In the previous chapter, – Romans 7:1-6, apostle Paul makes an important point, that the law, – the Mosaic law, has no longer dominion over believers. He says, that “we are become dead to the law by the body of Christ” (Romans 7:4, also Galatians 2:19). Note, please, that the law has not died, rather we have died to the law. As a woman can marry a new husband after her first husband had died, same as we have been released from the bonds of Mosaic law and have been married to our great Bridegroom after we died to the law.
The passage from Romans 7:7 through the end of the chapter describes inability of the law to deliver a sinner from the power of flesh. God’s law is perfect law. The proper attitude of a true Christian is to love God’s perfect law. In verse 22 Paul says, “for I delight in the law of God after [according to] the inward man” (see also Psalm 1:2). Apparently, the “inward man” is the same as the “new man”, the one who was “delivered from the law“, and who “serve in newness of spirit“. Thus, the “old man” (see Romans 6:6), having no delight in the law of God, gets “into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members“.
Scripture
3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: -- Romans 8:3 KJV
Observation
Apostle Paul ends the chapter 7 with great gratitude to “God through Jesus Christ our Lord“, for delivering him, and those who believe in Jesus Christ, from the slavery to the sin and from the influence of the wicked flesh. “For what the law could not do“, because “it was weak through the flesh” Jesus Christ has accomplished through the death and resurrection. Our wicked flesh cannot serve the perfect law of God, moreover it desires to sin knowing that the law will cover it (see Leviticus 7:37). So, “God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh” satisfices the requirement of the law, – “and for sin“, to offer a perfect sacrifices once and for all.
Indeed, Jesus Christ came in the flesh (see John 1:14; 1 John 4:2), but only in the “likeness of sinful flesh“. Even though Jesus was born of flesh, He did not inherit a sinful nature of the flesh. Jesus Christ was divinely conceived, therefore incapable to sin. The perfect and sinless life of Jesus Christ “condemned sin in the flesh: 4 that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit“. Thus what the law could not do, Christ did!
Application
This is the time for your journaling. Reflect on these questions. Ask the Holy Spirit to test your faith and your walk with Christ.
Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates? — 2 Corinthians 13:5 KJV
- Do you live your life according to your carnal cravings?
- Do the desires of your flesh contradict the Law of God?
- Do you delight in the Law of God?
- Do you thank God for the Son Jesus Christ who died on the cross on your behalf?
- Do you serve your Lord Jesus Christ in the newness of the Spirit?
Prayer
Dear Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your perfect law. We thank you Father for Your Son Jesus Christ whom You offer as a sacrifice to deliver us from the law. We thank you Lord Jesus that you have delivered us from the power of the flesh through Your Spirit. May we serve You Lord in the newness of the Spirit.
Al these we pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen
