The New Way of the Spirit

Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. Romans 7:4

Romans 7:1–6 – Romans: The Righteousness of God
Fourth Sunday of Easter  – April 30, 2023 (am)

Rom.7 is one of the most familiar, most compelling, and most experientially relevant passages in this letter. Because of that, it may be the most common entry point into this letter even for those who have no real familiarity with Rom. or with the Bible in general. It just captures the human struggle with sin in ways that don’t require saving faith to understand. Later in this chapter, Paul writes: 15 For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. … 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Everyone gets that! Everyone says: Wow, that’s me! Even those who’ve never trusted Christ as Savior recognize that they can’t live up to the standard of good that exists in their minds (cf. 1:19-20).

The potential range of meaning in this chapter is so wide that even the most conscientious commentators are forced to consider whether Paul may be giving voice to unbelievers here, or to pre-Christian Jews, or to nominal Christians. Or is it actually possible that genuine believers who’ve died to sin (6:2) might still struggle with sin to the depths that Paul describes here? This is a huge question! However, it’s not the main point of this passage! What we see here primarily is Paul’s description of the believer’s relationship to the law—both Jews and, by extension, [Gentiles] (cf. 2:14 For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves….) (Moo 1994 1137). This opening paragraph (1-6) sets up the whole chapter, expressing the central point that when we’ve died to sin (6:2) we’ve died to the law also (4), not meaning that it ceases to be the Word of God somehow, but that it no longer has dominion over us. We’re no longer under its curse, its condemnation. It was the definitive Word under the reign of sin, but we’ve been freed from it under the reign of Christ. Let’s see how this works—two parts.

The Law Brings Bondage to Death as Long as We Live – 1-3

This first part itself has two parts: the principle (1) and the picture, the illustration (2-3). 1 Or do you not know, brothers—this is an unusual opening, used only here and 6:3; essentially it means: [I’m sure you know this]—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? Now, it’s not immediately clear whom Paul’s addressing here. It surely seems like it’s the same mixed audience of Jews and Gentiles that it’s been from the start, but would he really make this statement to Gentiles—I am speaking to those who know the law? We could spend a while exploring possible answers here, but I think we can cut through that to hear Paul’s point. Everyone in his audience is acquainted with law in some form, whether Jews, who know the Law of Moses, or Jews and Gentiles living under Roman law as citizens of the Empire. They all know how law works sufficiently enough to understand this illustration. Now, surely, in context, Paul is pointing primarily to the law of Moses; that’s the touchpoint for this whole chapter. And surely the Gentiles in the Roman church would’ve had some familiarity with that. But also, the point he’s making, the illustration he employs, works for any expression of law.

2 For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. 3 Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress. That’s understandable. We can see Paul’s point clearly and grant it easily. Just one side note: be careful when people use this passage to build their view of divorce and remarriage. Paul isn’t teaching on that subject here. He’s using marriage as an example of how the law works toward making the point that death delivers from obligation to the law, even in marriage.

The Death of Christ Brings Freedom to Serve God – 4-6

Then he moves on to his summary and key verse in this paragraph, our theme verse for today: 4 Likewise, [in the same way], my brothers [and sisters], you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. Wow! This verse is the reason why we didn’t try to cover all of c.7 in one sermon—vv.1-6 convey the central thrust of the chapter (Moo 1994 1137), and v.4 is the heart of vv.1-6. This opening assertion is massive: you also have died to the law through the body of Christ. This is where we hear that the law belongs to the old realm of Adam, the flesh, sin, and death. So, just as we’ve died to sin (6:2) through faith in Christ, being baptized with him, into his death, [so] that we too might [be dead to sin] (6:3-4), by that same means—through the body of Christ—[we] have also died to the law. That death needs to happen for us to belong to another, namely, to [Christ], which is then the necessary precondition for us to bear fruit for God, to walk in newness of life (6:4).

5 For while we were living in the flesh, while we were under that reign of Adam and death (cf. 5:14), our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. We can’t help ourselves; even what we’d call good works in this life aren’t pleasing to God under His reign. They’re just a product of our sinful hearts trying to redeem themselves by their own self-styled, selfishly motivated expressions of good! These have no value to God! And it’s the law that makes this clear to us! That’s it’s role. But that part isn’t in today’s passage. That’s next week’s text. The natural question here is: If the law belongs to the reign of Adam, the flesh, sin, and death, then is the law itself actually sinful? And the way we can know we’re on the right track here is just to look at v.7 and see that this is the very question Paul poses next. In other words, Paul is really in danger of being heard to say that God’s revealed standard of holiness under the old covenant is sinful and fuels sin. Didn’t he just write that sinful passions are aroused by the law? Yes, he did. And he’ll get to that next. So will we, God willing, next Sunday. But before he defends the law’s goodness (12), we need to see the sin and death it identified and confirmed and condemned, providing no avenue of escape for us.

That’s Paul’s present point. 6 But now we are released from the law in Christ, having died in Him, united with him in a death like his (6:5), to that which held us captive, the law, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code. This is the second time we’ve seen this [letter]/Spirit contrast (2:29). Before it was contrasting physical circumcision with circumcision of the heart (2:27-29). So, really, in both places it’s primarily contrasting life under the old covenant with life under the new, the old realm and the new, the reign of Adam, the flesh, sin, and death and the reign of Christ, the Spirit, righteousness, and life.

So, before reassuring us of the goodness of the law (12), Paul tells us of our freedom from it’s unyielding condemnation (cf. 8:1) in Christ—4 … we have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that [we] may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, and we with him (6:4-5), to Christ, in order that we may bear fruit for God, [may] walk in newness of life (6:4), [may] serve in the new way of the Spirit (6) to the praise of His glory.

Conclusion

This, my friends, is our hope today! This is what makes us grateful to God as we come to the Table of the Lord. This is not just what makes us desire to remember, or determined to remember, this is what makes us able  to remember the death of our Lord on our behalf, because in His death, removing sin and absorbing God’s wrath for all who believe, we’re freed not only from death but from the law, its condemnation (cf. 8:1) that falls upon us for failing to live out/up to the righteousness of God on our own.

And it’s [dying with] Christ that leads to our being raised [with Him] in order that we may bear fruit to God (4). Any joy, any act of service, any expression of love or comfort or encouragement or hope, any fellowship we feel in the body of Christ is purchased for us by the shed blood of Jesus! And we can hear Paul building toward that here.

In fact, this is a pattern we see several times in this letter. Paul introduces the next section of his argument with a poignant statement made as he’s nearing the end of a previous section. One of the clearest examples of this is still to come: he pens cc.9-11 in explanation and defense of his poignant statement in 8:28 … we know that for those who love God all things work together for good….  Here, the very familiar c.7 is essentially an explanation of his poignant statement in 6:14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace. And right here in v.6 we read another of those poignant statements that catches our ear. Surely it will return soon! And when it does, it will bring with it one of the most glorious portions of this whole letter! We read: 6 … we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit…. As soon as Paul has reassured us that the law is not sinful even though it clarifies and magnifies our sin, placing us under unyielding condemnation, his next chapter opens saying: 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.

This is our inheritance in Christ! He’s provided for you and me, for all who believe, the privilege to bear fruit for God (4), to walk in newness of life (6:4), to serve in the new way of the Spirit (6)! He’s opened up before us the way of salvation with all its new-found freedoms from the condemnation of the law and sin and death in this life, and then eternal fellowship with Him, free of all reach of these things, in the life to come! So, come now to the Table of the Lord, all you who believe, so that we may be strengthened to remember.

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Resources

Arnold, Clinton E., gen. ed. 2002. Zondervan Illustrated Bible Background Commentary. Vol. 3, Romans-Philemon. Romans, by Douglas J. Moo, 2-95. Grand Rapids: Zondervan.

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Moo. Douglas J. 2000. The NIV Application Commentary. Romans. Grand Rapids: Zondervan.

Morris, Leon, ed. 1985. Tyndale New Testament Commentaries. Vol. 6, Romans, by F. F. Bruce. Downers Grove: InterVarsity.

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Murray, John. 1968. The Epistle to the Romans, 2 Vols. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.

Nygren, Anders. 1949. Commentary on Romans. Philadelphia: Fortress.

Owen, John, ed. Commentary on the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans, by John Calvin. Translated by John Owen.

Sproul, R. C. 2005. The Gospel of God: An Exposition of Romans. Ross-shire, Great Britain: Christian Focus.

Stott, John, NT ed. 1994. The Bible Speaks Today. The Message of Romans, by John Stott. Leicester, Eng.: InterVarsity.

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NEXT SUNDAY: I Find It to Be a Law, Romans 7:7–25