Down to Earth But Heavenly Minded

Release from the Legal Principle Illustrated: Jewish Believers, to whom the Law of Moses was given. Dead to that Law by Identification in Death with Christ Made Sin; now joined to the Risen Christ: thus Bearing Fruit to God and Rendering Glad Service. Verses 1-6.

Paul’s Vain Struggle to be Holy by the Law,—Before he knew of Indwelling Sin and his Helplessness against it; and that he had Died with Christ to Sin, and to the Law, which gave Sin power. Verses 7-24.

Deliverance seen through Christ; and the Flesh declared Hopeless. Verse 25.

1 Or are ye ignorant, brethren (for I speak to men acquainted with law), that the law rules over a man as long as he liveth?

2 For the woman that hath a husband is bound by law to the husband while he liveth; but if the husband die, she is discharged from the law of the husband. 3 So then, if while the husband liveth, she be joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but, if the husband die, she is free from the law, so that she is no adulteress, though she be joined to another man.

4 Wherefore, my brethren, ye also were made dead to the Law, through the body of Christ, that ye should be joined to Another,—to Him who was raised from among the dead, that we might bring forth fruit unto God.

5 For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sins which were through the Law wrought in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. 6 But now we have been annulled from the Law, having died to that wherein we were held: so that we serve in newness of spirit, and not in oldness of letter.

HERE WE HAVE a chapter of two sections,—(1) verses 1 through 6; and (2) verses 7 through 25: both of which we are prone to misunderstand and misapply, unless we exercise much prayerful care.

In the first section, God shows how those that were placed by Him under law were released from that relation by sharing in the death of Christ; so that, joined to a Risen Christ, they bear fruit; and, released from law, they give glad and willing service. In the second section, we have Paul describing his struggle under the Law, as a converted Israelite, before he knew the great facts of this first part,—that in Christ he was dead to the Law: “I was alive apart from law once.” It is the struggle of one that is born again, and “delights in the Law of God,” seeking to compel the flesh to obey God’s Law. The end, of course, is a cry of utter despair (for the Law was a “ministration of death”); and a new view of Christ, as the One through whom is found deliverance from sin’s power and from the Law that gave it that power! 149

The Gospel-Announcement of Chapter Seven:

Dead to and Discharged from Law

Verse 1: Or—the opening word of verse 1 connects the first six verses of
Chapter Seven directly with verse 14 of Chapter Six, “Ye are not under law but under grace.” (For the last part of Chapter Six is parenthetical,—a warning against abuse of our “not under law” position.) Therefore connect these words “Ye are not under law” with the “Or” of verse 1, Chapter Seven. Conybeare aptly paraphrases: “You must acknowledge what I say, (that we are not under law) or be ignorant,” etc.

The King James, by its failure to translate the chapter’s opening word “Or,” to which God gives the emphatic position in this argument, obscures the whole meaning of the passage and context. Unless we connect Chapter 7:1 with Chapter 6:14, (as the proper translation “or” does), we cannot properly understand the passage.

Are ye ignorant, brethren—Some one remarks that when Paul uses this expression concerning the saints, it often turns out that they are ignorant! (Compare Romans 6:3; 11:25; I Thess. 4:13, etc.)

(For I speak to men acquainted with law)—In this first verse it is law in
general,150 because this whole verse is connected with Chapter 6.14: “Ye are are not under law,” (not under that principle) referring, of course, to all believers.

That the law rules over a man as long as he liveth—Paul here declares that the claims of law endure throughout a man’s life,—death being the only deliverance. The Roman world well knew the reach and authority of human law—of which Paul is here speaking.

Verses 2, 3: For the woman that hath a husband—Here Paul uses the fundamental law of domestic relationship to illustrate the fact that only death breaks a legal bond. This is the evident, simple meaning in this passage. This husband-and-wife illustration is marvelously chosen. It is of world-wide application—instantly understood everywhere; and it sets forth perfectly what the apostle desired—that is, to describe the dissolution of a relationship by death, thus making possible a new relationship.

Now the simple, and to me obvious path of interpretation is to proceed
immediately to the fourth verse, spending no more time on verses 2 and 3 than will suffice to appreciate their force as an illustration of the fact announced in verse 1, that only death breaks a legal claim. We should proceed, therefore, according to the principle illustrated in verses 2 and 3, to the application of the principle in the case of those believers who had been openly placed by God under a law: that is, Jewish believers.

For in the example of the woman and her husband, there seems no real intention on Paul’s part, other than to set forth the fact that death ends a relationship, and sets one free to enter upon a new relationship; as we have, to Christ Risen.

If Adam was our federal head, Christ now is so. And this was made possible by our death with Christ made sin.

The obligation that governed our former condition as in Adam, no longer
calls for righteousness or holiness of our own in the flesh: we have died as to that place in Adam; and are in the Second Man, the last Adam, Christ,—who is Himself our righteousness and sanctification.

If we undertake to apply verses 4 to 6 directly to any but Jewish believers, we encounter this difficulty: that it is distinctly said, and that repeatedly, that the Jews, being under the Law, were in contrast to the Gentiles, who were “without law.” These verses then must first be applied to those who were under the Law, knew themselves to be under it, and were exercised by its commands. Otherwise verse 5 becomes unintelligible:

When we [Jewish believers] were in the flesh [they were now in Christ, and so in the Spirit] the arousings of sins which were through the Law wrought in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.

These words would not be written by Paul concerning Gentiles, but they express exactly the state of Jewish believers as exemplified in the latter part of our chapter. And now for the gospel, which lies in verses four and six:

Verse 4: Wherefore my brethren, ye also were made dead to the Law through the body of Christ.

As touching Gentile believers, this latter fact was to be reckoned on for
the disannulling (Chapter 6:6) of “the body of sin,” relieving them of sin’s bondage. But for the Jewish believer, there was the additional fact that he was under the Law, which bound his conscience, and gave sin very peculiar power over him. For he must obey the Law, for it had been given his nation by Jehovah, and they had covenanted at Sinai to let their obedience be the condition of their relationship to Him.

To the Jewish believer, then, the announcement is now directly made that he was made dead to the Law through the body of Christ, in order to be to Another, to the risen Christ, thus to bring forth fruit to God; and that he has been [verse 6] discharged from the Law [literally, annulled with respect to the Law], thus bringing him out into service in newness of spirit.151 This was the startling announcement made to those who, for 1500 years had known nothing but the Law: they had died to it all; the Law knew them no more.

Now what Paul affirms in Romans 6:14 covers, of course, both the Gentile and Jewish believer: “Ye are NOT UNDER LAW”: that is, not under that principle in any sense. The Gentiles had moral obligations as responsible children of Adam, though not under the Law, indeed, “without law.” There was the work of the Law in their hearts (as we saw in Chapter Two), with which their consciences bore witness. To Gentiles, therefore, the announcement that in Christ they are not at all under the principle of law, sets them free to delight in Christ, and to surrender to the operations of the Holy Spirit within them. The additional announcement is made to those under the Mosaic Law that they have the same liberty, having died to that wherein they were held.

The great lesson which each of us must lay to his own heart, is, that those in Christ, whether Jew or Gentile, are not under law as a principle, but under grace,—full, accomplished Divine favor—that favor shown by God to Christ! And the life of the believer now is (1) in faith, not effort: as Paul speaks in Galatians 2:20: “The life which I now live in the flesh, I live in faith, the faith which is in the Son of God”; (2) in the power of the indwelling Spirit; for walking by the Spirit has taken the place of walking by external commandments; and (3) exercising ourselves to have a good conscience toward God and men always: particularly, not wrongly using our freedom.

While the form of the language in the first six verses makes it evident that the Mosaic Law was before Paul’s mind, at the same time it is of profit to us because: (1) We all have a moral responsibility to produce a righteousness and holiness before God and we cannot; (2) Both Jew and Gentile are included in the tremendous statement of Chapter 6:6, “our old man was crucified.”

Through the body of Christ—This is a peculiar manner of speechapter God speaks not here of propitiation or justification, which are through the blood of Christ (Romans 3:25; 5:9; Ephesians 1:7). But God speaks here of that identification with Christ in which; in God’s view, all believers were brought to the end of their history at the cross, so that their former relationships (to sin, law, the world), are ended. It is to be noted that both concerning Christ’s death for us, and our death with Christ, Christ’s own body is mentioned. As to the first, we remember I Peter 2:24: “Who His own self bare our sins in His body upon the tree.” And as to the second, the present verse: made dead . . . through the body of Christ. 152

That ye should be joined to Another, to Him who was raised from among the dead. The great lesson to learn in this whole passage lies in what we might call the two Christs: first, there is “the body of Christ,” of Christ made sin, and our old man crucified with Him: our history in Adam thus ended before God; and, second, Christ raised from the dead. It is this latter Christ to whom we are now vitally united, to Him only.

That we might bring forth fruit unto God. In this Risen Christ, as we saw in Chapter 6:22: “Ye have your fruit unto sanctification”; or Philippians 1:11; “being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are through Jesus Christ,” brought about—made to bud, blossom, grow and ripen, through the indwelling Spirit: or “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, self-control” (Galatians 5:22)—what a cluster of grapes that is: fruit unto God, indeed!

Now—however the principle may apply to all believers—Paul evidently, in verses 4, 5 and 6, has the Jew under the Law definitely before him; for he says “Ye were made dead to the Law.” It is implicitly asserted here that those under law could not bring forth fruit to God. Because, in order to bring forth such fruit, they had to be made dead to the Law. This cannot be sufficiently emphasized, for all about us we find those who are earnestly seeking to bear fruit to God, while “entangled with the yoke of bondage,” not knowing themselves dead to the legal principle.

But before our very eyes those publicly placed under law, yea the Mosaic Law directly from God, did not bring forth fruit in that condition. Else would God have had them die wholly out of that position with Christ on the cross?

No, it is only those who see themselves to have died with Christ and to be now joined to a Risen Christ in glory, that fully bring forth fruit to God.

It Is a glorious day when a believer sees himself only in a Risen Christ—dead, buried and risen; and can say with another, “I am not in the flesh, not in the place of a child of Adam at all, but delivered out of it by redemption. The whole scene of a living man, this world in which the life of Adam develops itself, and of which the Law is the moral rule, I do not belong to, before God, more than a man who died ten years ago out of it.”

Verse 5: For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sins which were through the Law wrought in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. Now in this one verse is seen the whole of the great struggle detailed by the apostle in the latter part of this chapter: When we were in the flesh—Note, it does not say, in the body, for we are all that! Being in the body has no moral significance, but the words are, in the flesh—the condition of those not saved, as we see from Chapter 8:8, 9: “For ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you.” This does describe a moral state or condition,—absence of life, absence of the Holy Spirit, and control by the fallen nature.

The passions of sins which were through the Law—To those in the flesh
controlled by the evil nature through a body dead to God, legal restraint was intolerable. As we shall see in the last part of the chapter, sin was there, but quiescent, until the Law came, demanding obedience and holiness. Thus came the arousings [or passions] of sins—sins of all sorts. It is evident that the Jew who had the Law, is distinctly and especially before the apostle’s mind here. For these words could not be written of “Gentiles who have not the Law” (2:14, 15); although these very two verses assert that there was a “work” written in the hearts of the Gentiles, which is called “the work of the Law,” unto which their consciences bear fellow-witness. (See carefully, comment on Chapter 2:14.) Nevertheless, it cannot be said that verse 5 describes accurately any but an Israelite to whom the Law was given, and in whom the commandments of that Law directly aroused the opposition of sin in the flesh.

Wrought in our members to bring forth fruit unto death—Even in the last part of the chapter, in Paul’s great struggle—after he is saved, we find a law of sin in his members, against which he is powerless, and which would have engulfed him in everlasting hopelessness, except for the revelation of deliverance in Christ. Here, in verse 5, where an unsaved man, a man in the flesh, is in view, fruit unto death is brought forth by those “arousings of sins” which came through the Law

Verse 6: But now we have been annulled from the Law, having died to that wherein we were held: so that we serve in newness of spirit, and not in oldness of letter.

This word which we have rendered annulled, is Paul’s old word katargeo,—“put out of business.” In Chapter Six we read that “our old man was crucified with Him in order that the body of sin might be annulled”—put out of business. That blessed message could be given to all believers, Jew or Gentile. For it is a federal one, as the words “our old man” reveal. But the Jew had not only the body of sin: he had distinctly given to him the Mosaic Law. Therefore it is written, in Chapter 7:6, that he has been annulled, put out of business, from that Law, having died 153 to it.

The Law which once “held” him now had nothing to do with him, for he had been put out of the Law’s domain, out of the place of business in which the Law operated, that is, on natural children of Adam, on men in the flesh. What a glorious deliverance!

Now let us who are Gentile believers most carefully note two things: (1) that the Jewish believer, who was put publicly, and under sanctions of death, under the Law, by God at Sinai, has been declared by that same God to have died to that wherein he was held, so that the Law has no more business with him. (2) That therefore, however deeply taught by tradition that we Gentile believers are under law, we must throw that tradition all away. For if the Jew, who was Divinely placed under the Law, has been made dead to it and discharged therefrom, put out of the sphere and domain of the Law, then what presumption for a Gentile to claim that he is under that Law before God!

So that we serve!—Wonderful paradoxes of the gospel! In verse 4, having died, they bear fruit; and here, having been discharged, they serve. What an unspeakable satisfaction filled the apostle’s heart, at finding himself serving God, in all the capacities of his love-filled being, the more he felt his complete freedom from that Law that once “held” him. In the old days, it was, “I verily thought I ought to do”; now it is, “I delight to do.” As we say elsewhere, the instructed believer finds himself doing the will of God as it is in heaven, that is, in the very spirit of service, and not by forms, or ordinances—which are earthly “rudiments.” Oldness of letter it once was—minute particulars of legal observances according to the tradition of the fathers; newness of spirit it had become when the apostle learned that he had died out to the whole legal sphere, to the Adam-position—man in the flesh,154 unto whom the Law had been given at Sinai.

Truly Paul could say to his Jewish fellow-believers, God has here, concerning the Law, conferred on us a heavenly degree of D.D.: “Dead, Discharged.” (Beware that you do not turn into an LL.D. and go about “desiring to be teachers of the Law, understanding neither what you say, nor whereof you confidently affirm!” (I Timothy 1:7)

Now unto us Gentile believers, what a breeze from the delectable mountains this passage is! For our poor consciences are always—sad to say—ready to hear of some new “duty” or “path of surrender,” or “dying out” to this or that: not satisfied with God’s plain announcement that we died to sin, are not under law: that even those whom He placed under The Law had died to it, and been discharged therefrom! And that we are to present ourselves to Him as “alive from the dead, and our members as instruments of righteousness unto God—‘whose service is perfect freedom.’ “ 155

Paul’s Law-struggle—before he knew the Gospel-revelation, that he had died to the Law

7 What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? Banish the thought! On the
contrary, I had not become conscious of sin, except through law: for I had not perceived evil-desire, except the Law had said, Thou shalt not have evil-desire. 8 But sin, seizing occasion through the Commandment, wrought out in me all manner of evil-desire. For apart from law sin is dead.

9 And I was alive apart from law once. But upon the coming of the Commandment [to my conscience] sin sprang into life, and I died. 10 And the Commandment, which was unto life, this I found to be unto death: 11 for sin, seizing occasion, through the Commandment beguiled me, and through it slew me.

12 So that the Law indeed is holy, and the Commandment holy, and righteous, and good.

13 Did then that which is good become death unto me? Banish the thought! But sin, that it might appear as sin, by working out death to me through that which is good;—that through the Commandment sin might become exceeding sinful!

14 For we know that the Law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin. 15 For that which I am working out, I do not own: for not what I am wishing this am I doing: but what I am hating—this I am practicing. 16 But if what I am not wishing, I am practicing, I am consenting unto the Law that it is right.

17 So, therefore, no longer is it I that am working it out, but sin which is dwelling in me. 18 For I know that there does not dwell in me, that is, in my flesh, a good thing: for the wishing is present with me, but the working out that which is right, is not. 19 For not what I am wishing am I practicing—that is, the good; but on the contrary, what I am not wishing—that is, the evil, this I am doing! 20 But if what I am not wishing, this I am practicing, no longer is it I that am working it out, but on the contrary, sin which dwelleth in me.

21 I find then the law, that to me, desiring to be practicing the right, the evil is present. 22 For I delight in the Law of God after the inward man: 23 but I see a different law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity under the law of sin which is in my members.

24 Wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me out of the body of this death?

25 I thank God, [for deliverance] through Jesus Christ our Lord.

So then, I myself with the mind, indeed, serve God’s Law; but with the flesh sin’s law.

Before beginning the study of this great struggle of Paul’s, let us get it
settled firmly in our minds that Paul is here exercised not at all about pardon, but about deliverance: “Who shall deliver me from this body of death?” The whole question is concerning indwelling sin, as a power; and not committed sins, as a danger.

Mark also that while (as we shall show) the indwelling Holy Spirit is the Christian’s sole power against the flesh, He is not known in this struggle; but it is Paul himself against the flesh—with the Law prescribing a holy walk, but furnishing no power whatever for it.

Even the fact of deliverance through Christ from the Law (described in the fourth and sixth verses), is most evidently not known during this conflict with the flesh, (This fact itself marks the conflict as one that preceded the revelation to the apostle of his being dead to the Law, not under law: for such knowledge would have made the struggle impossible.)

Therefore this conflict of Paul’s, instead of being an example to you, is a
warning to you to keep out of it by means of God’s plain words that you are not under law but under grace.

But now you will adopt one of two courses: either you will read of and avoid the great struggle Paul had, under law, to make the flesh obedient by law,—with its consequent discovery of no good in him, and no strength; with his despairing cry, “Who shall deliver me?” and the blessed discovery of deliverance through our Lord Jesus Christ and by the indwelling Spirit: and this is, of course, the true way,—for you are not under law. It is the God-honoring path, for it is the way of faith. It is the wisest, because in it you profit by the struggle and testimony of another, written out for your benefit.

The second course, (and alas, the one followed by most in their distress and longing after a holy life), is to go through practically the same struggle as Paul had,—until you discover for yourself experimentally what he found. In this latter course you will be like Bunyan’s pilgrim who fell into the Slough of Despond. You will enjoy reading the quotations below from Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress. We suppose you have this priceless book: but quote, to save the trouble of reference.

If we (as Gentiles who were not put under the Law by God), were able to believe, simply to believe, I say, that we died federally with Christ, we should enter into the blessed state of deliverance belonging to a risen one, who knows ‘both that he died and that he is in Christ—not under law: and the “struggle” would be avoided. Rather, there would be a walk of faith, both in Christ’s work, and the Holy Spirit’s indwelling power.156

And, if we can learn from Paul’s struggle in this Seventh Chapter, the
lessons Paul seeks to teach us—of the fact that we cannot be what we would, because of the inveterate, incurable evil of our flesh—of “the sin that dwelleth in us,” and that deliverance is “through Christ Jesus our Lord,”—through faith in Him, as having become identified with us as we were, and having thus effected our death, with Him, to sin, and all the “I must” claims of our old standing: so that we count ourselves dead to sin, and alive unto God in Christ Jesus,—it will be well! We shall be blessed!

But if we refuse to learn the lessons Paul would teach us here—of the great facts of our deliverance in Christ from “the power of sin which is the Law” (I Corinthians 15:56), we shall not only fail of personal deliverance from sin’s power, but we shall soon be traducing all the glorious doctrines of Paul, and be sinking to the doctrine that we must expect to go on sinning and getting forgiveness “till we die,”—which is, of course, putting our own death in the place of Christ’s death: for God says we died with Him, and are now free in Him Risen!

Verse 7: What shall we say, then? Is the Law sin?—Paul has been telling us in Chapter Six of having died to sin, and now, in the first section of Chapter Seven, he tells us of having been made dead to the Law and discharged therefrom. His enemies (and he must always keep them in mind—the enemies of grace)—would immediately accuse him thus: “You say we died to the Law; therefore you class the Law with sin.” Banish the thought! is Paul’s answer—his usual holy, horrified rejection of what is false. On the contrary, I had not become conscious of sin except through law: That is, forbidding a thing to one who cannot abstain from that thing, is the way to make him know his bondage—his own helplessness. “By the Law is the knowledge of sin.”

For I had not perceived evil-desire, except the Law had said, Thou shalt not have evil desire—Here Paul begins to show the spiritual character and reach of the Law. He will proceed through the rest of the Chapter to show in detail the spiritual effect of the Law on him.

The direct reference in this word “desire” is to Deuteronomy 5:21, where
the correct translation is, “Neither shalt thou desire thy neighbor’s house, his field, or his man-servant, or his maid-servant, his ox, or his ass, or anything that is thy neighbor’s.” Now, Saul of Tarsus had been occupied with the outward things, positive and negative) of the Law. But when God quickened to his heart the real meaning of the word covet, or desire—showing him that “desire not” forbade the reaching out of the heart after anything other than loving God with all the heart, soul, and mind, and his neighbor as himself; he discerned for the first time that such desire is sin. For desire, in a creature, for aught else but God’s glory, is sin. Imagine Gabriel in God’s presence entertaining desire for something for himself157: It would be the beginning of
another Lucifer!

It will be well, by the way, for all legalists—for those who seek either righteousness or holiness through the Law, to HEAR the Law: “Thou shalt not have evil desire”!

Verse 8: But sin, seizing occasion through the Commandment, wrought out in me all manner of evil-desire. For apart from law sin is dead.

That indwelling sin which was in Paul’s members,—left there by God, had no means of making itself known to Paul, except by a quickened Law that became direct Divine Commandment to his very self. Then, indeed, when God revealed to Paul, (already renewed but not knowing the incurable evil of the flesh) the spiritual nature and character of His holy Law, together with the demand on his conscience to fulfil it,—then came Sin’s chance! Paul had no strength,—only the renewed will: Let Paul undertake—as he will—to fulfil what was commanded! Then it will be seen that “the strength of sin is the Law”: that sin will prove itself stronger than Paul, through the Commandment!

Wrought out in me all manner of evil-desire. This discovery that desire is sin would not be confined to the letter of the tenth commandment, “Thou shalt not desire, or covet”: but would in Paul’s inner consciousness extend itself through the whole Decalogue: For the Law is one!

To illustrate the words apart from Law, sin is dead: Suppose a man
determined to drive his automobile to the very limit of its speed. If (as is not quite yet done!) signs along the road would say, No Speed Limit, the man’s only thought would be to press his machine forward. But now suddenly he encounters a road with frequent signs limiting speed to thirty miles an hour. The man’s will rebels, and his rebellion is aroused still further by threats: Speed Limit Strictly Enforced. Now the man drives on fiercely, conscious both of his desire to “speed,” and his rebellion against restraint. The speed limit signs did not create the wild desire to rush forward: that was there before. But the notices brought the man into conscious conflict with authority.

Forapart from Law, sin is dead—Sin, like a coiled serpent, is in the old
nature, but cannot get at the conscience to condemn it: for indwelling sin has no means of “springing into life,” as sin, apart from law: it is quiescent, dormant, “dead.”

Every impulse of the flesh, the old natural life, is sin. Take desire, or coveting: who is to know that this inward, universal, natural desire is sin, till the Law says to the conscience, “Thou shalt not covet”? This command not to covet does not remove the covetousness, but rather calls attention to it. And in forbidding it, immediately puts into conflict the renewed human will with the power of indwelling sin,—in this case with covetousness.

Now, however quickened or renewed the human will may be, strength, power against sin, does not reside in the human will. Furthermore, human strength is not God’s way to overcome indwelling sin. That power resides always and only in the indwelling Holy Spirit.

Verses 9, 10: And I was alive apart from law once: but when the Commandment came, sin revived, and I died; and the Commandment, which was unto life, this I found to be unto death:

The words alive apart from law once—to what stage of his life does this refer? We have noted that the Law had not come as a spiritual thing, as commandment, to him in his unregenerate state. Now let us mark that it was not “the Commandment” that came to save him: it was Jesus of Nazareth, in absolute grace, who appeared to him on the Damascus road. Surely if absolute grace ever met a man, it met Saul of Tarsus that day! And the questions that came out of his mouth, “Who art thou, Lord?” “What shall I do, Lord?” have nothing whatever to do with law. He has met a Person, not a code! And when Ananias comes to Saul as he prays, in Judas’ house in Straight Street, he speaks nothing to Saul of law: but, “The Lord, even Jesus, who appeared unto thee in the way which thou earnest, hath sent me, that thou mayest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Spirit.”

Then Saul immediately begins his joyful, triumphant testimony in the synagogues in Damascus that “Jesus is the Son of God.” That was no time for the Commandment to come. God is not speaking to him yet of indwelling sin, but of full and free pardon and justification, through the shed blood of a Redeemer. This fills his soul during the first stage of his Christian life.

Then he goes away into Arabia, and God begins to exercise him, evidently—as we have shown—no longer concerning sins, for they are pardoned; but concerning indwelling sin.

It is to that happy, first stage of his Christian life, we believe, that Paul refers when he says, “I was alive apart from law once.” He says, “I was alive.” Paul would not affirm that a man dead in trespasses and sins was “alive”!

But let us go over the ground very carefully.

Apart from law—these words “apart from law” (Greek, choris nomou) are exactly the same as in Chapter 3:21 concerning justification! They indicate therefore, a state of no connection with law. Justification was on grounds where law did not come; and Paul’s first condition after salvation was also thus, as we shall see.

Paul connects with this word “once” the Law’s becoming quickened to his soul: When the Commandment came. No: this could not have been during the Tarsus, or Gamaliel, or persecuting days: for Paul says of those very days, “I verily thought I ought to do many things contrary to the Name of Jesus of Nazareth.” There was no hint there, surely, of a conflict with
indwelling sin! But only a steady certainty that he was right. Those who would make the struggle of Romans Seven in any sense that of an unregenerate Jew under the Law should remember that for a Jew there was no such struggle! An unregenerate Jew was occupied with outward things, and rested there! If he were ceremonially “clean,” and kept the “feasts, new moons, and Sabbath days,” there was no “struggle” in his heart. Why should there be? Was he not of the chosen people? and walked he not “according to the ordinances”? Paul was a Pharisee—“a Pharisee of Pharisees”—being “more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of the fathers.” Let him alone at that! There was no “struggle.” He was satisfied, serene, apart from any spiritual knowledge of the Law! The Law was a terrible thing. It was a “fiery Law.” When Israel heard it, at Sinai, they stood afar off, in terror, and said to Moses, “Let not Jehovah speak with us any more, lest we die”!

The Jews, in Paul’s day, (as today) held it in the letter. They knew nothing of its holy, “spiritual” character. They were occupied with the length of a “Sabbath day’s journey”; or the question of how many nails a man could have in his sandals without “bearing a burden on the Sabbath”; and of “washing their hands to the elbows” before eating (Mark 7:3, margin). There is not the slightest reason for differing Saul of Tarsus from those other Pharisees who would let the sick, palsied and demon-possessed remain under Satan’s bondage— if only their Sabbath were observed their way! (There is nothing so merciless as self-righteous religion: witness all History!) See Saul holding the clothes of Stephen’s murderers! See him “breathing out threatening and slaughter”—mark it—slaughter, wholesale murder, toward “any that were of the Name” of Jesus.

What perfect theological folly to conceive that the struggle of Romans Seven had been all along in Saul’s heart! That such a monster of murder was at the same time “delighting in the Law of God after the inward man”! No, no! That was before the holy Law, with its “Commandment” for an inner personal holiness,—free, even, from unlawful desire (epithumia) had been quickened to him! Saul of Tarsus could have headed the Spanish Inquisition, and have had no qualms of conscience! He was on his way to Damascus as a regular, merciless Duke of Alva, to crush Christ’s confessors,—with a good conscience: “I verily thought I ought to do.”

Paul certainly distinguishes here between his early Christian life of rejoicing in the new-found Redeemer, and that later experience in which God exercises him about indwelling sin and deliverance therefrom.

But upon the coming of the Commandment [to my conscience] sin sprang into life, and I died.

Here is seen that crisis described by so many godly saints. it is what some
people call “coming under conviction for holiness.” “Ye are yet carnal,” Paul wrote to the Corinthians. Here he is discovering that state in himself. To Paul, converted, but still thinking himself under law, God uses “the Commandment.” He discovers to Paul the spirituality of the Law and lets it command him to be and do. This Paul undertakes, not knowing of the sin dwelling in his members. So, Sin sprang into life, with the result that,—I died, as the following verses describe: it is the death of all hopes in himself, in his flesh.

And the Commandment, which was unto life, this I found to be unto death—its proper ministry, condemnation and death (II Corinthians 3:7, 9)—to all hopes in flesh, even in the flesh of people born again, as Paul was.

Verse 11: For sin, seizing occasion, through the Commandment beguiled me, and through it slew me.

Sin is personified all through this passage: Let Paul, says Sin, undertake
to fulfil this Commandment! Let him keep on trying it!

How wonderful the consistency of Scripture! Paul was not under Law, being in Christ. God was not “beguiling” Paul in commanding what He knew Paul could not fulfil. But God permitted Sin to “beguile” him, by leading him to rely on his own power to obey, that Paul might find his utter powerlessness, and finally despair of delivering himself.

And through it slew me—That is, killed off all his hopes in himself, his “flesh.” We all know how endlessly “resolutions” are formed by earnest Christians—honest resolutions to be “better” Christians, to “quit” this or that sin or bad habit: and what failure and despair is the result of relying on our own wills!

But to Paul, failure was terrible: for there was the Law, the Law of Moses, given by God, under which he had been born and brought up, and constantly instructed. The Law was his hope. And now it helps him? Not at all! Indeed it becomes the very means by which Sin attacks him. And Sin slays him—that is, all hopes in himself lie vanquished dead! And that by means of a holy instrument! for, Paul cries:

Verse 12: The Law is holy, and the Commandment holy, and righteous and good—Here Paul positively refutes the charge that he dishonored God’s Law. Nay, more, the Commandment (entolē), the direct application to him of the Law, with its fatal consequences to himself, to his self-hopes, he defends. This is the mark of a saint: he upholds God, and condemns himself.