Christian spiritual change: Sin must no longer rule in your mortal bodies, so that you obey the desires of your natural self. Romans 6:12

At the end of his third missionary journey, Paul likely decided to undertake an even longer journey, traveling to Spain and Italy. This explains why he sent an important epistle to the believers in Rome. This letter differs from the others in that it doesn't mention anyone personally, nor is it focused on denouncing heresies. Instead, it centers on the formation of believers in Christian theology, making the doctrine of justification its central theme.
This is why Paul, in his epistle, presented Jesus as a new Adam, just as with Adam, the first man in the Bible, sin entered the world and with it death, through Christ came grace that gives men a new spiritual life, the spiritual gift of eternal life. The apostle Paul then explained that with Jesus came a fundamental spiritual change; through faith in Christ, men pass from death to life and from sin to righteous living. The sacrament of baptism is, therefore, for each Christian, a step, a Passover, like when the Hebrews crossed the Red Sea with the prophet Moses. And this was something that the apostle Paul witnessed with the first conversions of pagans to the Christian faith.
The old man bound to sin must give way to the new man, the spiritual man, renewed in Christ and called to live the gifts through the grace of the Holy Spirit, the apostle wrote. Faith in Christ implies, then, that error cannot be a habit or a custom but the exception, and when it occurs, there must be a purpose of amendment. A Christian, then, is a person who cannot say that he sinned because society demands it, or because one has to look good in front of others. In this sense, there are no gray areas, righteousness and sin are, ultimately, paths for man.
This is why Paul wrote with wisdom in his epistle: "Sin must no longer rule in your mortal bodies, so that you obey the desires of your natural self. Nor must you surrender any part of yourselves to sin to be used for wicked purposes. Instead, give yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life, and surrender your whole being to him to be used for righteous purposes" Romans 6:12-13. Faith, then, in Paul's thought, is a new circumcision for man, no longer according to the flesh but according to the spirit, and in this consists the true Christian spiritual change.

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