When we see the word therefore, common sense should direct us to see what it is there for. First the believers are reminded that they are dead. Now this gives you the right and responsibility to act like men who are dead to sin. We are not commanded to put to death our sinful desires in order to become dead, but because we are dead. Being is not the result of doing, but doing is the result of being.
Every human religion reverses that order.
The best it can tell us is to stop lying and thereby put away the old man and his deeds. But the way of the gospel is utterly contrary to human devisings. This illustrates how we must grasp the promise of justification before we can obey the command of sanctification. For we are not only commanded to refrain from speaking evil of good men, but we are forbidden to speak evil of any man. Yet if the pastor merely exhorts his congregation to live this sort of life, it is only an exercise in moralism.