaking the power of the sin nature over us.
You may say, "I must have missed something for I know I am saved, but I still struggle a lot with sin. It sure doesn't seem like I am dead to it." Be encouraged for Paul dealt with the same problem (Romans7:15-24). God apparently allowed Paul to experience the failure of Romans chapter seven that he might be an excellent teacher of God's solution in Romans chapters six and eight.
You see, everyone seems to think that the answer to sin in a believer's life is to appeal to will power or to legislate against it. However, Paul wrote " ... to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not" (Romans 7:18b). If the holy apostle could not will the victory over sin, neither can we. Another way is to set up rules and regulations against it, but that only serves to inflame sin within us and provoke it to life. "But sin taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence (evil desire). For without the law sin was dead. For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died" (Romans 7:8-9).
So much for legislating moral goodness. Many have found that when they put up a sign like, "Don't touch wet paint," people are prompted by something within to do that very thing. Then they wise up and print something like "Please don't touch wet paint." Now it is in the form of a polite request rather than an order. Even when the law is successful in restraining outward acts of sin, the sin nature simmers beneath the surface waiting for the opportunity to express itself.
The Grace Way
To overcome sin we must not rely on rules and regulations, the law, will power, or anything in ourselves. The grace way is the only thing effective because it is God's way and the method by which He works in His own children today. "For sin shall not have dominion over you for ye are not under the law but under grace" (Romans 6:14). What Paul teaches here about being dead to sin but alive to God through the resurrection of Jesus Christ was the most valuable lesson he learned from God for complete victory over sin. You might think of it this way: if I were to die today, there would be one positive; I would not be able to sin against God anymore. The negative is that I would not be able to serve Him any more in this life. Similarly, when we receive Christ as Savior, God puts our old self to death (affected by Christ's death) and we become disconnected with our old nature. Thankfully, He doesn't leave us in death but now imparts new life (Christ's resurrection life) to us by which we have strength to serve Him.
Romans 6:5-10 is a further explanation of verses three and four. It does not deal with the future death and resurrection of the body but our current spiritual death and resurrection with Christ.
vs 5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
vs 6 Knowing this, that our old man is (was) crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
vs 7 For he that is dead is free from sin.
vs 8 Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him:
vs 9 Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more: death hath no more dominion over him.
vs 10 For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.
To be "dead to sin" does not mean that sin cannot affect us nor does the fact that "our old man is crucified" with Christ indicate that he no longer bothers us. Dead men affect us every day. Our parents and grandparents affect who we are, how we think, and how we react. Even dead presidents affect us in ways we don't even realize. But we need not be enslaved by a dead man. And we need not be controlled by the old man within that God has put to death.
It may be helpful to think of death as separation. Physical death, for example, is a separation of the spirit from the body. Likewise, the Romans chapter six form of death is a separation of our sin nature from us. When we believed the Gospel, God affected this separation by a spiritual circumcision in which He cut off (or surgically removed) the old heart (self) and a new heart (Christ) was replaced as the life-giving Source. Lack of knowledge, unbelief, and selfishness wait in the shadows to derail our spirituality. The old heart can be reconnected and take control of our lives if we allow our spiritual life to flounder.
A Prophetic Voice and a Contemporary One
The Old Testament prophet Ezekiel spoke of a time in the coming kingdom when his restored people, Israel, will receive their heart transplant. "A new heart also will I give you, and a new Spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them" (Ezek. 36:26-27). Their hard heart will be replaced with a soft heart which will be ready to do His will. While Israel's stony heart will be removed, God, in His wisdom, allows ours to remain within, and while separated, we still have the freedom to yield to its destructive ways. "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the, flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would" {Galatians 5:17).
Years ago, I heard a message on Romans six from Pastor Win Johnson of Denver, Colorado. He spoke at the annual Bible conference of the Berean Bible Fellowship. When the venerable old saint ascended the platform, the first thing he said was, "I wonder if I could amend the title of the message tonight. The title as it appears on the program reads, 'A Change of Masters.' I would like to change it to be 'A Choice of Masters.'" He, was right and I never forgot it. While we do have a change of masters in standing and position before God, it is nevertheless true that in our state and condition in the world, we have a responsibility to reckon it to be true of us personally and to yield ourselves to God as alive from the dead. But we are getting ahead of ourselves.
What Paul says in verse six about "the body of sin being destroyed" doesn't mean that our bodies cannot become the instruments of sin. That notion is dashed by what Paul says in verses twelve and thirteen as well as our own experience. All too often we open the coffin and consult with the old corpse of sin, The word "destroyed" does not mean annihilated but "rendered inoperative" or ineffective. It is potential.
Think of this illustration: Mark and Carol have been married for 15 years. Mark thought that it would be a wonderful wedding anniversary gift if he would surprise her with a new car. When the day came, Carol looked out the front picture window to see a bright, colorful, new car with all the accessories. She was delighted! But then Mark thought of a devious joke to play on her. During the night, he got out of bed, went to the garage, and disconnected the battery to the new car. The next morning, Carol got in the car to head off to work. Mark stood in the kitchen listening and laughing as she tried desperately to start the car. Carol finally walked in the house in tears and said, "Mark, I think we got a lemon!" Mark explained the prank and in a few months she thought it was funny too. The new car was in perfect running order. Mark had just separated it from its power source.
So Christ has positionally separated us from the sinful nature (or old heart) and connected us to Christ with His resurrection life. What God has joined let us not put asunder, and let us not join together what God has separated!
Our Union with Christ and the New Heart
Three Hinges for Better Understanding
Three Hinges for Better Understanding
Three key words will serve as hinges to help us open the door to Paul's teaching in the beginning of this chapter. They are Know - Romans 6:4,6, 9. Reckon - Romans 6:11. Yield - Romans 6:13. So far, the key word has been "know." But knowledge of the way of holiness is not enough to actually reach it. The following verses supply the remaining elements.
11) Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
12) Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.
13) Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. (Romans 6:11-13).
The next key word becomes "reckon." We understand that Christ died to put to death our sin nature and rose again. Now He says, consider it to be true of you personally. Since we are one with Him in His death, burial, and resurrection, reckon that He put the old heart to death and gave you a new resurrection heart that doesn't respond to sin. This is where we get to exercise our faith in what God has said. Notice how many times the phrases "unto sin" and "unto God" are used. Verse eleven describes the position of every believer as dead to sin but alive to God. Verses twelve and thirteen show potential movement toward either sin or God, depending on our choice. The command to "Let not sin reign in your mortal body" shows that it is possible to do so if we fail to reckon.
Let's face it. Sin is pleasurable to the flesh and is still a draw (1Timothy 5:6; Hebrews 11:25). But God wants to draw us to His right hand where there are pleasures forever more. Nothing is more pleasurable and fulfilling than living close to God and honoring the lordship of Christ in our lives. He fills the heart with a peace, love, and joy that eclipses any pleasure that we could experience in sin. And it lasts forever.
The final word is "yield," and it is an act of the will. It is the same word that Paul uses later in Romans 12:1 and is translated "present." "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service." God wants His children to choose God and His righteousness as a continuing lifestyle and yield their eyes, ears, tongue, hands, feet, and entire being to Him as an act of acceptable worship for His name's sake. We do it not out of fear or guilt but because "the love of Christ constrains us to live for Him who died for us and rose again (2 Corinthians 5:14-15). Paul says much more in the remainder of Romans to complement this short introduction to practical holiness but suffice it now to repeat Paul's instruction, "Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh (Galatians 5:16).
When temptation comes, we can speak to ourselves and say, "I am dead to this through Christ's death and alive to God through His resurrection. He has set me free from the task master of sin and I choose to conduct myself in newness of life because of who He has made me to be in Christ." A wise man once said, "When temptation knocks, send Christ to answer it."
In order to have the victory over sin, we must know (the fact of our co-crucifixion and resurrection with Christ), reckon (consider it to be true of us personally), and yield (an act of the will by which we choose to acknowledge the lordship of Christ in our lives). God's divine heart surgery has given us the power to will and to do of His good pleasure (Phil. 2:13). As sons of God, we now have a choice of masters which by knowledge, faith, and commitment will lead to a change of masters in our conduct, faithfulness, and attitude.
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