Greyfriars & New Hope Church Greyfriars & New Hope Church

Sunday 23rd June, 9:30 service, Chris Hall.

The law was given so that the people of God might know who He was and to live lives that reflect His goodness and holiness. The law provides a definition of sin for us. The law was in and of itself “holy, righteous and good”, but sin twists it into something it is not.

Sin ultimately changes what is good until it leads to death. It can even deceive us into believing that what is good is actually death. Paul here argues against this, saying that the effects of sin lead us to calling sin what it is, and knowing its ultimate effect.

Sunday 16th June, 9:30 service, Natalie Worsfold.

Paul changes his imagery here, using the death of a husband to illustrate the effect of the law. The law had the people of God bound while they were still alive. In the same way a married woman is released from the bond if her husband died, as we died to the law in Christ were released from the law so that we might bear fruit.

It’s important with this section to also read what comes next. Paul isn’t arguing that the law is sinful in this passage, but is saying that we are no longer bound to it. Instead we are bound to God, and to one another in “the new way of the Spirit”.

Sunday 9th June, 9:30 service, George Eapen.

Earlier in the chapter, Paul sets the theological framework: that because Jesus died and rose again so we are dead to sin and alive to His life. In this part of the chapter, Paul begins to unpack what that life looks like when it’s lived out.

We might be tempted to think that because we live under grace, that we have free license to sin and live however we want to. Paul compares this idea to slavery. That in living in sin, we become obedient to it. Instead, we are to be slaves to righteousness, fully obedient to what righteousness asks of us. We don’t have to work to become righteous, but we live from a place of knowing our righteousness is won for us.

Sunday 2nd June, 6:30 service, Chris Hall.

We are dead to sin. It no longer has a claim or any power over us. Jesus is alive and so are we. Paul uses baptism to illustrate his point in this passage: as we go under the water we are buried with Him, and we are born to the new life He won for us in His resurrection.

The penalty for sin is death, and as death is defeated so sin has lost its power. We are resurrection people who live in the life that Jesus now lives. There is no going back, Jesus cannot die again and His life is fully to God. We are called to live in that same life.

Sunday 26th May, 9:30 service, Alyssa Carey.

We are made righteous through Jesus. Although we were made sinners through the actions of Adam, we have been justified through Jesus and His obedience to God. There is no depth of sin that grace won’t meet us in as a result. This grace and righteousness ultimately leads us into eternal life.
Righteousness and justification are words that carry a lot of weight and meaning that people might not understand. What are righteousness and justification, and what is the link between them and grace?

Sunday 19th May, 9:30 service, David Walker.

Paul starts this section with a reminder of where we’ve been: that we are all under sin and death which came to us through Adam. Since the fall death has come to all people even before the law was given. But, as many died through Adam, how much more are we saved through Jesus?
We are given the free gift of grace and righteousness which reigns in our lives because of Jesus’s obedience to the cross. He is the new Adam and through the events of His death we see Him undo the curse that was placed on us in Genesis. How might we still think we are under death, when we have actually been won to life? What does it mean for us to receive this free gift?