Romans 6:13, commentary and pictures

Neither yield the powers of the body to obey the cravings of sin, nor use them as tools for evil ends, but give the self to God as one brought from death to life and use every member as a tool for right ends. This charge belongs to those dead to sin through burial with Christ in baptism and raised with Him to walk in new life with the old life crucified so sin no longer rules, for the servant obeys whichever master is chosen, sin leading to death and obedience leading to righteousness and eternal life. No one is at his own disposal, for all belong to God by creation and by purchase through Christ's blood, so the yielding embraces the whole person of body, soul, mind and strength with every organ, power and act of will kept pure and holy for His service. When the will once enslaved to sin is placed on God's side, He breaks Satan's control and imparts power to overcome, as the Holy Spirit awakens new life, denies old inclinations, forms new habits and restores weakened faculties to firm, loving obedience. Those so yielded become living channels of truth and righteousness in daily duty in home, neighborhood and missionary work, shown in self-denial of appetite, rule over passion, guarding of thought and senses, and obedience to God's law in freedom.

Words and Context

Sin is not to be allowed to reign in the mortal body, and its lusts and cravings are not to be obeyed. The members, faculties and powers of the body are not to be yielded over as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin for evil purposes and wrongdoing. Instead self is to be yielded over to God as those brought to life from death, and the powers and members of the body yielded over to God as instruments of righteousness for right purposes and righteous use.

Even with no further light than this command alone, its light is sufficient to enlighten the most beclouded mind and can be understood by all who wish to understand it. Professed Christians who let base passions and bodily lusts control life are without excuse for remaining under such control. Those who serve their own lusts and continue to take pleasure in unrighteousness do so despite threatened vengeance, and added plain warnings are given to point back to this neglected word, though the light is often rejected.

This command belongs to those dead to sin through being baptized into Jesus Christ, buried with Him by baptism into death, and raised as Christ was raised by the glory of the Father to walk in newness of life. The old man is crucified and the body of sin destroyed so they no longer serve sin nor live any longer therein nor continue in sin that grace may abound. They are to reckon themselves dead indeed unto sin but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord, living as people raised from death to a new life with Christ under a solemn pledge to belong to God that applies to everyone who receives baptism.

To whom a person yields servants to obey, that master is served, whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto righteousness. Sin shall not have dominion over those under grace. The end of the one path is death as the wages of sin, and the end of the other is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord as the gift of God, in contrast to former service to sin whose end is death and present service to righteousness growing in holiness.

Bought and Made Alive

To be alive from the dead is to have been brought from death to new life, renewed in Christ, and raised to live for God in righteous service and growing holiness rather than in the former service of sin whose end is death. Those baptized have pledged themselves to the Lord and must no longer let sin use their bodies or faculties for wrongdoing, but give themselves and their members to God for right purposes as people raised with Christ. This renewal puts away dishonesty and other sin, so that the life shows a person made new in Christ. It means seeking to please Him in all that is said and done and following Christ's example in sincere and faithful service.

No one is at his own disposal to please self, for people belong to God by creation and redemption, purchased with the price of Christ's own precious blood. The body is God's purchased possession, redeemed at great cost, and time with mental and physical powers is entrusted by God to be used for His work and glory, not for selfish purposes or left unused. Faithful service as a co-worker with Christ turns the life from selfish motives and actions toward a purposeful life of good works. To yield the faculties to sin is therefore to misuse what is His, and honor requires withholding them from sin's service.

Yielding embraces the whole person — body, soul and spirit, mind, soul, body and strength — with every power, organ, brain power and will carefully and holily cherished and preserved as tools for doing right and never given to Satan. The flesh in which the soul lives and through which it works belongs to the Lord, so no part of the living body or its machinery may be neglected, and knowledge of the physical organism teaches that every member must serve God for right doing. This requires presenting mind, soul, body and strength as a living sacrifice to answer the purpose of creation, taking heed to light and instruction in eating and drinking and acting intelligently so as not to bring feebleness upon oneself. When grace takes possession of the heart, inherited and cultivated tendencies to wrong are put to death and a new life under God's control begins, with all that is done for God's glory. Those living in the last days are for Christ's sake to walk in this light.

The body thus yielded is to be sanctified to the Lord as a vessel unto honor and a living sacrifice, kept as wholesome, pure and holy as possible for His service. Its lower passions and bodily impulses, including appetite, must be brought under the soul's higher powers and refused rule as masters. Obedience to God's law enables willing service and the freedom of Christ's followers, while yielding to impure acts corrupts the mind and prevents consecration, and delighting in sin and trampling the law is incompatible with that freedom.

Instruments of Unrighteousness

Cherishing even one sin or retaining even one wrong practice makes a person an instrument of unrighteousness, for the whole being is contaminated and a life shaped by Christ cannot blend with worldly policy or depart from righteousness. Yielding to God produces works corresponding to the truth once the truth is received into the heart, while refusing to listen to, contemplate, receive and practice the truth leaves any person high or low, rich or poor without hope. Such refusal exiles a person from God by his own will with a mortal moral disease no human invention can remedy. Refusing to hear and obey diffuses a spirit of revolt to other souls and sows seeds of disaffection, so one who will not obey must step down from an elevated, influential position to a narrow sphere where insubordination will not leaven the minds of many.

Yielding the body's faculties to sin means putting the members at sin's service for unrighteousness: unhallowed passion, words that drive away holy angels, evil thoughts about fellow believers, and hands profaned by ungodly gain. Giving oneself over to sow seeds of evil and corrupt the hearts and minds of others is becoming an instrument of unrighteousness, betraying sacred trust. This is seen when a man long professing present truth and counted worthy of trust in missions or institutions grows careless when changed circumstances bring temptation and then tempts others, revealing a corrupt heart lacking the principle every Christian should possess. Such a course makes him a traitor of the worst type, and from such a tainted, polluted mind youth often receive the first impure thoughts that lead to a life of shame and defilement. Those who profess to follow Christ can become corrupted by love of the world and serve opposing purposes as instruments of unrighteousness, as with professed Sabbath-keepers in whom the divine gives way to the satanic, in contrast to honest and generous people who put conscience and right above riches and use their lives to do good rather than to amass wealth.

Those yielded to sin enter a terrible conflict of evil against good, with minds and hearts surcharged with hostility against divine revelation. Their passions are stirred with envy against purity and holiness and devotion to God and His requirements, and their will is set like granite against all that is called God or that is worshiped, united in confederacy with satanic agencies and throwing their whole force into the battlefield. This is because supremacy is sought by converting all things to selfish purpose and imbuing human beings with an evil spirit and nature, so human beings need the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit without delay and with no conferring with flesh and blood.

Everyone who names Christ must refuse to yield the body and its powers to sinful indulgence, and the body and its desires are not to serve sin but to be given to God and used in righteous service. Continued pampering of natural appetite strengthens the animal propensities by exercise until they gain the ascendancy over the higher powers, enslaving reason and conscience, destroying principle and the power of self-government, and making the governing power the servant of corrupt passion. Such yielding holds the soul in lowest bondage and brings spiritual death, quenches the desire for holiness, and withers spiritual prosperity. Lustful passions must not rule as masters, for the lower passions and baser propensities must be overcome before a person can know the Spirit's work, a change calling for active, diligent use of one's abilities in service to God made possible through Christ's strength. The excuse that passion cannot be overcome is false and shameful.

Transformed by Yielding

Powers once yielded to sin had placed the will helplessly under Satan's control as a captive, but God broke that power and purchased the will, affections, mind and soul by giving Christ and all heaven. When a person comes under God's control the powers once used as members of unrighteousness in the service of sin are consecrated to the service of the God of love. The consecrated powers bring a will made firm and strong to do right, a heart cleansed from selfishness and filled with Christlike love and tenderness, and a mind yielding to the law of love with every thought brought into obedience to Christ.

Subjection to the Word restores the self by the working of the Holy Spirit on the heart with mighty power. Awakened as from the dead, the person lets Christ carry the mind along with His own and employ every faculty and created capability He created to better honor and glorify His name. Consecration to God brings the energies and noblest powers into exercise for His service, inspired by God, so that faculties and members once used to serve self and advance unworthy and unrighteous purposes are brought into captivity to Jesus Christ and become one with the will of God.

Yielding the self to God as instruments allows the Holy Spirit to awaken to new life and bring the powers under God's will so abilities honor and glorify Him. His grace helps deny old inclinations, overcome strong tendencies toward sin, and form new habits. As the Spirit is obeyed and whole-hearted sacrifices are made in God's service, the heart becomes able to receive more of His power, and dormant energies and weakened faculties gain new life.

God has not left people to battle evil in their own finite strength but is ready to impart power to overcome. Those who put trust in Christ are not to be enslaved by any hereditary or cultivated habit or tendency to wrong nor held in bondage to the lower nature, but are to rule every appetite and passion by yielding the will to Christ, since the person is not at his own disposal to please self but is the Lord's property purchased with the price of Christ's own blood. The body is to be sanctified to the Lord as a vessel unto honor, and every power and every organ, including brain power and will, belongs to Jesus and must be carefully and holily cherished and preserved as tools for doing right and not given to Satan. By uniting the weak, wavering human will to the omnipotent, unwavering will of God and putting the will every moment on the side of God's will, shouting victory that Christ has made free and refusing any expression of inability to overcome, they ally with divine power, receive strength from above to hold steadfast, and live a pure and noble life of victory over appetite and lust, triumphing as more than conquerors through Him that loved.

Surrender to God must be now, with sin left at once and not abandoned gradually, refusing to remain servants of sin. Humbling the self and recognizing need bring close to Christ, while self-righteousness and contentment with own goodness leave no room for His grace and righteousness, and clinging close to Christ who gave His life gives power to become sons of God. Christ's death and suffering provide cleansing from sin, and yielding to God renews and sanctifies so as to work as Christ worked and live a pure and holy Christ-life. That life never glosses over sin and never keeps perverted appetites and passions but uproots and casts them away, refuses to be a slave of passion, lets truth sanctify the soul, keeps the reason sanctified and carefully guarded, and reveals a thankful life radiant with heaven's brightness that sets a right example.

Instruments for Service

Those yielded to God become instruments of righteousness, workmen and living stones emitting light. They become channels through which the spirit of truth and righteousness flows to others, communicating the light of truth and the riches of grace. God puts His Spirit upon them to use them to awaken His church and set it in order, and to feed souls starving for truth by giving His word through them. This requires a sanctified life through the truth, in oneness with all Christ's followers, without worldly likes and dislikes, exclusive associations, self-pleasing, neglect of others, or self-confidence. It is lived with least self-confidence, a meek and quiet spirit, and a pure unselfish heart inclined to obedience, justice, purity, true holiness, simplicity, interest in and devotion to His cause, and living according to the light, warnings, and instruction given. Heavenly angels are encouraged to be present with such instruments.

Every follower has missionary work as a channel of light in the family, in the neighborhood, and in the town or city where he lives. Even when unbelievers appear indifferent and careless, God uses yielded instruments to impress and convict their hearts that truth is a reality. Those now doing nothing must render holy service, for the Lord of the vineyard calls idle believers with the question why they stand all the day idle. Idle Christian women are called to use their talents to the very highest account in self-denying, diligent labor to save souls and preach the truth now. Women render this holy service by loving souls for whom Christ died, representing the truth and example of Christ as Mary who first preached a risen Saviour did, teaching in the Sabbath-school, teaching children with a heart imbued with the love of Christ and praying with and for them so souls are converted, and laboring as missionaries by teaching truth through letters, distributing tracts and soliciting subscribers for periodicals containing present solemn truth, and conversing with families and praying with the mother and children to be a blessing.

Becoming instruments of righteousness means being thoroughly converted and receiving the Holy Spirit by pressing on, seeking, and persevering until it is received. It requires elevation and ennobling not by outward dress but by heart dress, with heart softened and subdued and character molded by the Holy Spirit through a clearing up and cleansing of heart and mind, so that the Spirit dwells in each person individually and the light of heaven abides upon them. Those thus yielded represent the truth in character and speak the truth in a way that converts souls, laboring as missionaries wherever they are to help souls in ignorance of the truth. Yielded service is done in daily duties with close connection to heaven and careful habits, so work blesses others. Youth who turn from rebellion and deny self can give themselves and use their abilities as instruments, serving as examples of righteous living to friends by bearing Christ's cross.

God's blessing can qualify people for this service, and the call extends to children for whom parents pray. By God's providential ordering of where they belong, a person may be placed as a member of a household to be a blessing and help, especially to a sorrowing widow, and this fulfills yielding members to God. A person is such an instrument in God's hands by resisting temptation and not following own judgment when it leads to actions or words inconsistent with a holy profession, with heart humble, meek, and lowly, directing people to trust in the living God rather than in a human instrument. Even someone of the lowest standing, when properly instructed, can become an instrument through God's moral power and exert a correcting influence by consistent example. Families consecrated to God lead others heavenward.

Becoming such an instrument requires entire surrender, giving self wholly to God. This consecration rests not on own strength but on trust in God as stay and everlasting friend, taking hold of His promises by living faith. True strength is being strong in God rather than feeling strong while being weak, blinded and infatuated. It requires willingness to suffer for Christ's sake and deliberate effort, for redeeming the time costs effort. Cherishing doubts and criticizing rather than submitting keeps a person from spiritual growth and from serving as such an instrument, while yielding the subdued will to God makes a person one, and going on from strength to strength in following light given fits talents and ability for His glory. Without that surrender a person remains unfit for that use, yet even now seeking meekness and the righteousness of Christ opens the way to be hid in the day of fierce anger.

Consecration brings the whole person — body, soul, and spirit — under God's control, using every part as an instrument of righteousness, with all done for God's glory. When grace takes possession of the heart, inherited and cultivated tendencies to wrong must be put to death, and a new life under God's control must begin. Offering self for righteous use is joined to the desire to have Christ's image reflected perfectly. One who has turned from sinful habits and indulgence serves as an instrument through a thorough change in habits and feelings, together with gentleness, patience, sympathy, and love that enables helping save others. Yielding the heart in response to light and good instruction means loving to follow Jesus and being influenced by His Spirit to advance far beyond present attainment, instead of flattering self as righteous because of doing better than others who act wrong. It means yielding self and faculties as instruments of righteousness, bringing passions and affections under control in God's strength so they do not become instruments of sin and ruin, preserving connection with God, relying wholly upon Him, emptying the soul temple from every defilement, aiming continually for a higher, holier standard, working in self-denial and practicing self-control, overcoming deficiencies of character, and thereby becoming fitted as a teacher and minister and a great blessing to others.

Daily Obedient Living

Yielding oneself to God as one alive from the dead means reckoning oneself dead indeed to sin and alive to God, refusing to let sin reign in the mortal body by obeying its lusts, and giving the powers of the body to God for righteous use rather than to sin for unrighteous use. In the last days of this world's history this requires walking in the light in eating and drinking, being led into knowledge of right habits and practices, and practicing self-denial from a Bible standpoint rather than remaining half-converted in table habits. It forbids indulging wrong appetites in eating and drinking at the expense of health, and requires presenting mind, soul, body and strength as a living sacrifice to answer the purpose of creation, taking heed to light and instruction and acting intelligently so as not to bring feebleness upon oneself. This calls for becoming intelligent about the care of the body and keeping its organs in right action, especially by those who advocate the claims of God's law while living where light on health is shining.

It requires denying appetite and controlling the passions, for the body is God's purchased possession redeemed at great cost and is to be kept as wholesome, pure and holy as possible. Its lower passions and baser propensities must be brought under the soul's higher powers and overcome before a person can know the Spirit's work, refusing to let appetite and other bodily impulses rule and refusing to let lustful passions rule as masters. In the strength of God passions and affections must be brought under control and every appetite and passion ruled by a will yielded to Christ, so that the faculties do not become instruments of sin and ruin but are yielded to God as instruments of righteousness in active, diligent service made possible through Christ's strength. It means yielding the body to God by controlling the thoughts, passions and affections, for every accountable being is responsible for thoughts, and indulging vain imaginations and dwelling on impure subjects brings guilt as if the thoughts were carried into action, with only lack of opportunity preventing the act. Day and night dreaming and castle-building are bad and exceedingly dangerous habits that once established are next to impossible to break, so the mind must be directed to pure, holy, elevated themes, the imagination positively and persistently controlled, and faithful sentinelship kept over the eyes, ears and all the senses to prevent vain and corrupt thoughts from staining the soul, which cannot be done without close and even severe effort and by the power of grace alone. Salvation depends on governing the passions and affections, which are powerful agents that if misapplied, set in operation through wrong motives, or misplaced, accomplish ruin and leave a miserable wreck without God and without hope, for passion of a base, destructive nature if allowed control sacrifices eternal interests, character and Heaven and can ruin the entire being.

The call to leave sin's bondage and defilement and to use the body in the service of righteousness belongs with teaching plainly about sin, salvation and redemption. The body is to be a living sacrifice kept pure and holy, and yielding it to impure acts corrupts the mind and prevents consecration to God. Obedience to God's law enables willing service and the freedom of Christ's followers, while delighting in sin and trampling on the law is incompatible with that freedom.