Study 19 – Start Counting

God says that we have died to sin. The first step is to believe that what He says is the truth.

The next step is to 'count' ourselves dead to sin on a daily basis (Rom. 6:11).

The word 'count' or 'reckon' in this verse is an accounting term which tells us to 'put it in that column because it goes there'. Paul is telling us to consider the truth and live by it.

I am not preaching the power of positive thinking. We do not screw up our faces and think our freedom from sin into reality. 'think it! I'm free from sin. I know I'm not really but if I think hard enough perhaps I can make it happen.'

This came home to me very forcefully when I was on an aircraft to Spain. As we touched down the pilot informed us that it was 4pm But my watch told me that he was an hour fast. I could have thought, 'He doesn't know what he's talking about. It's 3pm. My watch is always right and it hasn't left my wrist.'

Then I might have decided, 'Well, maybe I'll force myself to believe he's right. It's 4pm! It's 4pm! I know it's 3pm! No, it's 4pm!' The reality was that in Spain it was 4pm.

When you move from one nation to another, you often change time zones and need to adjust your watch to the reality of the situation.

When you move from Adam to Christ you enter a sphere which is free from sin's power and need to adjust your thinking to the truth.

The truth is that you were once a slave to sin. You could not simply walk free of its power. You needed releasing. Jesus alone releases captives from their sin.

There was a day when 'Righteousness' walked into the slave market, looked around and saw you standing there – filthy, in chains and under sentence of death.

Then he pointed to you, said, 'I'll have that one,' and paid the top price for your life. He bought you from sin's control. You are no longer a slave to sin. You are a slave to righteousness. You have a totally new master.

Have you grasped this?

Don't try to put mind over matter to make it true. Believe it because it is true. It's what God says.

To Meditate On

Jesus wants you to think right.

'… you were slaves of sin … having been freed from sin you became slaves of righteousness' (Rom. 6:17-18).

These are statements of fact all stated in the past tense.

Be Inspired

The more I reckoned that I was dead to sin, the more alive I clearly was. I simply could not believe myself dead, and I could not produce the death … one morning … I was upstairs sitting at my desk reading the Word and praying, and I said, 'Lord, open my eyes!' And then in a flash I saw it. I saw my oneness with Christ. I saw that I was in Him, and that when He died I died. I saw that the question of my death was a matter of the past and not of the future, and that I was just as truly dead as He was because I was in Him when He died … I was carried away with such joy at this great discovery that I jumped from my chair and cried, 'Praise the Lord, I am dead!...' Oh it was so real to me! I longed to go through the streets of Shanghai shouting the news of my discovery. From that day to this I have never for one moment doubted the finality of that word: 'I have been crucified with Christ.'
WATCHMAN NEE

To Observe

The same Greek word translated 'count' or 'reckon' is used in the following verses; consider the words which are used to translate the Greek

Luke 22:37; Rom. 4:9; 8:18.