WHO ISSUES THE PAYCHECK?

Romans 6:23 - For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

This is one of the most quoted verses in the book of Romans. (In all the Bible, for that matter.)

The standard interpretation goes something like this: "When you sin, God in time will bring His punishment of death. However, He offers eternal life to those who trust in His Son."

In other words, God offers eternal life as an escape hatch from the just penalty He has decreed for all who sin. 

And that's the way I have always understood it. 

But I realized the other day that I may have been missing something here in Romans 6:23 and it skews the interpretation. Maybe you've always seen this, but it was a lightbulb moment for me. Look at the basic structure of the sentence:

The wages OF SIN is death, 
but the gift OF GOD is eternal life. 

It doesn't say "The wages of SINNING is death ..."

"Sin" is being personified! And Paul is contrasting Sin as a master against God as a master. Death is the paycheck from SIN. Not a punishment from God. 

Romans 6:23 is part of an analogy: We are either slaves to Sin or slaves to God. If we work for Sin, we reap shameful fruit and get paid in death. If we work for God, we reap the fruit of holiness and He gives us eternal life as a free gift. 

Look at the verse in context:

20 For when you were slaves to sin, you were free of obligation to righteousness. 21 What fruit did you reap at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? The outcome of those things is death. 22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the fruit you reap leads to holiness, and the outcome is eternal life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

I think it makes a world of difference to understand death as a natural consequence of serving Sin rather than thinking of it as a harsh punishment from an angry God.