Romans 7:1-6
by:
Dan Hill, PhD
Pastor, Southwood Bible Church
7655 South Sheridan Avenue
Tulsa, Oklahoma 74113
E-Mail: hill918@aol.com
The struggle we read of in Romans Seven is a necessary link between the
position and potentials we have as explained in Romans 6 and the reality
of the Christian Life lived depending on the Holy Spirit, as described in
Romans Eight.
We should remember as we progress through this chapter that Paul is looking
at a progression. He really set us up for this in Romans Five where he spoke
of the much more things that we have. His goal is much more grace, much
more liberty, much more security, much more divine power, much more intimacy
with God.
In Rom 7:11-3 Paul begins with an analogy. And interestingly, he pulls the
analogy right out of the OT Law.
Paul is not afraid of the Law, in fact he honors the Law and is aware of
its divine eternal purpose. He sees its purpose and its fulfillment in Christ.
He sees that he can, even now a being free from the Law, go to the Law for
guidance. He does this in his epistles several times.
I Corinthians 9:9 For it is written in the Law of Moses, You shall not muzzle
the ox while he is threshing. God is not concerned about oxen, is He?
While we are not under the demands of the Law we can make application from
the law but these are application and not mandates. They guide and direct
but they do not force and demand.
Romans 7:1-3
Or do you not know, brethren (for I am speaking to those who know the
law), that the law has jurisdiction over a person as long as he lives?
For the married woman is bound by law to her husband while he is living;
but if her husband dies, she is released from the law concerning the husband.
So then if, while her husband is living, she is joined to another man, she
shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from
the law, so that she is not an adulteress, though she is joined to another
man.
Paul makes an analogy, and an analogy must not be taken too far. Analogies,
like parables, are designed to get across one point of truth. We really
fall into an allegorical interpretation of the Bible when we try to get
too much out of an analogy.
In verse 1, Paul establishes that the only thing that can take a person
away from the demands of the Law (and he is speaking expressly to the Jews
of Rome) is death.
But remember: Back at the beginning of Romans 6 he talked of a death that
was positional with and in Christ:
Romans 6:3-4, "Or do you not know that all of us who have
been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore
we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as
Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too
might walk in newness of life."
Look ahead also to Romans 7:6, "But now we have been released from
the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in
newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter."
Verse 2, the analogy to OT marriage Law: For the married woman is bound
by law to her husband while he is living; but if her husband dies, she is
released from the law concerning the husband.
Very simple analogy. Paul is not including divorce, he is not giving a message
on the dissolution of a marriage, he is not including separation or annulment.
He is making one point - married, both husband and wife alive, bound together
by law.
If the husband dies, she is free from that Law.
Verse 3 - describes what happens if there is no death:
So then if, while her husband is living, she is joined to another man, she
shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from
the law, so that she is not an adulteress, though she is joined to another
man.
Notice: There is nothing here about divorce, nothing assumes that they have
separated. The only options are that the husband is still alive which would
mean the wife is an adulteress or that he is dead which would means she
is not an adulteress.
The analogy is applied in verses 4 to 6.
Romans 7:4
Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through
the body of Christ, that you might be joined to another, to Him who was
raised from the dead, that we might bear fruit for God.
We see how Paul applies the analogy and how it is not specific in every
detail. Analogies usually are not.
WE AS BELIEVERS = THE WIFE
THE LAW = THE FORMER HUSBAND
THE NEW HUSBAND = JESUS CHRIST
In the application we, the believer (wife), is made to die to the Law through
the literal earthly human body of Christ, His work on the Cross.
Paul has not introduced the concept of the church as the body of Christ
in this epistle. And does not until Romans chapter 12.
MY BRETHREN: He is speaking to believers, this in not salvation but the
living of the Christian Life.
The result of our positional death with Christ is that we can now be joined
to Christ who was raised from the dead by the power of the Father.
THAT YOU MIGHT BE JOINED is an infinitive which views this as the result
of our death to the Law.
We could not be joined to Christ if the former husband was alive but he,
the Law, is not, because we have been made to die to the Law.
If we, having been joined to Christ, go back to the Law, it is like going
back to a former husband.
Now what would you think, if you were married to a woman who had a former
husband and you came home from work and there they were together in each
others arms?
I do not think you would like it and I do not think Christ likes it when
we go back to law.
In a further application of the analogy, Paul brings up an additional result
. . .
That we might bear the fruit for God.
This phrase begins with INA, which looks at a result.
The result is that we bear fruit, which is a one word verb in the Greek
and is an aorist, act, subjunctive which looks at a future events based
upon present conditions.
The FRUIT we are to bear belongs to God, a dative definite article and dative
noun.
THIS IS SET IN CONTRAST WITH v 5: The fruit of the Law is death.
Romans 7:5
For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused
by the Law, were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death.
Now here we have a description. Much has been written and even debated regarding
what the former husband in the analogy represents. Here we see that Paul
is not specific but rather expansive.
WHILE WE WERE is a verb in the imperfect tense, completed past action.
Hence, when we were unbelievers, not having died to the law, not being joined
to Christ.
The Law aroused sinful passions or affections:
PASSION is the word PAQEMA and looks at passive emotional influences that
motivate.
These motives operated in us by way of the Sin Nature
In our members . . .
So the sin operates by way of the presence of the sin nature that is in
us, with reference to the UB.
And that brought about death (Spiritual Death of the UB).
SO THEN: What we have died to and what is now dead to us is not just one
specific aspect of this process but the whole process that leads us to spiritual
death:
LAW ----- SIN NATURE ----- SINS ----- DEATH
Paul's emphasis is on the Law because if you take out the first step in
the process the process does not continue to the result of death.
Spiritual Death is defined by and demanded by the Law revealed by God so
without the first the last does not follow in the logical argument.
THIS RELATES TO WHAT PAUL HAS already said of the LAW:
Romans 3:20, "For through the Law comes the knowledge of sin."
Romans 4:15, "For the Law brings about wrath, but where there is no
law, neither is there violation."
Romans 5:20 "And the Law came in that the transgression might increase."
We see the new process that we now have in Christ.
Gordon Fee in his monumental work God's Empowering Presence, describes what
Paul is doing:
By this language Paul is moving towards that life of the Spirit, who in
Galatians 5:22 is responsible for producing such fruit.
In this verse, v 4, Paul then describes what happened at justification and
the potential of our sanctification.
Romans 6:22, "But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God,
you derive your (fruit) benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome,
eternal life."
Hebrews 12:11, "All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful,
but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields
the peaceable fruit of righteousness."
TRAINED BY IT: Passive voice. The subject receives the action of the verb.
This is grace. We not only receive the training itself . . . but the results
of the training as well. People! This is grace all the way, GOD DOES IT
ALL.
DISCIPLINE and TRAINING:
Educational
Preventative
Punitive
NOTICE the grace in this passage:
God designs the race course, the training course in life.
God designs the training schedule.
God produces the results.
IN VERSE 11, the results of this training is the Peaceful Fruit of Righteousness.
James 3:17-18 , "But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable,
gentle (considerate), reasonable (submissive), full of mercy and good fruits,
unwavering (impartial), without hypocrisy. And the seed whose fruit is righteousness
is sown in peace by those who make peace. "
NIV states: Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness.
DESCRIPTION OF RIGHTEOUSNESS:
Pure: Freedom from defilement or impurities.
Peace loving or Peaceable:
Root: Particularly in a single sense, the opposite of war and dissension.
Metaphorically: Peace of mind, tranquillity, arising from reconciliation
with God and a sense of divine favor.
EIREINIKOS: One who is disposed to peace, Peaceable.
Considerate or Gentle:
To yield. Mildness in the sense of not insisting on the letter of the Law
in a given case. It came to express moderation of kindness towards others.
Submissive or Reasonable:
Reasonable is to be easy to get along with, easily persuaded when the truth
is presented. Not taking a stand when no stand needs to be taken.
This means that a person will seek that which unifies rather than that which
divides.
Full of mercy:
Compassion or active pity. It has the sense of goodness, Mercy sees someone's
problems then acts in a manner that is not deserved but full of mercy (the
holding back of what is deserved) and grace (the extending of what is not
deserved).
Impartial:
KRINO: To sift through the facts and then to decide. To judge but to know
enough to withhold judgment or opinion until the facts are in. Or to know
enough not to have an opinion in some matters.
DIA KRINO: To judge or make a distinction between two.. by adding the prefix
KRINO is made stronger.
But our word is ADIAKRITOS: Used only here in Scripture.
It means without doubts . . . without division. It expresses the distinctive
assurance and resolution of faith . . . so it means without wavering or
unshakable.
Sincere or Without Hypocrisy
Originally it meant inexperienced in the art of acting. In the New Testament
it came to mean one without hypocrisy or pretense, genuine, real, true,
sincere.
The legalist is the one who pretends to be righteous but is in reality a
bad actor full of arrogance, unrighteous.
Romans 7:6
But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which
we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness
of the letter.
The word RELEASED is an aorist tense that looks back to salvation and is
the same word used in the analogy of marriage in verse 2 . . . wife is released
from the Law concerning her husband.
Paul also used the word in Romans 6:6 Knowing this, that our old self was
crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we
should no longer be slaves to sin;
It means "to make idle, to make of no effect". The Law still exists,
the sin nature is still present in us but we have died to them, we are no
longer under that bondage unless we chose to be. To go back to the former
husband.
But when we do we make something, or someone else idle:
Galatians 5:4, "You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking
to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace. "
The word SEVERED is the same word we have here RELEASED. When we go back
to the Law we make Christ of no effect in our lives.
But when we are in fellowship, the Law and the sin nature are of no effect
in our lives.
BOUND means not only to be possessed but to be suppressed.
As long as you are suppressed by the Law you cannot be free to follow your
new husband, the Lord Jesus Christ.
BUT WE ARE NO LONGER BOUND so that:
We serve in newness of spirit and not in oldness of letter.
Absence of the definite article before SPIRIT would indicate that Paul referees
to the human spirit, that spirit that is created in man at salvation.
This reflects all the way back to Romans 2:29, But he is a Jew who is one
inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit
[in spirit], not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from
God."
The human spirit is that immaterial part of the believer that is given by
God, belongs to God, ministered to by the Holy Spirit, is the place where
truth is stored, from which truth influences the soul, and the part of man
that serves God.
The human spirit is one third of what you are as a believer. It is one third
of the connected whole of the body, the soul, and the human spirit.
AND THAT IS HOW WE ARE TO SERVE GOD, in the newness of the human spirit,
not in the oldness of the letter of the Law.
SOME PRINCIPLES:
Being made a creature in Christ is not small thing even for
God. It took the sending of His Son and the Sacrifice of His Son, and the
Resurrection of His Son to accomplish it.
We are new creatures because we have something now we did not have before,
a human spirit.
In the human spirit we can now serve God in that spirit. That service is
not from our ability, it is from all that God gives us by way of position
and possession and potential.
The human spirit and our new creature status came about by grace.
When we want to go back to the letter of the Law we forget who we are, what
we are, we forget about grace.
It is impossible to serve God by the letter of the Law.
And that thought begins to set up the conflict of this chapter. You cannot
serve God, please God, have the freedom God wants you to have when you are
bound by the Law, living in the OSN.
Galatians 5:1, "It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore
keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery."
At this point, a new paragraph begins.
In Romans 7:1-6 Paul has shown that we are not under the Law. In Romans
7:7-14 he will show that a believer who chooses to put himself under the
Law fails to avail himself to the resources of grace and is living a life
of defeat.
End of Lesson 28
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