ACC ~ Romans 6 v16

YOU ARE SLAVES OF THE ONE YOU OBEY. ORIGEN: This is what the apostle is teaching in this passage: that each person has it in his control and in the power of his will to be either a servant of sin or a servant of righteousness. He proves himself to be a slave of whatever side he chooses to obey and of whatever side he inclines toward.

Note that Paul assumes that anyone who yields himself to sin is a slave of sin, but he does not go on to add that anyone who yields himself to righteousness is a slave of righteousness. … It would not have been right to phrase it like that, because although God himself does what is righteous he cannot for that reason be said to be a slave of righteousness! On the contrary, he is the Lord of righteousness. Therefore it is not true to say that everyone who does what is righteous is a slave to righteousness in the same way that everyone who sins is a slave to sin. For even the devil himself is a slave to sin, because he departed from the obedience of righteousness and rebelled in the face of Almighty God, for which reason he is called an apostate. COMMENTARY ON THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

CONFESSING GOD THROUGH OUR ACTIONS. AMBROSIASTER: Paul warns us not to say one thing and do another, so that when we are said to be servants of God we should be found by our actions to be servants of the devil. He proclaims that we are servants of the one whose will we do and that it is not fair to confess God as Lord but do the works of the devil. For God himself notices this and attacks it: “This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me,” and the Lord says in the Gospel: “No man can serve two masters,”and in the law it is written: “God is not mocked.” COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES.

THE PERVERTED WILLINGNESS TO REMAIN SLAVES TO SIN. CHRYSOSTOM: Without saying a word about hell or eternal punishment as yet, Paul talks about the shame which comes in this life when people become slaves, and especially when they do so of their own free will, and to sin, of all things, whose wages are the second (i.e., spiritual) death. HOMILIES ON ROMANS 11.

TWO MASTERS UNTHINKABLE. THEODORET OF CYR: Righteousness and sin are mutually incompatible. As the Lord himself said in the holy Gospel: “No man can serve two masters.”INTERPRETATION OF THE LETTER TO THE ROMANS.

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