From Creation to Restoration · Lesson 07
What must change as we follow Christ each day?
50-minute class · Adults and older teenagers · Full KJV readings included
No Bible needed: full KJV passages appear below and in both printable downloads. Bible text is separate from the teaching notes.
Words to know: Yield means offer or present; members refers here to parts of the body and their use; fruit describes the results a way of life produces.
Those who are alive to God through Christ are called to yield themselves to Him. Daily self-denial means refusing sin’s rule and practicing faithful obedience. Grace gives the setting for this new life; it is not permission to continue in what destroys relationships.
Provide each student with a worksheet and Scripture reader. Read the passages and teaching guide in advance. Invite participation without requiring personal disclosures.
50-minute flow: Welcome and opening prayer, 5 minutes; Scripture and teaching, 25 minutes; discussion, 10 minutes; weekly response, 5 minutes; closing prayer, 5 minutes.
Ask: “Why can a sincere decision require many later decisions to remain faithful to it?” Connect the answers with the difference between an initial commitment and the habits that follow.
12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.
13 Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.
14 For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.
15 What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.
16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?
17 But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.
18 Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.
19 I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh: for as ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness.
20 For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness.
21 What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death.
22 But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.
23 For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
23 And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.
24 For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it.
25 For what is a man advantaged, if he gain the whole world, and lose himself, or be cast away?
Read: Romans 6:12–14. See the class or supporting readings on this page.
Paul addresses people who have been called to count themselves alive to God. He tells them not to let sin reign in their mortal bodies and not to yield their members as instruments of unrighteousness. Instead, they are to yield themselves to God.
Our bodies, abilities, words, and time become places where obedience is practiced. The question is concrete: what will we make available, and to whose service? The good life God created is to be offered faithfully.
Ask: What might it mean to yield a voice, a skill, or an hour to God?
Read: Romans 6:15–23. See the class or supporting readings on this page.
Paul anticipates the suggestion that being under grace allows sin. He rejects it and describes the different outcomes of serving sin and serving righteousness. The language of service exposes how repeated obedience shapes our direction.
The chapter ends by distinguishing the wages of sin from God’s gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ. New obedience grows within a life received as a gift. It does not turn that gift into a wage we earn.
Ask: How does the final verse keep us from treating salvation as our achievement?
Read: Luke 9:23–25. See the class or supporting readings on this page.
Jesus speaks to all who would come after Him: deny yourself, take up your cross daily, and follow. This is an ongoing call to place allegiance to Him above the demand that everything serve our comfort, approval, or control.
Daily self-denial includes refusing a sinful desire even when it returns. It also includes choosing mercy when pride would rather retaliate. These choices have direction because we are following a Person.
Ask: Where might the desire to save face interfere with following Jesus?
Read: Romans 6:19–23; Luke 9:23–25. See the class or supporting readings on this page.
Paul speaks of fruit, holiness, and the end toward which a way of life moves. A changed allegiance should bear recognizable results. We can examine patterns without pretending that growth is instant or that we no longer need correction.
Choose practices that help obedience: pause before speaking, make time for prayer, keep an honest commitment, and ask for help where a pattern persists. When we fail, truthful repentance and renewed response belong to the life of following Christ.
Ask: What small repeated practice could support a change you already know is needed?
1 What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?
2 God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?
3 Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
7 For he that is dead is freed from sin.
8 Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him:
9 Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him.
10 For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.
11 Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
What does yielding ourselves to God involve?
Offering our actual bodies, abilities, words, and choices for His purposes.
Why is grace not permission to sin?
Paul describes freedom from sin’s rule as a call to a different allegiance and outcome.
What does daily add to the call in Luke 9?
Following Christ involves repeated choices, not only an earlier declaration.
How do gift and obedience belong together?
Life is God’s gift through Christ; obedience is the fitting response within that received life.
Ask each student to choose one specific habit for the coming week. Name the situation that triggers the old response, the faithful action to practice, and a simple way to remember it. For example: when interrupted, pause before answering and give the other person a hearing. Keep the response realistic and voluntary; seek appropriate help when needed.
Father, help us yield our lives to You. Teach us to recognize the habits that serve sin and to practice the obedience that grows from grace. Give us patience to follow Christ daily and humility to return honestly when we fail. Amen.
Lesson Eight examines the Spirit’s work and the renewing of our minds.
15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.
16 And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;
17 Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
18 I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.
19 Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also.
20 At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.
21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.
22 Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world?
23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.
24 He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father’s which sent me.
25 These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present with you.
26 But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.
27 Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.
5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.
6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.
7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.
8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
9 But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.
10 And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
11 But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.
12 Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.
13 For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.
14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.
Scripture: King James Version. Bible text is presented separately from teaching notes and prayers.