Romans 7:1-24
In order to understand Romans chapter 7, there are three different settings that Paul addresses in the chapter which once they are noticed make it much easier to see Paul's transition. We lose these settings because the words are translated into our English and we miss the clues in the Greek language Paul wrote the letter.
Chapter 7:1-6
Paul uses the analogy of death in marriage as an example to help us understand how the death of Christ has freed us from the law. The setting Paul addresses is life after salvation. The focus is on living free from the obligations of the law. Paul tries to help the readers realize that after accepting Christ as their Lord and savior, they are no longer obligated to keep the law in order to maintain a relationship with God. Jesus has freed them from such obligation [which is not a successful way of following God as we find out later in the chapter] so that they can truly live life in relationship with Christ.
Chapter 7: 7-13
In this section, Paul outlines the impossibility of being able to keep the law. The reason its impossible is that the sin in us takes advantage of the obligation of the law and so holds us prisoner. We are incapable of keeping the law and its obligations. It is impossible for anyone to keep the law because human beings are sinful and sin will always have the upper hand by taking advantage of our inability to keep law and so keep us distant from God. The setting is life before accepting Christ. Paul will now continue in this setting to show how vicious life under the law truly is.
Chapter 7:14-24
Remember that the Roman believers were taking stock in their ability to come close to God through their behaviour, racial background and all around ability to be able to get themselves close to God. Paul breaks this boastful facade by pointing out that life under the law is a vicious circle of sin taking advantage of the law and so becoming a law in itself, incapacitating us and keep us from good. It is not about observing and so being able to then be in relationship with God but it actually effects the opposite - by trying to obey it we fail and fall into condemnation. Living under the law is subjecting oneself to this cycle of punishment.
Application:
The wrong assumption about this passage is that believers have continually come to this passage to justify their feelings of inadequacy and incapability of drawing close to God and of doing good. We need to remember that Paul did not write this with such a pretense. He wrote it to describe what life under the law apart from Christ is truly like. He's not rolling in his own self-pity.
Is it wrong to feel like we don't measure up and we can't do good? I don't think its wrong. To say that Paul doesn't address our failings as believers doesn't mean that such feelings are not legitimate. In fact we do fall down at times in our desire to follow Christ. One of the best passages for helping us work through such feelings is Psalm 19. In this passage David talks about hidden and unknown sins asking God how one can make sense of it and asking for God's help in overcoming them. That should be our response to such feelings and I encourage you to go to Psalm 19 everytime you feel like you've failed in following Christ. God's goal is to pick us up, dust us off and help us on the road again.
Getting back to chapter 7, the only way to live free from condemnation is to live in light of the law of the Spirit of Life that has come our way through what Jesus has done both to us and for us. Its in this place that we continue to live as followers of Christ, under the strength and power of God's Spirit, not under our perceived ability to stay close to God through obedience to the law. That is a vicious pit of condemnation that we can never get out of.
Questions:
1. Think of what it feels like to live under the weight of rules and laws that are impossible to keep? Recall stories in your past that created feelings of inadequacies and not measuring up.
2. Talk about the power of Jesus in your life. Do you have a healthy view of the power of Jesus life to free you from your own adequacy before God?
3. Think a bit about what "The Law of the Spirit of Life" might mean in anticipation of the passage for next week [ch.8:2].
posted by Luciano Lombardi @ 6:23 PM
2 Comments:
I had a hard time with verses 9 & 10 "Once I was alive apart from law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death." It seemed to suggest that there was no sin until God made the law which begs the question why did God make the law then? We werent doing anything wrong before the law came around. Then I read an analogy comparing sin to swimming in shark infested waters. The water is inherently dangerous and swimming in it would bring death so someone put up a sign saying "No swimming. Fine $10" Now before the sign went up it was perfectly legal to swim there but it was put there for our safety. You can resent the sign all you want but it's not the signs fault there are sharks. The law was put in place not to arbitrarily restrict our lives but for our own good. If God leaves out the "Thou shall not steal" commandement, how would we live in a society where property wasnt respected and we took whatever we wanted? The evil desires that lie within us is what kills. Gods laws simply spell them out for us and help protect us from ourselves. thoughts?
I think your analogy is quite accurate. Through the Biblical story we are aware that God creates a "good" world and "good" people. That "good" creation is created with the presence of evil lurking in the background. Its the risk that God takes in creating us. Yet knowing the risk, God enacts a plan to ensure creation is not undermined by evil [cf. Eph. 1:3-6].
The Law simply states a fact about who we are - riddled with sin disease and the only cure is death. The law is certainly good but because of sin - it becomes a lethal cocktail that riddles our being. Jesus frees us from this.
I like the analogy - it works well at explaining what Paul says.
Luc
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