We do not go on sinning so that grace may increase. Yes, on the one hand, it is right to say that the more someone has sinned, the more they are forgiven. And yet, it is also right to say that someone who has been shown much grace, who has been forgiven many sins, has suffered already in Christ. They’re united to the Lord Jesus; they’ve gone through the experience of death already. They’ve suffered all the hell that they ever need to suffer when they were baptised. And if you’ve died to sin, it doesn’t make sense to live in it any longer. It doesn’t make sense for you to be someone who’s already suffered for the sin that you’ve committed and then to go back to that sin that you suffered for. You’ve already been through the death you deserve, so why would you go back to it?
You’ve been buried just like Jesus was buried—that’s what your baptism was—and you’ve risen from the dead with Jesus, you’ve risen out of the water, and the purpose of you going through all that is so that you can live a new life. No longer someone who is in sin, is in death, is condemned, is disobedient. No, you are now someone who is in Christ, and therefore your whole purpose now is to live a new life, to live a Christ-like life. Now, any sin that a Christian commits after they’re baptized is accounted to Adam, your old self. They don’t count against you; they count against Adam. It’s the remnants of Adam in you that are responsible for that. And yet, we shouldn’t be satisfied with that. We should be actively living in the new life we now have been given.
