I’m sure you are familiar with Romans 6:14 “For sin shall not have dominion over

you, for
you are not under law but under grace”. Recently I have been ministering to someone who
grew up being taught this scripture in a very religious way which resulted in terrible
depression, and more recently becoming very suicidal. He was taught that if you don’t have
dominion over sin then you are not in God’s grace and are not saved. He was told if you died
with sin in your life then you are going to hell.

The religious angle which makes this so deceptive and destructive is that “sin won’t have
dominion over you if you are in grace, therefore if sin is having dominion over you then you
are not in grace.” This is absolutely not what this scripture is saying and to teach it like this is
to bring bondage and death. This teaching kills believers slowly, and in the case of my new
friend almost drove him to the point of taking his own life. Thank God he is now seeing the
truth of grace and is getting set free. It is a wonderful testimony in the making that I hope I
get to fully share one day.

So how do we understand Romans 6:14 then?

How shall sin not have dominion over us?

Does being in grace mean we will never sin again?

If we still sin does that mean we’re not in grace?

I want to answer these questions by showing you the 2 ways that Romans 6:14 applies to us:

“Sin shall not have dominion over you”

1) Legally, and

2) Experientially.

1) Legally sin cannot have dominion over you anymore

because you are no longer under God’s law.
When you were under the law then sin could have dominion over you because the law could
find you guilty, and condemn and punish you for your sin. Once you believed in Christ then
you came out from the position of being under the law and came into a new position of
being under grace. Coming into Christ sets you free from the dominion of the law which
means that sin no longer has a way to find you guilty and to condemn and punish you. Sin
cannot use the law anymore to condemn or punish you since you are no longer under the
law anymore. The removal of the law has removed sins power over you to condemn you.
Therefore sin shall no longer legally have dominion over you, since you are no longer under
the law but under grace.

It’s important to see that everyone is positioned

either, under the law or under grace.
Before a person believes in Christ and is born again, they are under the law of God. (Romans
3:19). They are in the domain of the law, and therefore under the dominion of the law. This
is the position they are in. As long as they are under the law there is no amount of good
behaviour they could do that could take then out of the domain of the law and bring them
into the domain of grace. The only way to come out of the law and into grace is to have faith
in Christ and be born again. Once you are born again you come into the domain of grace,
and are therefore under the dominion of grace. This is now the new position you are in. You
are no longer in the domain of the law but in the domain of grace. You cannot be in both
domains. It is spiritually impossible! (Romans 7:1-4). You can only ever be in one, either law
or grace. If you are not born again then you are under the law. If you are born again then
you are under grace. Once you are born again and under grace, there is no amount of bad
behaviour that can take you out of the domain of grace and back under the domain of the
law. Good behaviour didn’t get you into the domain of grace and bad behaviour doesn’t
take you out. It has nothing to do with behaviour it has to do with faith.

The next most obvious question people will ask is, “What then, shall we just sin now
because we are not under law but under grace?”

That question is the right question to ask after you hear grace correctly taught. In fact, if our
grace teaching does not provoke this question then we are not teaching grace in its fullness.
Perhaps we are afraid that people will use what we’re teaching to run out and sin, so we
hold back on teaching grace the way Paul taught it. The way Paul taught grace provoked this
very question. In fact look at the very next verse that comes after Romans 6:14:

Romans 6:15 “What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace?”

Of course the answer is no! Which Paul clarifies at the end of verse 15, “Certainly not!”. But
Paul asks this question because he knew that other people would ask it after the revelation
of grace he just taught. For me this shows that if someone is teaching about grace from
Romans 6 and this question doesn’t flash across your mind, then they’re not teaching true
grace. Your grace teaching has to show that a believer is no longer under the law and
therefore that if they do sin that sin no longer has any legal dominion over them.

Until you can accept this revelation you will never fully understand grace.

And this actually is the heart of grace. God doesn’t want us to sin, but if we do sin, then that
sin is already legally pardoned and can never condemn or punish us. Does this mean that we
should just sin then? Of course not, but if we do sin that sin has already been dealt with in
Christ. Does that make it okay to sin. Of course not. We shouldn’t sin. But if we do sin, we
have One who has taken the punishment for us and continually reveals our eternal
innocence before the Father.

This is what 1 John 2:1-2 confirms:

“My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone
does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the
propitiation for our sins…”

Now it’s not just legally that sin can no longer have dominion over us. Because of your new
reborn nature you can now begin to exercise dominion and experience victory over sin.

2) Experientially you can walk in dominion over sin

because you are not under law but under grace.
Romans 6:14 is not saying that “if you don’t walk in dominion over sin then you are not
under grace”. Rather it is saying that “because you are under grace it is now possible to walk
in dominion over sin”.

If we had to walk in 100% dominion over sin in order to be under grace then nobody would
be under grace because nobody walks in 100% dominion over sin. But this scripture is not
saying that in order to get under grace you have to walk in dominion over sin, it is saying
that because you are under grace you can now walk in dominion over sin. This is a very
important difference and if we don’t understand it we will put God’s children in bondage.

You used to be dead to God and alive to sin, but now you are alive to God and dead to sin!

Before you were in Christ, you were dead to God and alive to sin. (Eph 2:1-2). Our sinful
nature is what was leading and controlling us. (Rom 7:5). We were slaves to sin and the law
that we were under had no power to control sin or set us free from sin. In fact the law only
exposed our sin and stirred up our sinful nature to sin even more. (Rom 7:5,7,8,13).
Therefore while we were dead to God and under the domain of the law, sin had dominion
over us and we were slaves to it.

But then we believed in Christ and were born again. This is where we died to sin and came
alive to God. (Rom 6:2,7,8). Just as Christ died once and rose again to new life, so too we
died to sin once and rose again to new life in Christ. (Rom 6:10-11). This is when our old
sinful nature was crucified with Christ and removed, and where God raised us up to new life
with a brand new righteous nature. (Rom 6:6. Col 2:11).

Before, when we were under the the law, we were dead to God and alive to sin, but now we
have been born again into the domain of grace and are dead to sin and alive to God!
Because we died with Christ to sin and were raised up with him into new life with a new
nature, we have been set free from sin. We are no longer slaves to sin. Sin no longer has
dominion over us to control us anymore. We now have dominion over sin and can exercise
that dominion. (Rom 6:6,7,17,18,22). We can now say “NO!” to sin. We don’t have to obey it
anymore. (Rom 6:12). We can exercise dominion over sin. We can now present all the parts
of our body to God as instruments of righteousness and no longer present them to sin as
instruments of unrighteousness. (Rom 6:13). Sin shall not have dominion over us because
we have died to our old powerless life under the law and have been raised up with Christ
into new powerful life in grace. (Rom 6:14).

However, if we are not experiencing total dominion over sin, it doesn’t mean we’re not
under grace, or that we’re not saved, or that we’re in danger of losing our salvation. It
simply means we have yet to learn how to exercise the dominion we have as born again
believers in grace. The wonderful thing about grace is that if we should fall while we are
learning, we always fall into His grace. His grace picks us up, dusts us off and encourages us
to keep going. And this is the perfect environment to learn how to exercise our dominion
over sin.

The way to exercise dominion is to present the members of our body to God and not to sin.
(Rom 6:12,13). We surrender our eyes, our mind, our hands and all other parts to God.
When sin comes to tempt us, we must say “no”. The reason why we sin is because we say
“yes” to sin. Nobody makes us say yes. We say yes. Sin cannot make us sin. We decide to
give into it. We don’t have to because we are no longer slaves to sin. We have power over
sin. We don’t have to try and get power over sin, we have power over sin and we just need
to exercise it! There is no sin that is beyond us being able to resist it. The problem is we’re
waiting for God to take the feeling away or to exercise dominion for us. But that’s not how it
works and if we’re waiting for that we’ll become disillusioned. God has given us dominion
and it’s up to us to exercise it.

But thank God for his grace, that even if we don’t experience full dominion over sin, we still
legally always have dominion over sin and therefore, it shall never have dominion over us
ever again. And I pray that as you discover your position in Christ and the new nature you
have, all because of His grace, that you will begin to experience dominion over sin more and
more.