This is the proper breathing of a Christian. "I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." This is Christianity. The old "I" crucified, and Christ living in me. The Christian is a new creation. Old things are passed away. The death of Christ has closed forever the history of the old "I;" and hence, though sin dwells in the believer, its power is broken and gone forever. Not only is its guilt canceled, but its terrible dominion completely overthrown. This is the glorious doctrine of Romans vi.-viii. The thoughtful student of this most magnificent epistle will observe that from chapter iii. 21 to chapter v. 11 we have the work of Christ applied to the question of _sins_; and from chapter v. 12 to the end of chapter viii. we have another aspect of that work, namely, its application to the question of _sin_--"our old man"--"the body of _sin_"--"_sin_ in the flesh." There is no such thing in Scripture as the forgiveness of sin. God has condemned sin, not forgiven it--an immensely important distinction. God has set forth His eternal abhorrence of sin in the cross of Christ. He has expressed and executed His judgment upon it, and now the believer can see himself as linked and identified with the One who died on the cross and is raised from the dead. He has passed out of the sphere of sin's dominion into that new and blessed sphere where grace reigns through righteousness. "God be thanked," says the apostle, "that ye _were_ [once, but now no longer are to be] the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that type of doctrine to which ye were delivered. (Margin.) Being then made _free from sin_ [not merely sins forgiven], ye became the servants of righteousness. 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. For when ye _were_ the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness. What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death. But now being made _free from sin_, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life." (Rom. vi. 17-22.)