One minute Paul says we’re “released from the law (Romans 7:6),” but the next minute he says “the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good (verse 12).” So, why would God release us from the law when it’s holy and good? Because the law “brought death (verse 10).”
Paul discovered to his intense dismay “that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death.” He believed with all his heart that keeping the commandments would “bear fruit to God (verse 4),” but “when the commandment came, sin sprang to life (instead) and I died (verse 9).” It was a nightmare. Instead of the law stopping him sinning, it only made him want to sin more! The more commandments he knew, and the more intensely he tried to obey them, the more he desired what they prohibited! The law said “Do not covet,” for instance, but instead of it stopping Paul coveting, it “produced in me every kind of covetous desire (verse 8)” instead!
Paul felt terribly deceived, “For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me, and through the commandment put me to death (verse 11).” Sin had been really clever. It had used the law that Paul thought “was intended to bring life (verse 10),” and turned it round so that it “actually brought death.”
And that raised a harrowing question in Paul’s mind. “Did that which is good, then, become death to me (verse 13)?” Was this wonderful law of God actually a highly cunning killer? Was the law, in fact, in cahoots with sin? Because it certainly looked like it. Without the law, sin didn’t affect him (verse 8), but with the law came all these awful desires to sin, and sin meant death.
So, is this good law of God really just a killer, Paul asks? “By no means!” he answers, “But in order that sin might be recognized as sin, it produced death in me through what was good, so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful (verse 13).”
Sin is awful, but we’d never know it without the law. The law exposes the sins within us, forces them into the open so we can see what a dreadful mess we’re in. By doing that though, the law kills us (verse 10), but in killing us it shows up who our real killer is. It’s sin and its evil desires and sinful passions that consume and control us.
And that’s why the law is good. It spotlights our worst enemy. But once that purpose is done, the law is replaced by “the new way of the Spirit”…
Filed under: The law
