“Now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 6:22-23
We have reached the end of Romans 6, where Paul considers what it means to be a slave to sin versus being a slave to God. Before we move on to today’s passage, we would be remiss if we failed to mention that when we speak of being a slave to God, we are not to understand it in terms of any of the degradations of slavery in even its most benign forms….
Paul is aware that the analogy he is using does not correspond precisely to the reality of first-century slavery; hence, the qualifier that he speaks “in human terms” in verse 19. In the Old Testament categories that are the background of the Apostle’s teaching, being God’s slave or servant is the highest honor possible. Moses, Joshua, David, and, most preeminently, the Messiah are all servants of the Lord (Deut. 34:5; Judg. 2:8; Ps. 18; Isa. 53). Thus, to be a slave or servant of God is to fulfill the purpose for which we were made.