Be Killing Sin (Rom. 8:13)
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This verse has sometimes been called the most important text on the Biblical teaching about sanctification in the life of the believer. Sanctification is a big, fancy word, but it just refers to how we become progressively more holy and more Christlike in our lives. And surely that is very important. It is, as we shall see, the goal of God’s purpose in saving us: “For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren” (Rom. 8:29). It behooves us then to pay close attention to what our text says. And what does it say? It tells us to kill the sin in our lives. To use the illustration from our last message and to connect it to the previous verse, the flesh is like an alligator that is trying to drag us into a lake and drown us and eat us. Verse 12 tells us that, if by the grace of God we have been rescued from its jaws and brought back to safety, it is crazy to try to go back and find the monster and pet it and feed it. We are not debtors to the flesh to fulfill the lusts thereof.
What then are we to do with this alligator of the flesh? We are to hunt it down and kill it. The Puritan John Owen, who wrote an entire book on this verse called The Mortification of Sin in Believers, said this in it: “Be killing sin or sin will be killing you.” And, “Let not that man think he makes any progress in holiness who walks not over the bellies of his lusts. He who doth not kill sin in this way takes no steps towards his journey’s end.” You have to put the sword to the neck of your lusts.
What does it mean to kill sin? As we consider verse 13, we see that it means, negatively, that we don’t live after the flesh. We don’t serve the sinful nature that is still within us. Though for the believer it no longer rules us, yet it is still there to tempt us, to trouble us, and to deceive us into disobedience to God. It is there to move us away from the good life, the blessed life. We are not to live after it, we are to live after the Spirit, we are to live by faith and obedience to God.
Positively, it means that we “through the Spirit do mortify [an old word that mean to put to death] the deeds of the body.” When Paul calls acts of sin the “deeds of the body,” he is reminding us that sin acts through the body. It may start in the heart, but it will find its way to our hands and feet and mouths. We are reminded of what Paul says back in chapter 3:
As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift to shed blood: Destruction and misery are in their ways: And the way of peace have they not known: There is no fear of God before their eyes. (Rom. 3:10-18)
Throats, tongues, lips, mouths, feet, eyes: these are all the outlets of sin. This is what the apostle means when he talks about the “deeds of the body.” And so when the apostle tells us to put to death the deeds of the body, he is telling us to mortify the sin that is constantly trying to find a way to break out into concrete acts of disobedience. Paul is not of course teaching that the body is itself sin. He is simply reminding us that sin needs to be dealt with on the battleground of our bodies.
And that of course includes our minds and our hearts. You can’t fight sin if you don’t start on the level of the heart. We’ll come back to that in a bit, but it’s good to remind ourselves of that here at the start. This is what our Lord was getting at when he said, “But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: These are the things which defile a man: but to eat with unwashen hands defileth not a man” (Mt. 15:18-20). The mouth may be the place at which sin manifests itself openly, but it doesn’t start there. It began in the heart, and to mortify the deeds of the body will mean that we start with the heart and mind, with the thoughts and the affections.
But this is not all that Romans 8:13 tells us. We remarked on this last time, but it’s well worth it to say it again. The apostle tells us here that this is a life and death struggle. Those who live after the flesh will die, whereas those who put to death the deeds of the body will live. Now this clearly is not talking about the cessation or preservation of our present physical existence, for all, including the holiest of believers, will die in that sense. Neither is this talking about present spiritual death, because this is something that is going to happen to those who are already spiritually dead. Those who are in the flesh, who walk after the flesh are already spiritually dead. They can’t die in that sense because they are already dead in that sense. No, this is talking about something much more serious, namely future, eternal death. This is talking about the judgment which the wicked will receive when they are cast, along with the devil and his angles, into the lake of fire. This is serious. Sin is not something you can play around with and be okay in the end.
Now Paul is not saying that we merit eternal life by sanctification. That would contradict what he has already said. We are saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. But if the child of God is necessarily characterized by a life that puts sin to death, and if those who live after the flesh are that way because they are not born again, then it will follow that if you live after the flesh and continue living after the flesh and never repent, then you will die eternally because that means you have never been saved from your sin. Such a person has never been born again, is not indwelt by the Spirit and so is not one of God’s.
In fact, this is the implication of verse 14 – notice how it begins with the word “for:” “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.” The word “for” means that this gives us a reason for the statement of verse 13. The reason why living after the flesh will lead to eternal death, and the reason why those who through God’s spirit kill the sin in their lives will life eternally is because those who are led by the Spirit to mortify the sin in their lives are in fact the sons of God. They are the ones who are saved, every one of them, and none other but them.
By the way, I just have to remark that being led by the Spirit doesn’t mean following an impression in your mind or a feeling within you that you think is from God. This is not really a feeling at all; it is a way of living, and it it means putting sin to death in your life by the help, through, the Spirit of God, who indwells you so that you will do just that. There are all sorts of people who try to justify a sinful course of action, something that is clearly forbidden in the word of God, by arguing that it just feels right, or that they are being led of God to do that. But you know what? The Scripture – God’s word! – tells us that being led by the Spirit means that through the Spirit you are putting to death the things forbidden by God’s word in your life.
So this text is about killing sin in the life and it reminds us that this is serious in the sense that it defines those who are saved and those who are not. With that in mind, I want to make two basic points about Romans 8:13. First, I want to help us see exactly what it means to mortify the deeds of the body. And second, I want to help us see how we do it. What is the mortification of sin, and how do we do it?
What does it means to mortify the deeds of the body?
It means four things: it means that silence sin, that we starve sin, that we shun sin, and that we supplant sin
Silence sin. Kill it! Yes, we’ve been saying that already, but I want to point out in addition to that what may seem obvious but nevertheless needs to be said. To kill the sin in your life means that you don’t just beat at the fruit on the tree of sin; it means that you strike it at the root. It doesn’t mean that you wait until sin has appeared in overt acts in your life, but that you attack it when it is still fluttering about in your mind and when it is trying to get a hold on your affections. It means universal holiness, in other words. It means that we give sin no quarter. It means that we chase sin out of every corner of our lives.
Here's why this is so important: sin is out to do the same to you. Even the very first and weakest acts of sin in the heart have within it the seeds of the worst apostasy. If lust is to get its way, it will lead to adultery. If covetousness is let alone and allowed to flourish, it will end up in ruthlessness and oppression. Selfish habits may seem harmless at first, but it is the tendency of them to destroy every relationship among men. If you’ve ever read a book or watched a documentary on the battles in the Pacific theater during the Second World War, you will probably come across statements from American soldiers saying that they didn’t give their enemy any quarter. But do you know why? Because they learned very quickly that the Japanese soldiers were trained themselves to give no quarter nor to ask for any. That is what sin in like in the soul. It will give you no quarter, so you should give it none. Kill it.
Second, starve it. It is not enough to kill the sin after it’s already acting, but we must strike first. We must not make provision for the flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof (Rom. 13:14). Allow me to give another military illustration: in 1967, the Israelis astounded the whole world because they were able to defeat the Egyptians so quickly in the Six Day War, even though at that time the Egyptians had in almost every respect a better and more modern military force. The reason why was because the Israeli military preemptively destroyed the Egyptian air force on the ground on the very first day. And that is the way we have to deal with the sin in our lives. We don’t just wait until it strikes, but we take preemptive measures to make sure that it never gains any foothold in our thoughts and imaginations and affections. Don’t feed it don’t give it any room to breathe. Don’t let it get started; starve it.
Third, we must shun it. Flee sin. We must run from sin the way Joseph the son of Jacob ran from the temptations of Potipher’s wife. We must run from it the way the angels commanded Lot to get away from Sodom: “Escape for thy life; look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to the mountain, lest thou be consumed” (Gen. 19:17). Or, to use an image from Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, we must be like Chrisitan fleeing from the City of Destruction, and as people were calling him to come back, Bunyan writes that “the man put his fingers in his ears, and ran on, crying, Life! Life! Eternal life!”
We must run from sin which seems to tempt us from the outside. But we must also run from the sin that has managed to gain a toe-hold in our souls. Don’t dabble with it, don’t dally over it, run from it. This is Biblical language, and one that Paul uses several times in his letters. As he put it to the Corinthians, we are to flee sexual immorality (1 Cor. 6:18), and idolatry (10:14). To Timothy, he warned him as a man of God to flee covetousness and the love of money (1 Tim. 6:11). He tells him to flee youthful lusts (2 Tim. 2:22).
What does it means to flee from sin? Why do you run from something? It may be because you are afraid of something. The Bible is like that shirt which says, “I am a bomb technician: if you see me running, try to catch up.” The Bible is the expert on what terrible things can happen when people fall to sin, and it is also full of examples of people running from sin and it is telling us to catch up.
Or it may be you are fleeing from something because you are disgusted by something. Or it may be because you hate it. All these attitudes ought to factor into the Christian fleeing from sin. We should fear it, because of what it does – after all, those who live after the flesh will die. We should be disgusted by it because of what it is – it disfigures the image of God in us. And we should hate it because it separates us from God and his fellowship and friendship.
And then we should supplant sin. Just as weeds are best dealt with by good grass in good soil, even so sin is best dealt with, at in the long term, by cultivating the opposite habits. It is not enough to run from sin if there is not a place to run to. We are not only to abhor that which is evil, but we are also to cleave to what is good (Rom. 12:9). So we will try to flesh some of this out in a moment, but for right now I just want to place that principle firmly in front of us. How do you kill sin? By cultivating righteousness. So, for instance, in two of the verses I mentioned above about fleeing from sin, the apostle not only says we should flee sin but also that we should do something else. So, for example, in 1 Tim. 6:11-12, the apostle writes “But thou, O man of God, flee these things; and follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness. Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses.” And then in 2 Tim. 2:22, “Flee also youthful lusts: but follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.” Both are necessary – not only to flee but also to follow, not only to run from something, but to run to something else. Flee the bad and embrace the good.
So that brings us to our next point – how do we do this? How do we kill, starve, flee from and supplant the sin in our lives in order to mortify it? Let me suggest four things: doctrine, desperation, dependence, and devotion.
How we mortify the sin in our lives?
Doctrine. This may seem counterintuitive to a lot of people, but by this point in Romans I hope that you can see the importance of doctrine for sanctification. The “therefores” of Scripture are witnesses to it. Paul argues this way: the doctrine almost always comes first in order to motivate and make sense of the practical application. The “therefore” of verse 12 functions exactly this way. So will the “therefore” at the beginning of chapter 12. We need to understand Biblically why it is so important to do what the Bible tells us to do. The Bible really does tell us why. God doesn’t just tell us what to do; he also tells us why we should do it.
And so that means that we don’t just short-cut our way to the “practical” parts of the Bible. Neither does it mean that you have to be some profound theologian. But it does mean that you don’t despise theology. You can’t, because if you do you are going to end up depriving yourself of the oxygen you need to carry out the commands of Scripture. To try to live a holy life without doctrine would be like trying to exercise while holding your breath. You just can’t do it!
Primarily, this means that we understand the gospel and how the gospel connects to everything. How the gospel precedes duty, how faith makes way for obedience, how the doctrine of the just justification of the unjust by Christ prepares us to obey God’s commandments. The gospel helps us to understand that we don’t obey to be saved but because we are saved. But it also tells us that the transformative nature of the gospel makes a changed life inevitable and therefore necessary. The gospel points us to Christ and his work that brings about redemption from sin in all its aspects: not only the freedom from the guilt of sin but also freedom from its grip. We need to be gospel people, but that means we need to be doctrine people.
Desperation. One of the things doctrine as well as our own experience should create in us is a sense of desperation. By that I mean desperation that comes from a sense of our inadequacy. The world says that you are enough; but the Bible says that without Christ we can do nothing (Jn. 15:5). In fact, I believe that a sense of self-sufficiency is the worst thing a person could have when it comes to killing sin. Nothing will lull you to sleep on the field of battle more quickly than the sense that the battle is already won and we are just fine and can handle everything from here, thank you very much.
If you are going to kill sin in your life, you need to do so from a profound sense of your need for God and his grace. Sanctification will not happen in any other way. Note the way Paul puts it here in Rom. 8:13: “if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body.” In other words, we can’t do what Paull is telling us to do here simply on our own. It takes the almighty Spirit of God, the Spirit that raised Christ from the dead, to enable us to do this take. Without the Spirit, we are soldiers without weapons. The sword in the Christian’s hand is the sword of the Spirit. Yes, we are the ones doing the mortifying. But we do it through the Spirit, and we must because without the Spirit we can do nothing.
We need to realize that. Do you? Do I? I think if you have ever seriously tried to do battle with your lusts then you know exactly what I mean. Anyone who thinks they have it handled doesn’t know the first thing about pleasing God or keeping his commandments, or living by faith.
By the way, I put doctrine first because it can help us develop this sense. If we just listen to the lies of the world, we are not going to think we need God and his grace. We will be self-sufficient. But God’s word – the sword of the Spirit! – cuts through all the lies and helps us to see, whether we feel it right now or not, that we desperately need God. The doctrine can help us get to the appropriate sense of desperation.
We need this sense of desperation because we will never seek the Lord as we ought until we get there. And that is my next point.
Dependence. I am thankful that God’s word doesn’t just tell us how desperately we need him, but also promises that all who seek him will find him, and will find him to be a most generous and kind Father. The life of faith has every promise in the Bible to draw from. “The just shall live by faith” (Rom. 1:17). “For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed” (10:11). This is why the apostle Paul told the Galatian Christians, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20).
What does it mean to live by faith in Christ? It means that we see Christ for who he is (doctrine) and from a sense of personal poverty (desperation) put our trust in him and his work for us and in us by the Spirit. We trust that he will give us all the grace and strength and wisdom to live the lives he wants us to live. It means living with a Jude 24 perspective: “Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy.”
It means that we don’t seek to serve God in order to gain his favor and help, but from a place of utter and complete dependence upon his grace from first to last. It is a recognition that we don’t fight to get our sins forgiven, but that we only fight sins that have already been forgiven. As the hymn puts it:
Finally, we need to be people of devotion. By that, I am thinking about devotion to God through the means of grace: the Bible, prayer, the ordinances or the sacraments, and the fellowship of the saints.
We need to be Bible people, though not as if the Bible were some totem or talisman, but to know its contents so that its teaching becomes part and parcel of our lives. But that does mean we know what the Bible says. Knowing doctrine is really just knowing the total teaching of the Scriptures. It means that we have personally profited from the teaching, the reproof, the correction, and the instruction in righteousness that the Holy Spirit-inspired Scriptures give us, making us mature and complete men and women of God (2 Tim. 3:16-17). And that of course means that we read it, meditation upon it, memorize it, believe it, and obey it.
The Bible itself makes the connection between holiness and Scripture inseparable. “Blessed are the undefiled in the way, who walk in the law of the Lord” (Ps. 119:1). “Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? by taking heed thereto according to thy word” (9). “The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether” (Ps. 19:7-9).
We need to be people of prayer. Just as you cannot become a sanctified person apart from listening to God’s word, neither can you apart from prayer. In fact, prayer is part and parcel of the sanctified life. Our Lord taught us that “men ought always to pray and not to faint” (Lk. 18:1). He taught us that certain things just will not happen apart from prayer (cf. Mt. 17:21). The way we wear God’s armor and wield the Spirit’s sword in order to fight effectively against our spiritual foes is “praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints” (Eph. 6:18).
I think this is part of what it means to mortify the deeds of the body “through the Spirit.” If you really believe that, that our ability to kill sin is not a natural ability but one given to us by the Spirit of God, then you are inevitably going to pray to God for help and strength. Those who do not pray are precisely those who don’t understand their total dependence upon Lord and his grace for help. Let us be people of prayer.
Then we need to appreciate the role that the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper play. They are not empty ordinances; they do, when done with true faith in Christ, minister grace to us. They are visible symbols of the grace of Christ to us in his death, burial, and resurrection. They are regular reminders of the gospel of God.
And then we need the fellowship of the saints. The thing is, you aren’t supposed to practice the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper independently of the church. They are church ordinances in the sense that they are meant to be practiced as part of a church. The ordinances are reminders that we grow in grace not as islands unto ourselves but as part of a community, the community of the visible church on the earth.
I am thankful for much of the technology that we have today, but technology also can be used in really bad ways as well. And one of the things technology has done is to give a lot of people the completely false notion that religion is best done in an individualistic setting. So we listen to sermons on YouTube with earbuds cordoning us off from the rest of the world. We do worship though Spotify and Pandora instead of sitting with God’s people and singing to one another – preferably in a lighted auditorium! I’m not of course saying that can’t do any of those things – I do them – but I am saying that we should not see them ever as replacements for the regular, weekly meeting of God’s people who come together to sing together, to pray together, to read the Bible together, and to hear the word of God preached together.
It is said that George Washington set the tone for the US Presidency and that actually what made the Constitutional Convention even possible was the expectation that he would be the first president and set that tone and that pattern. Well, we have something similar for us in Acts 2 as the church begins. I want you to notice the habits of public worship and fellowship that are meant to be habits for the church today:
And they continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers. And fear came upon every soul: and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles. And all that believed were together, and had all things common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need. And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, Praising God, and having favour with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved. (Acts 2:42-47)
How did the church grow? It grew together as “they continued [together] in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship.” It’s the way we grow too. It’s why Paul tells Timothy – note the words! – “Flee also youthful lusts: but follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart” (2 Tim. 2:22). You don’t just pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace by yourself. Of course it must start there, and it’s inauthentic if it doesn’t, but these fruits flourish best when they are cultivated in the context of the church.
So we grow in holiness and put to death the sin in our lives through doctrine, desperation, dependence, and devotion.
My friends, sin may have its pleasures. No one would sin if that were not the case. Forbidden fruit may not only look good, but it often tastes very good. But it leads to death. The pleasures of sin are only temporary, whereas the blessedness of godliness has the promise of God’s blessing not only in this world, but also in the world that is to come (1 Tim. 4:8). “Bread of deceit is sweet to a man,” Solomon warns us, “but afterward his mouth shall be filled with gravel” (Prov. 20:17).
So where are you this morning? Have you turned from your sins, have you turned from a life of idolatrous self-worship and self-determination? Have you turned from the broad way of worldliness that leads to destruction to embrace a life of repentance and faith that leads to life?
My friend, there is only one way we can do this. We cannot turn from a poisonous lifestyle of self-determination unless we surrender all to God. And the first thing this means is giving up all hope of saving ourselves, and putting our entire trust in the grace of God that comes through Jesus Christ. For the Spirit, by whose help alone we can mortify the sin in our lives, is the Spirit of Christ, and we cannot have him apart from Christ and faith in him. So come to him, trust in him, and embrace him as the Lord and Savior that he is.
And if you’ve come, you keep coming, keep resting in him, and always through his Spirit mortify the deeds of the body.
I was made aware recently that I had misunderstood the meaning of one of the Christmas hymns that is often sung this time of year. It’s the hymn “God rest ye merry, gentlemen.” If you look at the lyrics, you will notice that there’s a comma between the words merry and gentlemen. It’s actually an archaic use of the words “rest” and “merry,” the first of which really means something along the lines of “make” or “strengthen” whereas “merry” doesn’t just mean “happy” but “valiant.” It means, “God make you valiant.”
In some ways, that is what Paul is calling us to here. God make you valiant to destroy the sin in your life! But how do we do that? The hymn goes on to tell us, doesn’t it?
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