Romans 7
7
An Example From Marriage
1Brothers and sisters, you all understand the Law of Moses. So surely you know that the law rules over people only while they are alive. 2It’s like what the law says about marriage: A woman must stay married to her husband as long as he is alive. But if her husband dies, she is made free from the law of marriage. 3But if she marries another man while her husband is still alive, the law says she is guilty of adultery. But if her husband dies, she is made free from the law of marriage. So if she marries another man after her husband dies, she is not guilty of adultery.
4In the same way, my brothers and sisters, your old selves died and you became free from the law through the body of Christ. Now you belong to someone else. You belong to the one who was raised from death. We belong to Christ so that we can be used in service to God. 5In the past we were ruled by our sinful selves. The law made us want to do sinful things. And those sinful desires controlled our bodies, so that what we did only brought us spiritual death. 6In the past the law held us as prisoners, but our old selves died, and we were made free from the law. So now we serve God in a new way, not in the old way, with the written rules. Now we serve God in the new way, with the Spirit.
Our Fight Against Sin
7You might think I am saying that sin and the law are the same. That is not true. But the law was the only way I could learn what sin means. I would never have known it is wrong to want something that is not mine. But the law said, “You must not want what belongs to someone else.”#Quote from Ex. 20:17; Deut. 5:21. 8And sin found a way to use that command and make me want all kinds of things that weren’t mine. So sin came to me because of the command. But without the law, sin has no power. 9Before I knew the law, I was alive. But when I heard the law’s command, sin began to live, 10and I died spiritually. The command was meant to bring life, but for me it brought death. 11Sin found a way to fool me by using the command to make me die.
12Now the law is holy, and the command is holy and right and good. 13Does this mean that something that is good brought death to me? No, it was sin that used the good command to bring me death. This shows how terrible sin really is. It can use a good command to produce a result that shows sin at its very worst.
The War Inside Us
14We know that the law is spiritual, but I am not. I am so human. Sin rules me as if I were its slave. 15I don’t understand why I act the way I do. I don’t do the good I want to do, and I do the evil I hate. 16And if I don’t want to do what I do, that means I agree that the law is good. 17But I am not really the one doing the evil. It is sin living in me that does it. 18Yes, I know that nothing good lives in me—I mean nothing good lives in the part of me that is not spiritual. I want to do what is good, but I don’t do it. 19I don’t do the good that I want to do. I do the evil that I don’t want to do. 20So if I do what I don’t want to do, then I am not really the one doing it. It is the sin living in me that does it.
21So I have learned this rule: When I want to do good, evil is there with me. 22In my mind I am happy with God’s law. 23But I see another law working in my body. That law makes war against the law that my mind accepts. That other law working in my body is the law of sin, and that law makes me its prisoner. 24What a miserable person I am! Who will save me from this body that brings me death? 25I thank God for his salvation through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So in my mind I am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful self I am a slave to the law of sin.
Currently Selected:
Romans 7: ERV
Highlight
Share
Copy
Want to have your highlights saved across all your devices? Sign up or sign in
© 1987, 2004 Bible League International
Romans 7
7
Released from the Law through Death
1 Or do you not know, brothers (for I am speaking to those who know the law), that the law is master of a person for as long a time as he lives? 2For the married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law of the husband. 3Therefore as a result, if she belongs to another man while#*Here “while” is supplied as a component of the participle (“is living”) which is understood as temporal her husband is living, she will be called an adulteress. But if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress if she#*Here “if” is supplied as a component of the participle (“belongs”) which is understood as conditional belongs to another man. 4So then, my brothers, you also were brought to death with respect to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to the one who was raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. 5For when we were in the flesh, sinful desires were working through the law in our members, to bear fruit for death. 6But now we have been released from the law, because we#*Here “because” is supplied as a component of the participle (“have died”) which is understood as causal have died to that by which we were bound, so that we may serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter of the law.
Knowledge of Sin Comes through the Law
7What then shall we say? Is the law sin? May it never be! But I would not have known sin except through the law, for I would not have known covetousness if the law had not said, “Do not covet.”#A quotation from Exod 20:17; Deut 5:21 8But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin is dead. 9And I was alive once, apart from the law, but when#*Here “when” is supplied as a component of the participle (“came”) which is understood as temporal the commandment came, sin sprang to life 10and I died, and this commandment which was to lead to life was found with respect to me to lead to death. 11For sin, seizing the opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
Internal Conflict with Sin
13Therefore, did that which is good become death to me? May it never be! Rather it was sin, in order that it might be recognized as sin, producing death through what is good for me, in order that sin might become sinful to an extraordinary degree through the commandment. 14For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am fleshly, sold into slavery to sin#Literally “sold under sin”. 15For what I am doing I do not understand, because what I want to do, this I do not practice, but what I hate, this I do. 16But if what I do not want to do, this I do, I agree with the law that it is good. 17But now I am no longer the one doing it, but sin that lives in me. 18For I know that good does not live in me, that is, in my flesh. For the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. 19For the good that I want to do, I do not do, but the evil that I do not want to do, this I do. 20But if what I do not want to do, this I am doing, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin that lives in me.
21Consequently, I find the principle with me, the one who wants to do good, that evil is present with me.#Or “in me” 22For I joyfully agree with the law of God in my inner person, 23but I observe another law in my members, at war with the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that exists in my members. 24Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 25Thanks be#Some manuscripts have “But thanks be” to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself with my mind am enslaved to the law of God, but with my flesh I am enslaved to the law of sin.
Currently Selected:
:
Highlight
Share
Copy
Want to have your highlights saved across all your devices? Sign up or sign in
2010 Logos Bible Software. Lexham is a registered trademark of Logos Bible Software