2026 Pentecost Devotions I
Friday, June 26
Romans 6:12-23
12 Do not let sin reign in your mortal bodies, so that you obey their desires. 13 No longer present your members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and present your members to God as instruments of righteousness. 14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.
15 What then? Should we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! 16 Do you not know that, if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God that you who were slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the form of teaching to which you were entrusted 18 and that you, having been set free from sin, have become enslaved to righteousness. 19 I am speaking in human terms because of your limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and lawlessness, leading to even more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness, leading to sanctification.
20 When you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. 21 So what fruit did you then gain from the things of which you now are ashamed? The end of those things is death. 22 But now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the fruit you have leads to sanctification, and the end is eternal life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
“… 13 No longer present your members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and present your members to God as instruments of righteousness. …”
When I was a kid, I had a BB gun. In and of itself, the BB gun was simply an instrument. When I employed that gun to shoot at targets, I was using the gun in an appropriate way. However, when I used that same gun to shoot at neighborhood cats – I wasn’t a very good shot, so I never hit them – I was using the gun in an inappropriate way.
Paul uses the same logic. In his analogy, you and I are the instruments. Either we are employed in obedience to God’s will and ways which is appropriate (righteously) or we are employed in obedience to sin which is inappropriate (unrighteously).
Taking it one step farther, Paul reminds us that we have been claimed and named by God through the waters of baptism. We have been delivered from sin and death through the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, we are already instruments of God’s grace and mercy. Therefore, while prior to our new life in Christ we could not choose between obedience to God and obedience to sin, because of God’s grace we are not only able to choose obedience but we are empowered and directed to do so.
In other words, because of God’s righteousness, I am now not only able but encouraged and directed to use the BB gun appropriately. No more shooting at cats!
Prayer: Lord, thank You for Your grace. Use me as an instrument of Your love and mercy. Amen.