Rom 6:16-20 | JFB | STEP | 15-16. What then? ... Know ye not-- it is a dictate of common sense.

‏ Romans 6:16-20

15-16. What then? ... Know ye not--it is a dictate of common sense.

17. But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of Sin--that is, that this is a state of things now past and gone.

but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you--rather, "whereunto ye were delivered" (Margin), or cast, as in a mould. The idea is, that the teaching to which they had heartily yielded themselves had stamped its own impress upon them.

18. Being then--"And being"; it is the continuation and conclusion of the preceding sentence; not a new one.

made free from Sin, ye became the servants of--"servants to"

Righteousness--The case is one of emancipation from entire servitude to one Master to entire servitude to another, whose property we are (see on Ro 1:1). There is no middle state of personal independence; for which we were never made, and to which we have no claim. When we would not that God should reign over us, we were in righteous judgment "sold under Sin"; now being through grace "made free from Sin," it is only to become "servants to Righteousness," which is our true freedom.

19. I speak after the manner of men--descending, for illustration, to the level of common affairs.

because of the infirmity of your flesh--the weakness of your spiritual apprehension.

for as ye have yielded--"as ye yielded," the thing being viewed as now past.

your members servants to Uncleanness and to Iniquity unto--the practice of

iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to Righteousness unto holiness--rather, "unto (the attainment of) sanctification," as the same word is rendered in 2Th 2:13; 1Co 1:30; 1Pe 1:2:--that is, "Looking back upon the heartiness with which ye served Sin, and the lengths ye went to be stimulated now to like zeal and like exuberance in the service of a better Master."

20. For when ye were the servants--"were servants"

of Sin, ye were free from--rather, "in respect of"

Righteousness--Difficulties have been made about this clause where none exist. The import of it seems clearly to be this:--"Since no servant can serve two masters, much less where their interests come into deadly collision, and each demands the whole man, so, while ye were in the service of Sin ye were in no proper sense the servants of Righteousness, and never did it one act of real service: whatever might be your conviction of the claims of Righteousness, your real services were all and always given to Sin: Thus had ye full proof of the nature and advantages of Sin's service." The searching question with which this is followed up, shows that this is the meaning.