ROMANS UNWRAPPED 119

"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.   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 7v5-6

Now Paul is taking us back to our pre-conversion days, and comparing them to what we have now.   He does this using "we" in verses 5&6, referring to all God's people, and in verses 7 - 11 he uses the "I" of his own personal experience.   He is taking us back to what we all were in Adam, and thinking of us "in the flesh."   This is the first time he has used the word "flesh" in Romans, but it will become a big part of his teaching in chapter 8.   It just means our lives lived purely in the physical sense, devoid of any contact with God in the spiritual sense.   The phrase "in the flesh" or "after the flesh" will become an important reference throughout Paul's writings.   When we were in the flesh the function of the law was to promote the motions of sins (or a better word, passions of sins - in other places described as lusts), purely physical cravings which were motivated by an unseen spiritual power, assisted by the law.   So the function of law was to raise the passions of sins, and it did so because of the rebellious streak within us, that always wants to go against someone else's law.

The whole point Paul is making here is that the law could not save us, it could not justify us in the sight of God, but neither can it sanctify us, make us live lives that are pleasing to God.   In a nutshell we cannot enter the kingdom of heaven by means of the law, nor can we do any works that are pleasing to God through the law.   So something else had to happen and that was, we were delivered from the whole realm and rule of sin and law.   We died with Christ, and we died to something that was much more powerful than us, he says " delivered from the law.... wherein we were held."   Like it or not we were captives to our own sinful desires, to the cravings of the flesh and this situation was exaggerated by the presence of the law.    As we have stated before it is the old  "forbidden fruit" syndrome that what appears good to the eye, often ends up bringing us down.

It is not a popular subject that in our former lives we were captive, but there is no doubt that is the teaching of the New Testament.   Paul now focuses on the other side of this and what God has done is that he has made us dead to sin (chapter 6), and dead to the law (chapter 7).   Now we are captive to the spirit of God in a completely new life style altogether.   He says that we should serve as slaves "in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter"   This last phrase becomes very important in the Christian life.   We are no longer under the law and we should understand that expression fully.  This means there is no more ceremonial law, there is no more moral law, there is no more civil law, as given under the Mosaic code.   There are two qualifications of this; firstly that we are not free from the Old Testament as a whole, we are free only from the Mosaic law in all its facets.   Secondly, we are now under law to Christ (Galatians 6v2)  and basically speaking all the teachings of Christ in the gospels and the teaching of His apostles in the New Testament are now the code for Christians, but this code is not a set of rules laid before us, but is a Divine instructor residing within us as we shall see when we come to chapter 8.   There is a tendency to think that we can't get saved by the law, yet we as Christians must live by the law.   This is totally false and has led to mere mortals lording it over the people of God by introducing their own code of rules and regulations which are not inspired by the spirit of God.   This is not the only time Paul will refer to the letter of the law; it is all too easy to create human codes, commandments of men, creeds written by men, many of them well intentioned, but none of them have any place in the hearts and minds of God's people.   Before Paul ends this letter he will tell us that what is good for one person may not be good for another but only the Lord can persuade a person what is acceptable and what is not.   (The gist of this is taught in Romans chapter 14).   There are of course matters affecting all of us which are right and wrong, but there are many grey areas where one person may be free to do something another is not.   We are clearly told not to judge our brethren or to set them at nought because the work is the Lord's and He is able to make all His people stand.   This is entirely the work of the Holy Spirit and He is able to make good His will in each and every case.   This is what is meant by the newness of spirit, and if we have departed from it, then we need to return to it.   I repeat, the law was unable to save us, it is also unable to sanctify us.   This is the work of God and we should allow Him to do His work in each individual life.

Tomorrow d.v. we shall consider the activity of the law in the life of Paul.