1. Or are you ignorant, brothers; for I speak to those who know the Law; that the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives?
Picking up from Romans six Paul continues in his train of thought here in Romans seven. Paul is speaking to the the Christians who are in Rome and also to the Jews who see Jesus as the one they have been waiting on (Their Messiah), The law he is speaking about is not the Roman laws but the law of Moses. With the christians now able to intermingle with these Jewish believers they were probably taught some about the Law of Moses from them.
2. For the married woman was bound by law to the living husband. But if the husband is dead, she is set free from the law of her husband. 1 Cor. 7:39 3. So then if, while her husband lives, she is married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress. But if the husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is no adulteress by becoming another man’s wife. Matt. 5:32; 19:3-9; 1 Cor. 7:39
Paul is metaphorically using the law of marriage to show how Christ’s death freed us from the death penalty of the law. The term law shows that it offers condition for binding (chained to), A woman cannot marry another man as long as her husband is alive (According to the law). This would make her an adultress. When her husband dies she is set free from the law and is no longer considered an adulteress if she marries another man. Death is taken here in the literal sense (Not meaning dead in Christ, but physically dead).
4. So, my brothers, you also have become dead to the law by the body of Christ so that you should be married to Another, even to Him raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit to God. 4:25
We are dead to the law because Christ has come and died. He has taken the penalty of death for all of us. Thru Jesus’s death and resurrection we are now free from the death penalty of the law. And if we are baptized we now have the fruit of everlasting life instead of death. By comparison, he explains that “you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ …” (Romans 7:4). Notice that Paul does not say that the law is dead. Rather, we become dead to the law (the penalty for sin is death according to the law), on repentance. That is, the law’s claim on our life as the penalty for breaking it is considered met through Jesus Christ’s sacrificial death in our place. Paul’s point is that, like the woman released from the specific law binding her to her former husband, we through Jesus’ death may be released from the law’s specific requirement of death for past sins. We are now married to Christ As and as a response to our marriage through baptism “we should bear fruit to God,” in contrast to bearing “fruit to death” (Romans 7:4-5).
5. For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sin worked in our members through the law to bring forth fruit to death.
The relationship we have with the world ends with death, the law provides a path for understanding that the law is not what causes death, it is giving us guidance so that you can have life. When we were dead in Christ, (Meaning we didn’t have Christ Jesus living in us, or the Spirit), the law revealed to us the sinful nature of the flesh, which brought forth bad fruit that we may die.
6. But now we having been set free from the Law, having died to that in which we were held, so that we serve in newness of spirit and not in oldness of the letter. 2:29; 2 Cor. 3:6
The old man has been set free from the penalty of the law that held us captive to the sin nature, leading us to death. Now that the Spirit dwells in us we are no longer held captive by the flesh, and from it’s condemnation of death for our past sins. for the flesh is now dead in us, and the Spirit now lives in us, so we can now resist the temptation to sin, and overpower the weakness of our fleshly nature through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Rom 7:7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Let it not be said! But I did not know sin except through the law. For also I did not know lust except the law said, You shall not lust. 3:20; Ex. 20:17
The law itself is not bad. If it weren’t for the law we would not know good from evil. The law is a guide of right from wrong. Without the law we would not know sin.
8. But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, worked in me all kinds of lust. For apart from law, sin was dead. 4:15
We don’t understand what we were doing was bad, until the law revealed that sin was bad. the law didn’t kill us, it showed what does kill us (SIN). The commandment made it possible for sin to reveal itself to us, and manifest the evil desires of the flesh, The law defines sin, for without the law there is no sin.
9. For I was alive without the law once. But when the commandment came, sin revived and I died.
Paul is saying I learned that if I keep sinning only death would come. Before there was the law I was alive, because I didn’t know sin. Once I was told, “Thou shalt not” sin came into being and I was dead (The penalty for sin is death), in the flesh, or if you will? The carnal mind.
10. And the commandment, which was to life, was found to be death to me. 18:5
And thus. the commandment, which was designed to give life through the keeping of it. we found it to be unto death through breaking it.
11. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me.
The law gives us an understanding of what we are to keep, despite the fact that we are heading to death, but Christ took that penalty of death to Him. Before the commandment (The law), came, my sinful nature thought sin wasn’t bad (we were deceived),we had no conscience of good and bad. Therefore we were dead because The penalty for sin is death.
12. So indeed the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and just and good. Ps. 19:8
The law and the commandment are both sacred, deserving deep respect. And the commandment is fair, Righteous, pure and honorable. The law shows us what is just and good.
Rom 7:13 Then has that which is good become death to me? Let it not be! But sin, that it might appear to be sin, working death in me by that which is good; in order that sin might become exceedingly sinful by the commandment.
That what is good does not bring about death. Whereas the commandment make me realize how bad sin is. The more we look into God’s law the more we should understood how sinful sin is. And the more we realize the difference between being righteous and being evil.
14. For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin. Rom 6:16
The word law means the Mosaic law (God’s law), the law is spiritual tells us what is good and right and just (Spiritual), and we are of the flesh, subject to sin. For the carnal mind is enmity against God and not subject to the law of God (Rom 8:7),
15. For what I am doing, I do not understand; for what I will to do, that I do not practice, but what I hate, that I do. Gal. 5:17
Our human tendencies never go away even after baptism, this will go on until the day we die. We have a hard time understanding why we can’t do the good that we want to do and keep doing The things that we hate to do, we keep doing them over and over.
16. If then I do that which I do not desire, I consent to the law that it is good.
When we do the things we do not desire to do, it is the law that leads us to recognizes right from wrong.
17. But now it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me.
It is not the Spirit that makes us do wrong, but the flesh (The human nature), inside us.
18. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwells no good thing. For to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good I do not find. Gen. 6:5; 8:21
Nothing good can come from our flesh that is inside us, the flesh does not recognize what is good, or knows how to do good. The sinful things we desire are inside us. Through our baptism we know that God’s Spirit is present with us, but sometimes we stumble and can’t find the way to do good.
Gal 5:19 The wrong things the sinful self does are clear: committing sexual sin, being morally bad, doing all kinds of shameful things, Gal 5:20 worshiping false gods, taking part in witchcraft, hating people, causing trouble, being jealous, angry or selfish, causing people to argue and divide into separate groups, Gal 5:21 being filled with envy, getting drunk, having wild parties, and doing other things like this. I warn you now as I warned you before: The people who do these things will not have a part in God’s kingdom.
19. For the good things I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I do. Rom 7:15
The good things that we want to do (According to the Spirit) we do not do them, but all the evil things we do not want to do, are the things I do.
20. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. Rom 7:17
If we do the things that we know we shouldn’t do (According to the Spirit), it is because of the sin nature (The Flesh) that dwells inside us. And not the Spirit.
21. I find then a law: when I will to do the right, evil is present with me.
When we want to do good, there is this law that says to do good. but evil is there with us (in the flesh), at the same time.
22. For I delight in the Law of God according to the inward man; Ps 1:2
we should be pleased in our inner self that wants to do good according to the law of God.
23. but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin being in my members. 6:13; 19; Gal. 5:17
There is also another law in my flesh that is at war with our spirit. This law is leading us to be a prisoner of sin, which is of the flesh and not the spirit.
24. O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? 1 Cor. 15:51, 52
we miserable in the flesh, because we are giving it everything that we have but we still succumb to the sinful desires. I am so afflicted with these thoughts it brings me pain, whom can I turn to, to release me from this sinful body that leads to death? It is through the blood of Jesus Christ that saves me from my wretched self.
Rom 7:25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then with the mind I myself serve the Law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.
I thank God for the gift of Jesus Christ. I consciously serve God’s law through His spirit, but my flesh still serves the law of sin. It is through the blood of Jesus Christ that saves me from my wretched self.