The End of Sin’s Reign

"Do not let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey its lusts” (Romans 6:12).  Thomas Manton gives us a very sobering overview of the disorder which has invaded all mankind through sin: “Man is composed of a body and a soul.  By God’s wise design, the body was subordinated to the soul, and both soul and body unto God.  But sin has defaced and disturbed the harmony and order of God’s creation.  Man rejected subordination to God, to seek happiness without Him in worldly things.  This disorder also  inclined mankind to prefer seeking the happiness and good of the body above that of the soul.  Reason and conscience are now enslaved to sense and appetite; understanding and will are made bond-slaves to the lusts of the flesh.”  The glory of the Christian religion is that in its unique and glorious gospel of Jesus Christ freedom from this disorder is found!  The true honor and dignity of a person consists in victory over indwelling sin.  Paul wrote that he was in a daily struggle, not merely to keep sin from ruling his body, but to make his body his slave (1 Corinthians 9:27), that grace, not sin, might reign through righteousness (Romans 5:21).