“But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.”
But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from the heart that pattern of teaching to which you were entrusted. — The μορφή (morphē, "pattern/form") of teaching is the gospel tradition; obedience ἐκ καρδίας (ek kardias, "from the heart") indicates not external compliance but volitional reorientation. The passive ἀπαredōthēte ("were entrusted") suggests divine action: God has committed the teaching to them. Faith is not intellectual assent but grateful submission to a teaching that transforms the heart.
Church Fathers on Romans 6:17
“But God be thanked, that you were the servants of sin, but you have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered unto you.” (Lit. “into which you were delivered.”) After shaming them by the slavery, after alarming them by the rewards, and so exhorting them, he again rights them by calling the benefits to mind. For by these he shows that they were great evils from which they were freed, and that not by any labors of their own, and that things henceforth…
Nicene & Post-Nicene / Ante-Nicene Fathers translations · public domain
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