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Romans 7 — Commentary 4

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Benson Commentary Romans 7:1 Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? Romans 7:1-3 . Know ye not, brethren — The apostle, having shown that justified and regenerated persons are free from the dominion of sin, shows here that they are also free from the yoke of the Mosaic law, it being dead to them, Romans 7:6 ; and they to it, Romans 7:4 : for I speak to them that know the law — To the Jews or proselytes chiefly here; that the law — The Mosaic dispensation in general, to which you were espoused by Moses; hath dominion over a man — Over a Jew married to it, and engaged to observe it; as long as he — Rather, as long as it liveth; that is, abideth in force, and no longer. For it would be contrary to the apostle’s design, to suppose the sense of this to be as our translation renders it, as long as he, that is, the man in question, liveth; for he professedly endeavours to prove that they had outlived their obligations to the law. But the rendering here proposed is natural, and suits the connection with the following verses, in which the law is represented as their first husband, whose decease left them free to be married to Christ. The law is here spoken of, by a common figure, as a person to which, as to a husband, life and death are ascribed. It is as if he had said, The dominion of the law over particular persons can, at the utmost, last no longer than till it is itself abrogated; for that is, as it were, its death; since the divine authority going along with it was the very life and soul of it. Suppose that to cease, and the letter of the precept becomes but a dead thing, and with respect to its obligations, as if it had never been. But he speaks indifferently of the law being dead to us, or us to it, the sense being the same. For the woman, &c. — Just as it is, according to the law itself, with respect to the power of a husband over his wife, who is bound by the law to be subject to her husband so long as he liveth — The law here referred to is not merely that particular branch of the law of Moses which respected marriage, but also and especially the law of marriage promulgated in paradise, Genesis 2:24 ; whereby our Lord declared marriages were appointed to continue for life, except in the case of adultery, Matthew 19:6 . This argument was peculiarly adapted to the Jews, whose connection with God, as their king, was represented by God himself under the idea of a marriage, solemnized with them at Sinai. But if the husband — To whom she was bound, be dead, she is loosed — From that law, which gave him a peculiar property in her. So then, if while her husband liveth, ??????? ????? ????? , she become the property of another man, &c. — The apostle, says Theodoret, “does not consider here the permission given by the law of Moses to the woman divorced to be married to another, as being taught by Christ not to approve of such divorces; but he seems only to intimate that she had no power to dissolve this bond by putting away her husband, or that this divorce rendered her husband dead in law to her, she being not to return to him again. Deuteronomy 24:4 .” Perhaps we ought rather to say, he speaks in the general, not entering exactly into every excepted case that might be imagined. To infer, therefore, hence, as some have done, that adultery is not a sufficient foundation for divorce, is very unreasonable. But if her husband be dead, she is free from that law — Which bound her to be in subjection, and yield conjugal affection to her husband only; so that she is no more an adulteress — Subject to the shame and punishment of one; though she be married, ????????? ????? ????? , becoming the property of another man; for death, having interposed between them, hath dissolved the former relation. He is dead to her, and she to him. Romans 7:2 For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. Romans 7:3 So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man. Romans 7:4 Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. Romans 7:4 . Wherefore, my brethren — Hence it follows, or by this comparison it appears; ye also — Believing Jews, and much more believing Gentiles; are become dead to the law — Taken off from all hopes of justification by it, and confidence in your obedience to it: and so likewise it has become dead to you, and has no life or efficacy in these respects; by the body of Christ — By the offering up of Christ’s body on the cross; that is, by the merit of his death, by which it evidently appears, that there is no other way of making reconciliation for sin, or of obtaining deliverance from wrath but by that; his death and sufferings having now accomplished the design of the law, and abrogated its authority; and it, therefore, expiring with him. That ye should be married to another — ( 2 Corinthians 11:2 ;) so that you must now give up yourselves to Christ, as your second husband, that you may be justified by faith in him. The apostle speaks of Christ as the husband of the believing Jews, because he was now become their Lord and head; and he calls him another husband, because they had been formerly, as it were, married to the Mosaic law, and relied on that alone for salvation. And the crucifixion of their old man, or corrupt nature, and their obtaining a new nature, through the death of Christ, was a fit preparation of them for being espoused to Christ. Who is raised from the dead — Who is alive himself, and will bestow spiritual life on those that believe on him, and give up themselves to him; that we should bring forth fruit — Namely, of holiness and good works, Galatians 5:22 ; unto God — To his glory, Matthew 5:16 ; John 15:8 ; Php 1:11 . In this passage the union of Christ with his people is represented as a marriage, as it is also Ephesians 5:31-32 ; Revelation 21:9 ; Revelation 22:17 . The apostles probably took that idea from the ancient phraseology concerning the Jews. See on Romans 7:2 . But from whatever source it was derived, it is a strong representation of the friendship and endearment which subsists, and to all eternity will subsist, between Christ and believers, and of the happiness which they will derive from his love to them, and from their entire subjection to him. Romans 7:5 For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. Romans 7:5-6 . For — We ought now to be fruitful in good works, because we were formerly fruitful in evil: when we were in the flesh — Under the comparatively carnal dispensation of Moses, and in our natural corrupt state, before we believed on Christ and were regenerated. Thus, ?? ????? ?? ????? , they that are in the flesh, and ?? ???? ????? ????? , they that are after the flesh, ( Romans 8:5 ; Romans 8:8 ,) signify those that are influenced and governed by the fleshly principle, in opposition to the guidance and influences of the Holy Spirit; and ????? ?? ????? , to be in the flesh, ( Romans 7:9 ,) ??? ?????????? ???? ????? , to live, to walk according to the flesh, ( Romans 7:12-13 ,) bear the same sense. It is evident, therefore, as Dr. Whitby justly observes, that this expression, when we were in the flesh, not only signifies to be under the carnal ordinances of the law, for so were all the pious Jews, who lived from Moses to gospel times; but that it more especially relates to them who, living under these ordinances, were themselves carnal, and so had the law of the flesh still warring against the law of their minds, and bringing them into captivity to the law of sin, which could not be the state of Zacharias and Elisabeth, or any other of those persons who were righteous before God, and walked in all the commandments of the Lord blameless. And if of such [unregenerate persons] only, we understand the apostle’s following discourse in this chapter, the sense will be clear. The motions of sins — ?? ???????? ??? ???????? , sinful passions; which were by the law — Accidentally occasioned or irritated thereby; did work in our members — Spread themselves all over the whole man; to bring forth fruit — Very different from that which has just been mentioned, even such as would have been unto death, Romans 6:21 ; Romans 6:23 ; that is, would have exposed us to, and have issued in, eternal death, if God in his mercy had not interposed, and brought us acquainted with the gospel. But now — Being brought out of that carnal state; we are delivered from the law — Set at liberty from our subjection to it as a law, and our obligation to observe it, and from the condemning, irritating power thereof, and therefore from the sinful passions occasioned by it; that being dead wherein we were held — In subjection, as the wife to her living husband; that law being now made void, and having no further power to condemn us. It may be proper to observe here, that the Syriac and Arabic versions, Origen, Theodoret, Œcumenius, and Theophylact, (with whom agree Bengelius, Mill, Macknight, and others,) read ??????????? , we being dead to that by which we were held: which, says Origen, is undoubtedly the best reading, agreeing with Romans 7:4 , ye are become dead to the law. That we should serve — God and our generation; in newness of spirit — In a new and spiritual manner; and not in the oldness of the letter — Not in a bare, literal, external way, as we did before. The new service here enjoined implies, 1st, A freedom from the dominion of the flesh, by the power of the Spirit enabling us to mortify the deeds and lusts of the flesh, Romans 8:13 . 2d, The serving God, not chiefly with bodily services and carnal ordinances, but in the spirit of our minds, Romans 12:2 ; Php 3:3 ; having our minds renewed and transformed after the image of God, in righteousness and true holiness, which are the fruits of the Spirit. 3d, The serving him by the continual aid of his Spirit, strengthening us with might in the inner man, Ephesians 3:16 , so as to live and walk in the Spirit, or to live as those who are renewed by the Spirit, and possessed of his various graces. With regard to the believing Jews in particular, it implies, that being loosed from the Mosaic law, they were no longer to worship and serve God with rites and ceremonies pertaining to their flesh, but with services of their spirit, consisting in faith, love, and new obedience. From this, however, we must not infer that the pious Jews under the law did not serve God with spiritual services: all the services in which true piety and morality consist, were enjoined in the covenant with Abraham, and were practised by the pious Israelites. But to these the law of Moses added numberless services pertaining to the body, from which the converted Jews were freed since their embracing the gospel. Romans 7:6 But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter. Romans 7:7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. Romans 7:7-8 . What shall we say then? — This, to the beginning of the next chapter, is a kind of digression, wherein the apostle, in order to show, in the most lively manner, the weakness and inefficacy of the law, changes the person, and speaks as of himself. This he frequently does when he is not speaking of his own person, but only assuming another character. See Romans 3:7 ; 1 Corinthians 10:30 ; 1 Corinthians 4:6 . The character here assumed is that of an unrenewed, unregenerated man; first, ignorant of the spirituality and holiness of the law, then acquainted therewith, and convinced of his depravity and weakness thereby, and sincerely but ineffectually striving to serve God. To have spoken this of himself, or of any true believer, would have been foreign to the whole scope of his discourse; nay, utterly contrary thereto, as well as to what is expressly asserted Romans 8:2 . Is the law sin? — Macknight connects this with the preceding words thus: What then, do we say that the law is sin? is a bad institution, that causes or encourages sin? that there is any moral evil in it, or that it is intended by God, or adapted in its own nature, to lead men into sin? That this is the apostle’s meaning is plain from Romans 7:12 , where he mentions, by way of inference, the proposition which his reasoning was designed to prove, namely, the law is holy, &c. God forbid — We revere the high authority by which it was given too much to insinuate any thing of that kind. Nay, I had not known sin — Either not at all, or not clearly and fully: I had not known its evil nature and destructive consequences; nor, in many instances, what really was sin; but by the law — As the apostle is speaking of the law of Moses, and, as appears from the last clause of the verse, of the moral law, the quotation there being from the tenth commandment, his words must not be understood universally. “For it is not to be supposed that the reason and conscience of the heathen gave them no knowledge at all of their sins; the contrary is affirmed by the apostle, Romans 2:14 . Nevertheless, the most enlightened among them had but an imperfect knowledge of the nature and demerit of sin in general, and of the number and aggravations of their own sins in particular, compared with the knowledge of these things which they would have derived from revelation. The truth is, they fancied many things to be innocent which were real enormities; and many things trivial sins which were very heinous, as is evident from their writings. The inference to be drawn, therefore, is, that since the law discovers, or forbids and condemns sin, in order that it may be avoided, it does not directly promote it, but only by accident, by reason of the corruption of our nature. For I had not known lust — To be sin; ????????? , desire — That is, the desire of an unlawful thing, or the inordinate desire of what is lawful. The word signifies desire, or, as Dr. Macknight renders it, strong desire, whether good or bad. Here it is used in the bad sense, as it is likewise 1 John 2:16 ; ???????? ??? ?????? , the lust of the flesh. “But it signifies strong desire of a good kind also, Luke 22:15 : ???????? ????????? , I have strongly desired to eat this passover. 1 Thessalonians 2:17 , Endeavoured the more abundantly, ????? ???????? , with great desire, to see your face. Except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet — In this commandment, the desire that is forbidden is of what belongs to others. Now, as the operation of such a desire is to prompt men to acts of injustice, the existence of it in the mind is obviously sin, because it could not hold its place there for any length of time, unless it were indulged. However, the knowledge that strong desire, not exerted in outward actions, is sin, is not very obvious; and therefore the apostle ascribes it to the information given us by the revealed law of God.” But sin — But what I say is, not that the law is sin, but that sin, namely, the corrupt inclination of fallen nature; taking occasion by the commandment — Forbidding but not subduing it, and being excited, quickened, and drawn forth into action by it; wrought in me — While unrenewed; all manner of concupiscence — Every kind of evil desire; inclinations to sins of all sorts. This evil principle in human nature is acknowledged even by heathen, whose words are frequently quoted in illustration of it: Gens humana ruit per vetitum nefas: Nitimur in vetitum semper, cupimusque negata. “Mankind rush into wickedness, and always desire what is forbidden.” The reader will observe, that this, which appears to be the true sense of the words, namely, that the prohibitions of the law awaken and irritate men’s evil desires, supposes such desires to exist in the mind previous to these prohibitions, and that these desires, with other evil dispositions, prompt men to make trial of things forbidden, the inclination of human nature being too generally like that of a froward child, who will do a thing because it was forbidden; and perhaps is, as it were, reminded of an evil, on hearing it mentioned in a prohibition. It must not, however, be supposed, that all evil desire arises from hence; for fleshly appetites, and other strong desires, which prevail in men’s minds, do not owe either their existence or their operation to the prohibitions and penalties of the law, or to the knowledge thereof; but only their power to kill, of which, therefore, Macknight interprets the words. For without the law sin was dead — Neither so apparent nor so active; nor was I under the least apprehension of any danger from it. Sin, which he still represents as a person, would have had no being, or at least no strength to kill men, had not the law, revealed or natural, existed; for the essence of sin consists in its being a violation of law. Though the apostle speaks this primarily and directly of the law of Moses, it is equally true of the law of nature, and may be applied to the state of mankind before the law of Moses was given. For unless there had been a law written in men’s hearts, sin would have been dead, or have had neither existence nor power to kill. Romans 7:8 But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead. Romans 7:9 For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. Romans 7:9-11 . For I was alive — In my own conceit; without the law — Without the proper knowledge of its spirituality, extent, and obligation. I apprehended myself to be righteous, and in the way to life eternal; but when the commandment came — That is, the law; (a part being put for the whole;) but this expression particularly intimates its compulsive force, which restrains, enjoins, urges, forbids, threatens; — when, in its spiritual meaning, it came to my heart: or, when the spiritual meaning and full extent of the law, condemning desires of evil, was brought home, and closely applied to my conscience by the Spirit of God; sin revived — My conscience was awakened and convinced, and I found myself guilty of many sins, which before I perceived not, and a lively sense of the guilt of them was imprinted on my soul; and I died — My virtue and strength died away, and my former persuasions vanished: for I saw myself to be dead in sin, in a state of condemnation, and liable to death eternal. And the commandment — The law; which was ordained to life — Which promised life to them that kept it, saying, The man that doeth these things shall live in, or by them; and which, if rightly used, would have been a means of increasing spiritual life, and leading to life everlasting. “The law of nature, and its transcript in the moral precepts of the law of Moses, were intended for life; because the threatening of death for every offence, is virtually a promise of life to those who obey perfectly. This appears from the law given to Adam in paradise.” I found to be unto death — To be attended with deadly consequences, both as it consigned me over to destruction for past sin, and occasionally, though not intentionally, proved productive of new guilt and misery. Perfect obedience being impossible, according to the present state of human nature, the law, which threatens death for every offence, necessarily ends in death to the sinner, although it was originally intended to give life to the obedient. For sin, as I said before, (see on Romans 7:8 ,) taking occasion by the commandment — Prohibiting it under the severest penalties, but affording me no help against it; deceived me — Came upon me unawares, while I was expecting life by the law; and by it slew me — Slew all my hopes, by bringing me under guilt, condemnation, and wrath. In other words, Satan, the grand enemy of mankind, and author of sin, finding a law which threatened death to the transgression of it, takes occasion thence more earnestly to tempt and allure us to the violation of it, that so he may more effectually subject us to condemnation and death upon that account. Thus, when God had forbidden, under the pain of death, the eating of the forbidden fruit, Satan thence took occasion to tempt our first parents to the breach of it, and so slew them, or made them subject to death. Dr. Doddridge paraphrases the verse rather differently, thus: “Sin, taking occasion by the terror and curse of the violated commandment, and representing the great Lawgiver as now become my irreconcileable enemy, deceived me into a persuasion that I could be no worse than I was, and thereby it slew me; it multiplied my mortal wounds, and rendered my case still more desperate.” Instead of sin taking occasion, Dr. Macknight renders ??????? ??????? , taking the opportunity, an expression which he thinks less likely to countenance the idea, that men’s evil desires are owing to the prohibitions of the law; to suppose which, would be to make God the author of sin by his law. “The apostle’s meaning,” says he, “is, that sin took the opportunity of men being under the commandment, first to deceive, and then to kill them.” According to Bengelius, the most approved copies read, not, sin taking occasion or opportunity by the commandment, but, by the commandment deceived and slew me; connecting the commandment, not with the former, but with the latter clause of the verse. In the words, deceived me, there seems to be an allusion to the excuse which Eve made for eating the forbidden fruit. The serpent deceived me, by assuring me that I should not die. “The apostle speaks of a two-fold opportunity taken by sin, while men are under the commandment. The first is, sinful dispositions, deceiving men into the belief that the prohibitions of the law are unreasonable, that the thing forbidden is pleasant or profitable, and that it will not be followed with punishment, persuade them to do it. This was the serpent’s discourse to Eve; and it is what men’s sinful inclinations always suggest to them. The second opportunity which sin takes under the commandment, is that of killing the sinner by the curse annexed to the commandment which he hath broken.” Romans 7:10 And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. Romans 7:11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me . Romans 7:12 Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. Romans 7:12-13 . Wherefore — Since then, by what has been said, it appears that the law is not the cause of sin or death, except indirectly and by accident, it must be acquitted from this charge, and acknowledged to be holy; and the commandment — The preceptive part of the moral law, and every particular precept of it; is holy, just, and good — It springs from and partakes of the holy nature of God; tends only to promote holiness and a conformity to God, and prescribes our duty to God in his worship and service. It is every way just and right in itself, and commands nothing but what is agreeable to those common apprehensions of right and equity which are imprinted in our natures: it is designed wholly for the good of man, 1 Timothy 1:8 , and is really profitable and conducive to our good, both temporal and eternal, and subservient to the common interest of mankind. Was then that which is good made the cause of evil to me? — Yea, of death, which is the greatest of evils? Was it made the proper and direct cause of death? Not so: But it was sin, which was made death to me, inasmuch as it wrought death in me, even by that which is good. Here the apostle clearly distinguishes between a proper cause and an occasion, or cause by accident. The law is the occasion of death to sinners; but sin is the proper or efficient cause of that evil. That it might appear sin — Might appear superlatively vile; working death in me by that which is good — By the good law: that sin by the commandment — Manifesting and forbidding it, and thereby awakening and irritating it; might become exceeding sinful — That, being quickened and excited by so innocent and holy a thing as the commandment, it might thereby show its horrid and vile nature; the guilt of it being hereby greatly aggravated. “Our translators suppose that ????????? [rendered sinful ] is put here for the adjective. But, as Beza observes, it is used as a substantive, and signifies a sinner. For the apostle carries on the personification of sin, begun chap. Romans 6:6 , by showing its exceeding sinfulness in this respect, that it makes the law, which was intended for life, the occasion of men’s death.” — Macknight. Romans 7:13 Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. Romans 7:14 For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin. Romans 7:14 . For we know that the law is spiritual — Extending to the spirit of man; forbidding even the sins of the spirit; sins internal, committed merely in men’s minds, such as vain thoughts, foolish imaginations, carnal inclinations, pride, self-will, discontent, impatience, anger, malice, envy, revenge, and all other spiritual evils, in the commission of which the body has no concern: enjoining, at the same time, all spiritual graces and virtues, such as humility, resignation, patience, contentment, meekness, gentleness, long-suffering, benevolence; with all holy intentions, affections, and dispositions, included in loving God with all our heart, and our neighbour as ourselves, which the law especially enjoins: being intended, at the same time, to purify and exalt the spirit, and assert its superiority over the meaner part of our nature. But I am carnal — That is, man, considered in himself, as in a state of nature, and destitute of the regenerating grace of God, is carnal. See note on Romans 7:5 , where to be in the flesh is evidently of the same import with the word carnal here, as are also similar expressions, Romans 8:5 ; Romans 8:8-9 , &c., expressions which, all are agreed, solely respect the unregenerate; and in which the person that is in the flesh, or carnally minded, is represented as being in a state of death, and enmity against God. Very different, surely, from the spiritual man, whom this same apostle represents as living in a state of favour and friendship with God; minding chiefly the things of the Spirit; yea, having the Spirit of God dwelling in him, and giving him dominion over all fleshly lusts, which, through that Spirit, he is enabled to mortify; whose passions submit to the government of reason, and whose reason is itself under the influence of grace; whose enjoyments are chiefly of a spiritual nature, and his great employment to work out his salvation with fear and trembling. The Scriptures, therefore, place these two characters in direct opposition the one to the other; and the apostle begins this paragraph by informing us that it is his carnal state which he is about to describe, in opposition to the spirituality of God’s holy law, saying, But I am carnal; and adding, as a still more decisive proof that his meaning is as is here stated, sold under sin — That is, sold as a slave, to remain under the dominion of sin, and to be compelled to do those evil actions to which sinful inclinations prompt men. “In peccati potestatem, libidinis et concupiscentiæ predio redactus,” says Origen; brought under the power of sin by the enticement of lust and concupiscence. “So enslaved to it,” says Theophylact, ???? ?? ????????? ???????? , as not to be able to look up: “a willing slave, who had sold himself to it,” says Theodoret. The meaning is, totally enslaved: slaves bought with money being absolutely at their master’s disposal. In this sense, the phrase is continually used in the Old Testament, as the reader may see by consulting the texts referred to in the margin. By the addition of this clause, therefore, the apostle evidently shows that he does not here use the word carnal in the sense in which it is taken 1 Corinthians 3:1 , namely, to denote only such a state of imperfection in knowledge and holiness, as persons may be in who are newly converted; but that he uses it in the worst sense, namely, in the same sense in which the expression, to be in the flesh, and carnally minded, is used; that is, to signify a state of death and enmity against God. Those commentators, therefore, who suppose that in this and what follows, to the end of the chapter, the apostle describes his own state, at the time he wrote this epistle, and consequently the state of every regenerated person, must be under a great mistake. Universally, indeed, in the Scriptures, man is said to be in this state of bondage to sin until the Son of God make him free; but in no part of the sacred writings is it ever said of the children of God, that they are sold under sin, or enslaved to it. The very reverse is the Holy Spirit’s description of Christians, for the Son of God makes them free, and therefore they are free indeed; free especially from the power of sin, which has no longer dominion over them. See notes on Romans 6:13-22 ; Romans 8:2 . The truth is, through this whole paragraph the apostle, to wean the Jews from their attachment to the Mosaic law, is showing how little that dispensation, even the moral part of it, considered as a covenant of justice, independent of the covenant of grace, could do for them, or for any of the fallen offspring of Adam. It could convince them of sin, but not constitute them righteous. It could show them their guilt, depravity, and weakness, but could neither justify their persons, nor renew their nature, nor furnish them with power to do the will of God. As he expresses himself, Romans 8:3 , It was weak through the flesh, or through the corruption and infirmity of human nature. In pursuance of his design, having compared together the past and present state of believers, that in the flesh, Romans 7:5 , and that in the spirit, Romans 7:6 . in answering two objections, ( Is then the law sin? Romans 7:7 , and, Is the law death? Romans 7:13 ,) he interweaves the whole process of a man reasoning, groaning, striving, and escaping from the legal to the evangelical state. This he does, from Romans 7:7 to the end of the chapter. Romans 7:15 For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I. Romans 7:15 . For that which I do — Greek, ???????????? , what I thoroughly work, the word signifying earnestness and perseverance in working till the work in which the agent is employed is finished. It is therefore used by the apostle to denote the continued employment of God’s people in his service unto the end of their lives; Php 2:12 , Work out your own salvation. That is, as you have, in time past, laboured to serve God in all things, so persevere in that service to the end. The word here denotes a continued employment of a very different nature. Therefore he says, What I work, I allow not, or, approve not; for the word, ??????? , which literally signifies I know, is used in the sense of approving, Matthew 7:21 . For what I would — That is, incline to, or desire, as Macknight renders ???? , which, he observes, cannot here signify the last determination of the will, “actions always following that determination; but such a faint ineffectual desire as reason and conscience, opposed by strong passions, and not strengthened by the Spirit of God, often produce.” These corrupt passions frequently darken the understanding, mislead the judgment, and stupify the conscience; in consequence whereof the will, strongly impelled by criminal desires, in the place of being governed by these higher powers of the mind, governs them herself. But, “when order is restored to the soul by regeneration, then the enlightened understanding determines the judgment, and the decisions thereof, enforced by the voice of conscience, determine the will, whose volitions, thus excited, become the spring of action; so that the good the regenerated man would, he doth, — and the evil he hates, he doth not. But, in the unregenerate, those volitions neither obey the direc

Expositors

Expositor's Bible Commentary Romans 7:1 Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? 23 Chapter 15 JUSTIFICATION AND HOLINESS: ILLUSTRATIONS FROM HUMAN LIFE Romans 6:14-23 - Romans 7:1-6 AT the point we have now reached, the Apostle’s thought pauses for a moment, to resume. He has brought us to self-surrender. We have seen the sacred obligations of our divine and wonderful liberty. We have had the miserable question, "Shall we cling to sin?" answered by an explanation of the rightness and the bliss of giving over our accepted persons, in the fullest liberty of will, to God, in Christ. Now he pauses, to illustrate and enforce. And two human relations present themselves for the purpose; the one to show the absoluteness of the surrender, the other its living results. The first is Slavery, the second is Wedlock. For sin shall not have dominion over you; sin shall not put in its claim upon you, the claim which the Lord has met in your Justification; for you are not brought under law, but under grace. The whole previous argument explains this sentence. He refers to our acceptance. He goes back to the justification of the guilty, "without the deeds of law," by the act of free grace; and briefly restates it thus, that he may take up afresh the position that this glorious liberation means not license but divine order. Sin shall be no more your tyrant creditor, holding up the broken law in evidence that it has right to lead you off to a pestilential prison, and to death. Your dying Saviour has met your creditor in full for you, and in Him you have entire discharge in that eternal court where the terrible plea once stood against you. Your dealings as debtors are now not with the enemy who cried for your death, but with the Friend who has bought you out of his power. What then? are we to sin, because we are not brought under law, but under grace? Shall our life be a life of license, because we are thus wonderfully free? The question assuredly is one which, like that of ver. 1, and like those suggested in Romans 3:8 ; Romans 3:31 , had often been asked of St. Paul, by the bitter opponent, or by the false follower. And again it illustrates and defines, by the direction of its error, the line of truth from which it flew off. It helps to do what we remarked above, to assure us that when St. Paul taught "Justification by faith, without deeds of law," he meant what he said, without reserve; he taught that great side of truth wholly, and without a compromise. He called the sinner, "just as he was, and waiting not to rid his soul of one dark blot," to receive at once, and without fee, the acceptance of God for Another’s blessed sake. Bitter must have been the moral pain of seeing, from the first, this holy freedom distorted into an unhallowed leave to sin. But he will not meet it by an impatient compromise, or untimely confusion. It shall be answered by a fresh collocation; the liberty shall be seen in its relation to the Liberator; and behold, the perfect freedom is a perfect service, willing but. absolute, a slavery joyfully accepted, with open eyes and open heart, and then lived out as the most real of obligations by a being who has entirely seen that he is not his own. Away with the thought. Do you not know that the party to whom you present, surrender, yourselves bondservants, slaves, so as to obey him, -bondservants you are, not the less for the freewill of the surrender, of the party whom you obey; no longer merely contractors with him, who may bargain, or retire, but his bondservants out and out; whether of sin, to death, or of obedience, to righteousness? (As if their assent to Christ, their Amen to His terms of peace, acceptance, righteousness, were personified; they were now the bondsmen of this their own act and deed, which had put them, as it were, into Christ’s hands for all things.) Now thanks be to our God, that you were bondmen of sin, in legal claim, and under moral sway; yes, every one of you was this, whatever forms the bondage took upon its surface; but you obeyed from the heart the mould of teaching to which you were handed over. They had been sin’s slaves. Verbally, not really, he "thanks God" for that fact of the past. Really, not verbally, he "thanks God" for the pastness of the fact, and for the bright contrast to it in the regenerated present. They had now been "handed over," by their Lord’s transaction about them, to another ownership, and they had accepted the transfer, "from the heart." It was done by Another for them, but they had said their humble, thankful that as He did it. And what was the new ownership thus accepted? We shall find soon ( Romans 6:22 ), as we might expect, that it is the mastery of God. But the bold, vivid introductory imagery has already called it ( Romans 6:16 ) the slavery of "Obedience." Just below ( Romans 6:19-20 ) it is the slavery of "Righteousness," that is, if we read the word aright in its whole context, of "the Righteousness of God," His acceptance of the sinner as His own in Christ. And here, in a phrase most unlikely of all, whose personification strikes life into the most abstract aspects of the message of the grace of God, the believer is one who has been transferred to the possession of "a mould of Teaching." The Apostolic Doctrine, the mighty Message, the living Creed of life, the Teaching of the acceptance of the guilty for the sake of Him who was their Sacrifice, and is now their Peace and Life-this truth has, as it: were, grasped them as its vassals, to form them, to mould them for its issues. It is indeed their "tenet." It "holds them"; a thought far different from what is too often meant when we say of a doctrine that "we hold it." Justification by their Lord’s merit, union with their Lord’s life; this was a doctrine, reasoned, ordered, verified. But it was a doctrine warm and tenacious with the love of the Father and of the Son. And it had laid hold of them with a mastery which swayed thought, affection, and will; ruling their whole view of self and of God. Now, liberated from your sin, you were enslaved to the Righteousness of God. Here is the point of the argument. It is a point of steel, for all is fact; but the steel is steeped in love, and carries life and joy into the hearts it penetrates. They are not for one moment their own. Their acceptance has magnificently emancipated them from their tyrant enemy. But it has absolutely bound them to their Friend and King. Their glad consent to be accepted has carried with it a consent to belong. And if that consent was at the moment rather implied than explicit, virtual rather than articulately conscious, they have now only to understand their blessed slavery better to give the more joyful thanksgivings to Him who has thus claimed them altogether as His own. The Apostle’s aim in this whole passage is to awaken them, with the strong, tender touch of his holy reasoning, to articulate their position to themselves. They have trusted Christ, and are in Him. Then, they have entrusted themselves altogether to Him. Then, they have, in effect, surrendered. They have consented to be His property. They are the bondservants, they are the slaves, of His truth, that is, of Him robed and revealed in His Truth, and shining through it on them in the glory at once of His grace and of His claim. Nothing less than such an obligation is the fact for them. Let them feel, let them weigh, and then let them embrace, the chain which after all will only prove their pledge of rest and freedom. What St. Paul thus did for our elder brethren at Rome, let him do for us of this later time. For us, who read this page, all the facts are true in Christ today. Today let us define and affirm their issues to ourselves, and recollect our holy bondage, and realise it, and live it out with joy. Now he follows up the thought. Conscious of the superficial repulsiveness of the metaphor-quite as repulsive in itself to the Pharisee as to the Englishman-he as it were apologises for it; not the less carefully, in his noble considerateness, because so many of his first readers were actually slaves. He does not lightly go for his picture of our Master’s hold of us, to the market of Corinth, or of Rome, where men and women were sold and bought to belong as absolutely to their buyers as cattle, or as furniture. Yet he does go there, to shake slow perceptions into consciousness, and bring the will face to face with the claim of God. So he proceeds. I speak humanly, I use the terms of this utterly not-divine bond of man to man, to illustrate man’s glorious bond to God, because of the weakness of your flesh, because your yet imperfect state enfeebles your spiritual perception, and demands a harsh paradox to direct and fix it., For-here is what he means by "humanly"-just as you surrendered your limbs, your functions and faculties in human life, slaves to your impurity and to your lawlessness, unto that lawlessness, so that the bad principle did indeed come out in bad practice, so now, with as little reserve of liberty, surrender your limbs slaves to righteousness, to God’s Righteousness, to your justifying God, unto sanctification-so that the surrender shall come out in your Master’s sovereign separation of His purchased property from sin. He has appealed to the moral reason of the regenerate soul. Now he speaks straight to the will. You are, with infinite rightfulness, the bondmen of your God. You see your deed of purchase; it is the other side of your warrant of emancipation. Take it, and write your own unworthy names with joy upon it, consenting and assenting to your Owner’s perfect rights. And then live out your life, keeping the autograph of your own surrender before your eyes. Live, suffer, conquer, labour, serve, as men who have themselves walked to their Master’s door, and presented the ear to the awl which pins it to the doorway, each in his turn saying, "I will not go out free." To such an act of the soul the Apostle calls these saints, whether they had done the like before or no. They were to sum up the perpetual fact, then and there, into a definite and critical act ( ??????????? , aorist) of thankful will. And he calls us to do the same today. By the grace of God, it shall be done. With eyes open, and fixed upon the face of the Master who claims us, and with hands placed helpless and willing within His hands, we will, we do, present ourselves bondservants to Him; for discipline, for servitude, for all His will. For when you were slaves of your sin, you were freemen as to righteousness, God’s Righteousness. It had nothing to do with you, whether to give you peace or to receive your tribute of love and loyalty in reply. Practically, Christ was not your Atonement, and so not your Master; you stood, in a dismal independence, outside His claims. To you, your lips were your own; your time was your own; your will was your own. You belonged to self; that is to say, you were the slaves of your sin. Will you go back? Will the word "freedom" (he plays with it, as it were, to prove them) make you wish yourselves back where you were before you had endorsed by faith your purchase by the blood of Christ? Nay, for what was that "freedom," seen in its results, its results upon yourselves? What fruit, therefore, (the "therefore" of the logic of facts,) used you to have then, in those old days, from things over which you are ashamed now? Ashamed indeed; for the end, the issue, as the fruit is the tree’s "end," the end of those things is-death; perdition of all true life here and hereafter too. But now, in the blessed actual state of your case, as by faith you have entered into Christ, into His work and into His life, now liberated from sin and enslaved to God, you have your fruit, you possess indeed, at last, the true issues of being for which you were made, all contributing to sanctification, to that separation to God’s will in practice which is the development of your separation to that will in critical fact, when you met your Redeemer in self-renouncing faith. Yes, this fruit you have indeed; and as its end, as that for which it is produced, to which it always and forever tends, you have life eternal. For the pay of sin, sin’s military stipend ( ?????? ), punctually given to the being which has joined its war against the will of God, is death; but the free gift of God is life eternal, in Jesus Christ our Lord. "Is life worth living?" Yes, infinitely well worth, for the living man who has surrendered to "the Lord that bought him." Outside that ennobling captivity, that invigorating while most genuine bond service, the life of man is at best complicated and tired with a bewildered quest, and gives results at best abortive, matched with the ideal purposes of such a being. We "present ourselves to God," for His ends, as implements, vassals, willing bondmen; and lo, our own end is attained. Our life has settled, after its long friction, into gear. Our root, after hopeless explorations in the dust, has struck at last the stratum where the immortal water makes all things live, and grow, and put forth fruit for heaven. The heart, once dissipated between itself and the world, is now "united" to the will, to the love, of God; and understands itself, and the world, as never before; and is able to deny self and to serve others in a new and surprising freedom. The man, made willing to be nothing but the tool and bondman of God, "has his fruit" at last; bears the true product of his now recreated being, pleasant to the Master’s eye, and fostered by His air and sun. And this "fruit" issues, as acts issue in habit, in the glad experience of a life really sanctified, really separated in ever deeper inward reality, to a holy will. And the "end" of the whole glad possession, is "life eternal." Those great words here signify, surely, the coming bliss of the sons of the resurrection, when at last in their whole perfected being they will "live" all through, with a joy and energy as inexhaustible as its Fountain, and unencumbered at last and forever by the conditions of our mortality. To that vast future, vast in its scope yet all concentrated round the fact that "we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is," the Apostle here looks onward. He will say more of it, and more largely, later, in the eighth chapter. But as with other themes so with this, he preludes with a few glorious chords the great strain soon to come. He takes the Lord’s slave by the hand, amidst his present tasks and burthens, (dear tasks and burthens, because the Master’s, but still full of the conditions of earth,) and he points upward-not to a coming manumission in glory; the man would be dismayed to foresee that; he wants to "serve forever"; -but to a scene of service in which the last remainders of hindrance to its action will be gone, and a perfected being will forever, perfectly, be not its own, and so will perfectly live in God. And this, so he says to his fellow servant, to you and to me, is "the gift of God"; a grant as free, as generous, as ever King gave vassal here below. And it is to be enjoyed as such, by a being which, living wholly for Him, will freely and purely exult to live wholly on Him, in the heavenly places. Yet surely the bearing of the sentences is not wholly upon heaven. Life eternal, so to be developed hereafter that Scripture speaks of it often as it began hereafter, really begins here, and develops here, and is already "more abundant" { John 10:10 } here. It is, as to its secret and also its experience, to know and to enjoy God, to be possessed by Him, and used for His will. In this respect it is "the end," the issue and the goal, now and perpetually, of the surrender of the soul. The Master meets that attitude with more and yet more of Himself, known, enjoyed, possessed, possessing. And so He gives, evermore gives, out of His sovereign bounty, life eternal to the bondservant who has embraced the fact that he is nothing, and has nothing, outside his Master. Not at the outset of the regenerate life only, and not only when it issues into the heavenly ocean, but all along the course, the life eternal is still "the free gift of God." Let us now, today, tomorrow, and always, open the lips of surrendering and obedient faith, and drink it in, abundantly, and yet more abundantly. And let us use it for the Giver. We are already, here on earth, at its very springs; so the Apostle reminds us. For it is "in Jesus Christ our Lord"; and we, believing, are in Him, "saved in His life." It is in Him; nay, it is He. "I am the Life"; "He that hath the Son, hath the life." Abiding in Christ, we live "because He liveth." It is not to be "attained"; it is given, it is our own. In Christ, it is given, in its divine fulness, as to covenant provision, here, now, from the first, to every Christian. In Christ, it is supplied, as to its fulness and fitness for each arising need, as the Christian asks, receives, and uses for his Lord. So from, or rather in, our holy bond service the Apostle has brought us to our inexhaustible life, and its resources for willing holiness. But he has more to say in explaining the beloved theme. He turns from slave to wife, from surrender to bridal, from the purchase to the vow, from the results of a holy bondage to the offspring of a heavenly union. Hear him as he proceeds: Or do you not know, brethren, (for I am talking to those acquainted with law, whether Mosaic or Gentile,) that the law has claim on the man, the party in any given case, for his whole lifetime? For the woman with a husband is to her living husband bound by law, stands all along bound to him. "His life," under normal conditions, is his adequate claim. Prove him living, and you prove her his. But if the husband should have died, she stands ipso facto cancelled from the husband’s law, the marriage law as he could bring it to bear against her. So, therefore, while the husband lives, she will earn adulteress for her name if she weds another ("a second") husband. But if the husband should have died, she is free from the law in question, so as to be no adulteress, if wedded to another, a second, husband. Accordingly, my brethren, you too, as a mystic bride, collectively and individually, were done to death as to the Law, so slain that its capital claim upon you is met "and done," by means of the Body of the Christ, by the "doing to death" of His sacred Body for you, on His atoning Cross, to satisfy for you the aggrieved Law; in order to your wedding Another, a second Party, Him who rose from the dead; that we might bear fruit for God; "we," Paul and his converts, in one happy "fellowship," which he delights thus to remember and indicate by the way. The parable is stated and explained with a clearness which leaves us at first the more surprised that in the application the illustration should be reversed. In the illustration, the husband dies, the woman lives, and weds again. In the application, the Law does not die, but we, its unfaithful bride, are "done to death to it," and then, strange sequel, are wedded to the Risen Christ. We are taken by Him to be "one spirit" with Him. { 1 Corinthians 6:17 } We are made one in all His interests and wealth, and fruitful of a progeny of holy deeds in this vital union. Shall we call all this a simile confused? Not if we recognise the deliberate and explicit carefulness of the whole passage. St. Paul, we may be sure, was quite as quick as we are to see the inverted imagery. But he is dealing with a subject which would be distorted by a mechanical correspondence in the treatment. The Law cannot die, for it is the preceptive will of God. Its claim is, in its own awful forum domesticum, like the injured Roman husband, to sentence its own unfaithful wife to death. And so it does; so it has done. But behold, its Maker and Master steps upon the scene. He surrounds the guilty one with Himself, takes her whole burthen on Himself, and meets and exhausts her doom. He dies. He lives again, after death, because of death; and the Law acclaims His resurrection as infinitely just. He rises, clasping in His arms her for whom He died, and who thus died in Him, and now, rises in Him. Out of His sovereign love, while the Law attests the sure contract, and rejoices as "the Bridegroom’s Friend," He claims her-herself, yet in Him another-for His blessed Bride. All is love, as if we walked through the lily gardens of the holy Song, and heard the call of the turtle in the vernal woods, and saw the King and His Beloved rest and rejoice in one another. All is law, as if we were admitted to watch some process of Roman matrimonial contract, stern and grave, in which every right is scrupulously considered, and every claim elaborately secured, without a smile, without an embrace, before the magisterial chair. The Church, the soul, is married to her Lord, who has died for her, and in whom now she lives. The transaction is infinitely happy. And it is absolutely right. All the old terrifying claims are amply and forever met. And now the mighty, tender claims which take their place instantly and of course begin to bind the Bride. The Law has "given her away"-not to herself, but to the Risen Lord. For this, let us remember, is the point and bearing of the passage. It puts before us, with its imagery at once so grave and so benignant, not only the mystic Bridal, but the Bridal as it is concerned with holiness. The Apostle’s object is altogether this. From one side and from another he reminds us that "we belong." He has shown us our redeemed selves in their blessed bond service; "free from sin, enslaved to God." He now shows us to ourselves in our divine wedlock; "married to Another," "bound to the law of" the heavenly Husband; clasped to His heart, but also to His rights, without which the very joys of marriage would be only sin. From either parable the inference is direct, powerful, and, when we have once seen the face of the Master and of the Husband, unutterably magnetic on the will. You are set free, into a liberty as supreme and as happy as possible. You are appropriated, into a possession, and into a union, more close and absolute than language can set forth. You are wedded to One who "has and holds from this time forward." And the sacred bond is to be prolific of results. A life of willing and loving obedience, in the power of the risen Bridegroom’s life, is to have as it were for its progeny the fair circle of active graces, "love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, fidelity, meekness, self-control." Alas, in the time of the old-abolished wedlock there was result, there was progeny. But that was the fruit not of the union but of its violation. For when we were in the flesh, in our unregenerate days, when our rebel self, the antithesis of "the Spirit," ruled and denoted us, (a state, he implies, in which we all were once, whatever our outward differences were,) the passions, the strong but reasonless impulses, of our sins, which passions were by means of the Law, occasioned by the fact of its just but unloved claim, fretting the self-life into action, worked actively in our limbs, in our bodily life in its varied faculties and senses, so as to bear fruit for death. We wandered, restive, from our bridegroom, the Law, to Sin, our paramour. And behold, a manifold result of evil deeds and habits, born as it were into bondage in the house of Death. But now, now as the wonderful case stands in the grace of God, we are (it is the aorist, but our English fairly represents it) abrogated from the Law, divorced from our first injured Partner, nay, slain (in our crucified Head) in satisfaction of its righteous claim, as having died with regard to that in which we were held captive, even the Law and its violated bond, so that we do bond service in the Spirit’s newness, and not in the Letter’s oldness. Thus he comes back, through the imagery of wedlock, to that other parable of slavery which has become so precious to his heart. So that we do bond service, "so that we live a slave life." It is as if he must break in on the heavenly Marriage itself with that brand and bond, not to disturb the joy of the Bridegroom and the Bride, but to clasp to the Bride’s heart the vital fact that she is not her own; that fact so blissful, but so powerful also and so practical that it is "worth anything" to bring it home. It is to be no dragging and dishonouring bondage, in which the poor toiler looks wistfully out for the sinking sun and the extended shadows. It is to be "not in the Letter’s oldness"; no longer on the old principle of the dread and unrelieved "Thou shalt," cut with a pen of legal iron upon the stones of Sinai; bearing no provision of enabling power, but all possible provision of doom for the disloyal. It is to be "in the Spirit’s newness"; on the new, wonderful principle, new in its full manifestation and application in Christ, of the Holy Ghost’s empowering presence. In that light and strength the new relations are discovered, accepted, and fulfilled. Joined by the Spirit to the Lord Christ, so as to have full benefit of His justifying merit; filled by the Spirit with the Lord Christ, so as to derive freely and always the blessed virtues of His life; the willing bondservant finds in his absolute obligations an inward liberty ever "new," fresh as the dawn, pregnant as the spring. And the worshipping Bride finds in the holy call to "keep her only unto Him" who has died for her life, nothing but a perpetual surprise of love and gladness, "new every morning," as the Spirit shows her the heart and the riches of her Lord. Thus closes, in effect, the Apostle’s reasoned exposition of the self-surrender of the justified. Happy the man who can respond to it all with the "Amen" of a life which, reposing on the Righteousness of God, answers ever to His Will with the loyal gladness found in "the newness of the Spirit." It is "perfect freedom" to understand, in experience, the bondage and the bridal of the saints. Romans 7:7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. Chapter 16 THE FUNCTION OF THE LAW IN THE SPIRITUAL LIFE Romans 7:7-25 THE Apostle has led us a long way in his great argument; through sin, propitiation, faith, union, surrender, to that wonderful and "excellent mystery," the bridal oneness of Christ and the Church, of Christ and the believer. He has yet to unfold the secrets and glories of the experience of a life lived in the power of that Spirit of whose "newness" he has just spoken. But his last parable has brought him straight to a question which has repeatedly been indicated and deferred. He has told us that the Law of God was at first, ideally, our mystic husband, and that we were unfaithful in our wedded life, and that the injured lord sentenced to death his guilty spouse, and that the sentence was carried out-but carried out in Christ. Thus a death divorce took place between us, the justified, and the Law, regarded as the violated party in the covenant-"Do this and live." Is this ancient husband then a party whom we are now to suspect, and to defy? Our wedlock with him brought us little joy. Alas, its main experience was that we sinned. At best, if we did right, (in any deep sense of right,) we did it against the grain; while we did wrong, (in the deep sense of wrong, difference from the will of God,) with a feeling of nature and gravitation. Was not our old lord to blame? Was there not something wrong about the Law? Did not the Law misrepresent God’s will? Was it not, after all "Sin itself in disguise," though it charged us with the horrible guilt of a course of adultery with Sin? We cannot doubt that the statement and the treatment of this question here are in effect a record of personal experience. The paragraph which it originates, this long last passage of chapter 7, bears every trace of such experience. Hitherto, in the main, he has dealt with "you" and "us"; now he speaks only as "I," only of "me," and of "mine." And the whole dialect of the passage, so to say, falls in with this use of pronouns. We overhear the colloquies, the altercations, of will with conscience, of will with will, almost of self with self, carried on in a region which only self-consciousness can penetrate, and which only the subject of it all can thus describe. Yes, the person Paul is here, analysing and reporting upon himself; drawing the veil from his own inmost life, with a hand firm because surrendered to the will of God, who bids him, for the Church’s sake, expose himself to view. Nothing in literature, no "Confessions" of an Augustine, no "Grace Abounding" of a Bunyan, is more intensely individual. Yet on the other hand nothing is more universal in its searching application. For the man who thus writes is "the chosen vessel" of the Lord who has perfectly adjusted not his words only but his being, his experience, his conflicts and deliverances, to the manifestations of universal spiritual facts. We need hardly say that this profound paragraph has been discussed and interpreted most variously. It has been held by some to be only St. Paul’s intense way of presenting that great phenomenon, wide as fallen humanity-human will colliding with human conscience, so that "no man does all he knows." Passages from every quarter of literature, of all ages, of all races, have been heaped around it, to prove, (what is indeed so profoundly significant a fact, largely confirmatory of the Christian doctrine of Original Sin,) that universal man is haunted by undone duties; and this passage is placed as it were in the midst, as the fullest possible confession of that fact, in the name of humanity, by an ideal individual. But surely it needs only an attentive reading of the passage, as a part of the Epistle to the Romans, as a part of the teaching of St. Paul, to feel the extreme inadequacy of such an account. On the one hand, the long groaning confession is no artificial embodiment of a universal fact; it is the cry of a human soul, if ever there was a personal cry. On the other hand, the passage betrays a kind of conflict far deeper and more mysterious than merely that of "I ought" with "I will not." It is a conflict of "I will" with "I will not"; of "I hate" with "I do." And in the later stages of the confession we find the subject of the conflict avowing a wonderful sympathy with the Law of God; recording not merely an avowal that right is right, but a consciousness that God’s precept is delectable. All this leads us to a spiritual region unknown to Euripides, and Horace, and even Epictetus. Again it has been held that the passage records the experiences of a half-regenerate soul; struggling on its way from darkness to light, stumbling across a border zone between the power of Satan and the kingdom of God; deeply convinced of sin, but battling with it in the old impossible way after all, meeting self with self, or, otherwise, the devil with the man. But here again the passage seems to refuse the exposition, as we read all its elements. It is no experience of a half-renewed life to "take delight with the law of God after the inner man." It is utterly unlawful for a half-regenerate soul to describe itself as so beset by sin that "it is not I, but sin that dwelleth in me." No more dangerous form of thought about itself could be adopted by a soul not fully acquainted with God. Again, and quite on the other hand, it has been held that our passage lays it down that a stern but on the whole disappointing conflict with internal evil is the lot of the true Christian, in his fullest life, now, always, and to the end; that the regenerate and believing man is, if indeed awake to spiritual realities, to feel at every step, "O wretched man that I am"; "What I hate, that I do"; and to expect deliverance from such a consciousness only when he attains his final heavenly rest with Christ. Here again extreme difficulties attend the exposition; not from within the passage, but from around it. It is liberally encircled with truths of liberty, in a servitude which is perfect freedom; with truths of power and joy, in a life which is by the Holy Ghost. It is quite incongruous with such surroundings that it should be thought to describe a spiritual experience dominant and characteristic in the Christian life. "What shall we say then?" Is there yet another line of exegesis which will better satisfy the facts of both the passage and its context? We think there is one, which at once is distinctive in itself, and combines elements of truth indicated by the others which we have outlin

Illustrator

Know ye not, brethren...how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? Romans 7:1-6 Believers not under the law as a covenant of works J. Stafford. I. ALL MEN ARE, NATURALLY, UNDER THE LAW AS A COVENANT OF WORKS. 1. As men. God made man capable of moral government; he was naturally bound to obey the will of his Maker. The moral law: perfect obedience to this law could never entitle him to any greater degree of happiness, yet God was pleased to superadd a promise of everlasting life upon obedience, to which He annexed His awful sanction, "In the day that thou sinnest, thou shalt surely die." This is what we call a covenant: as such it was proposed on the part of God, and it was accepted on the part of man. Now as this covenant was made with Adam as the federal head, so all men are naturally under it. 2. As sinners. In this view sinners are under the law as a broken covenant, which therefore can afford no relief to them that seek salvation by it ( Galatians 3:10-12 ). II. TO BE UNDER THE LAW, AND ESPECIALLY AS A BROKEN COVENANT, IS A MOST DREADFUL THING. 1. The law requires perfect, universal, and everlasting obedience of all that are under it. Now this law is not abolished or made void, either by Christ or by any of His apostles. "I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil; for verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled" ( Matthew 5:17, 18 ; Romans 3:31 ). How dreadful then is such a state, since no mere man can thus keep it. And while the Christian betakes himself to the mercy of God in Christ, as his only hope, the sinner supports his vain confidence in the supposition that God will not insist on His claim. 2. It denounces against every transgressor the most awful curse ( James 2:10, 11 ; Galatians 3:10 ). III. MANY HAVE OBTAINED A GLORIOUS DELIVERANCE OUT OF THIS DREADFUL STATE. In Christ they are made brethren: "Know ye not, brethren." IV. THEY WHO ARE DELIVERED FROM THIS STATE ARE TO BE DISTINGUISHED FROM OTHERS IN THE MINISTRY OF THE WORD. Addressing himself to believers, Paul appeals to their spiritual knowledge and judgment, "Know ye not." 1. There is a knowledge peculiar to the saints, whereby they know the things that are excellent; they have judgment to distinguish betwixt truth and error; an inward principle ( 1 John 2:27 ; 1 John 5:20 ) which teaches them the knowledge of every truth necessary for consolation or salvation. 2. One great reason why many know not the truth, is not merely owing to their ignorance of it, but often to their prejudice against it. 3. Sound and saving knowledge hath respect not only to the truth itself, but also to the use we are to make of it. 4. It is no inconsiderable part of our happiness when we are called to minister unto such as know the truth as it is in Jesus.Conclusion: 1. If all men are naturally under the law as a covenant of works, who can wonder if they seek life by that covenant? Natural light, natural conscience can discover no other way of salvation. 2. If all are miserable who are under the law, especially as a broken covenant, this calls upon men who are under a profession of religion to examine themselves as to their state before God. 3. If believers are delivered from the law as a covenant, yet still let them remember, "They are under the law to Christ." 4. If true believers are to be distinguished from others in the ministry of the Word, let them distinguish themselves, not only by a public profession, but also by a becoming walk and conversation. ( J. Stafford. )

Matthew Henry

7:1-6 So long as a man continues under the law as a covenant, and seeks justification by his own obedience, he continues the slave of sin in some form. Nothing but the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, can make any sinner free from the law of sin and death. Believers are delivered from that power of the law, which condemns for the sins committed by them. And they are delivered from that power of the law which stirs up and provokes the sin that dwells in them. Understand this not of the law as a rule, but as a covenant of works. In profession and privilege, we are under a covenant of grace, and not under a covenant of works; under the gospel of Christ, not under the law of Moses. The difference is spoken of under the similitude or figure of being married to a new husband. The second marriage is to Christ. By death we are freed from obligation to the law as a covenant, as the wife is from her vows to her husband. In our believing powerfully and effectually, we are dead to the law, and have no more to do with it than the dead servant, who is freed from his master, has to do with his master's yoke. The day of our believing, is the day of being united to the Lord Jesus. We enter upon a life of dependence on him, and duty to him. Good works are from union with Christ; as the fruitfulness of the vine is the product of its being united to its roots; there is no fruit to God, till we are united to Christ. The law, and the greatest efforts of one under the law, still in the flesh, under the power of corrupt principles, cannot set the heart right with regard to the love of God, overcome worldly lusts, or give truth and sincerity in the inward parts, or any thing that comes by the special sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit. Nothing more than a formal obedience to the outward letter of any precept, can be performed by us, without the renewing, new-creating grace of the new covenant. 7:7-13 There is no way of coming to that knowledge of sin, which is necessary to repentance, and therefore to peace and pardon, but by trying our hearts and lives by the law. In his own case the apostle would not have known the sinfulness of his thoughts, motives, and actions, but by the law. That perfect standard showed how wrong his heart and life were, proving his sins to be more numerous than he had before thought, but it did not contain any provision of mercy or grace for his relief. He is ignorant of human nature and the perverseness of his own heart, who does not perceive in himself a readiness to fancy there is something desirable in what is out of reach. We may perceive this in our children, though self-love makes us blind to it in ourselves. The more humble and spiritual any Christian is, the more clearly will he perceive that the apostle describes the true believer, from his first convictions of sin to his greatest progress in grace, during this present imperfect state. St. Paul was once a Pharisee, ignorant of the spirituality of the law, having some correctness of character, without knowing his inward depravity. When the commandment came to his conscience by the convictions of the Holy Spirit, and he saw what it demanded, he found his sinful mind rise against it. He felt at the same time the evil of sin, his own sinful state, that he was unable to fulfil the law, and was like a criminal when condemned. But though the evil principle in the human heart produces sinful motions, and the more by taking occasion of the commandment; yet the law is holy, and the commandment holy, just, and good. It is not favourable to sin, which it pursues into the heart, and discovers and reproves in the inward motions thereof. Nothing is so good but a corrupt and vicious nature will pervert it. The same heat that softens wax, hardens clay. Food or medicine when taken wrong, may cause death, though its nature is to nourish or to heal. The law may cause death through man's depravity, but sin is the poison that brings death. Not the law, but sin discovered by the law, was made death to the apostle. The ruinous nature of sin, and the sinfulness of the human heart, are here clearly shown. 7:14-17 Compared with the holy rule of conduct in the law of God, the apostle found himself so very far short of perfection, that he seemed to be carnal; like a man who is sold against his will to a hated master, from whom he cannot set himself at liberty. A real Christian unwillingly serves this hated master, yet cannot shake off the galling chain, till his powerful and gracious Friend above, rescues him. The remaining evil of his heart is a real and humbling hinderance to his serving God as angels do and the spirits of just made perfect. This strong language was the result of St. Paul's great advance in holiness, and the depth of his self-abasement and hatred of sin. If we do not understand this language, it is because we are so far beneath him in holiness, knowledge of the spirituality of God's law, and the evil of our own hearts, and hatred of moral evil. And many believers have adopted the apostle's language, showing that it is suitable to their deep feelings of abhorrence of sin, and self-abasement. The apostle enlarges on the conflict he daily maintained with the remainder of his original depravity. He was frequently led into tempers, words, or actions, which he did not approve or allow in his renewed judgement and affections. By distinguishing his real self, his spiritual part, from the self, or flesh, in which sin dwelt, and by observing that the evil actions were done, not by him, but by sin dwelling in him, the apostle did not mean that men are not accountable for their sins, but he teaches the evil of their sins, by showing that they are all done against reason and conscience. Sin dwelling in a man, does not prove its ruling, or having dominion over him. If a man dwells in a city, or in a country, still he may not rule there. 7:18-22 The more pure and holy the heart is, it will have the more quick feeling as to the sin that remains in it. The believer sees more of the beauty of holiness and the excellence of the law. His earnest desires to obey, increase as he grows in grace. But the whole good on which his will is fully bent, he does not do; sin ever springing up in him, through remaining corruption, he often does evil, though against the fixed determination of his will. The motions of sin within grieved the apostle. If by the striving of the flesh against the Spirit, was meant that he could not do or perform as the Spirit suggested, so also, by the effectual opposition of the Spirit, he could not do what the flesh prompted him to do. How different this case from that of those who make themselves easy with regard to the inward motions of the flesh prompting them to evil; who, against the light and warning of conscience, go on, even in outward practice, to do evil, and thus, with forethought, go on in the road to perdition! For as the believer is under grace, and his will is for the way of holiness, he sincerely delights in the law of God, and in the holiness which it demands, according to his inward man; that new man in him, which after God is created in true holiness. 7:23-25 This passage does not represent the apostle as one that walked after the flesh, but as one that had it greatly at heart, not to walk so. And if there are those who abuse this passage, as they also do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction, yet serious Christians find cause to bless God for having thus provided for their support and comfort. We are not, because of the abuse of such as are blinded by their own lusts, to find fault with the scripture, or any just and well warranted interpretation of it. And no man who is not engaged in this conflict, can clearly understand the meaning of these words, or rightly judge concerning this painful conflict, which led the apostle to bemoan himself as a wretched man, constrained to what he abhorred. He could not deliver himself; and this made him the more fervently thank God for the way of salvation revealed through Jesus Christ, which promised him, in the end, deliverance from this enemy. So then, says he, I myself, with my mind, my prevailing judgement, affections, and purposes, as a regenerate man, by Divine grace, serve and obey the law of God; but with the flesh, the carnal nature, the remains of depravity, I serve the law of sin, which wars against the law of my mind. Not serving it so as to live in it, or to allow it, but as unable to free himself from it, even in his very best state, and needing to look for help and deliverance out of himself. It is evident that he thanks God for Christ, as our deliverer, as our atonement and righteousness in himself, and not because of any holiness wrought in us. He knew of no such salvation, and disowned any such title to it. He was willing to act in all points agreeable to the law, in his mind and conscience, but was hindered by indwelling sin, and never attained the perfection the law requires. What can be deliverance for a man always sinful, but the free grace of God, as offered in Christ Jesus? The power of Divine grace, and of the Holy Spirit, could root out sin from our hearts even in this life, if Divine wisdom had not otherwise thought fit. But it is suffered, that Christians might constantly feel, and understand thoroughly, the wretched state from which Divine grace saves them; might be kept from trusting in themselves; and might ever hold all their consolation and hope, from the rich and free grace of God in Christ.