Discovery BoxRomans 6:17-22 
Context6:17 But thanks be to God that though you were slaves to sin, you obeyed 1 from the heart that pattern 2 of teaching you were entrusted to, 6:18 and having been freed from sin, you became enslaved to righteousness. 6:19 (I am speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh.) 3 For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification. 6:20 For when you were slaves of sin, you were free with regard to righteousness.
6:21 So what benefit 4 did you then reap 5 from those things that you are now ashamed of? For the end of those things is death. 6:22 But now, freed 6 from sin and enslaved to God, you have your benefit 7 leading to sanctification, and the end is eternal life.
1 tn Grk “you were slaves of sin but you obeyed.”
2 tn Or “type, form.”
3 tn Or “because of your natural limitations” (NRSV).
sn Verse 19 forms something of a parenthetical comment in Paul’s argument.
4 tn Grk “fruit.”
5 tn Grk “have,” in a tense emphasizing their customary condition in the past.
6 tn The two aorist participles translated “freed” and “enslaved” are causal in force; their full force is something like “But now, since you have become freed from sin and since you have become enslaved to God….”
7 tn Grk “fruit.”
