Dying to Live

 DEVOTION

THE LETTER TO THE ROMANS

DYING TO LIVE

Rom 7:1-6

7:1 Do you not know, brothers — for I am speaking to men who know the law — that the law has authority over a man only as long as he lives? 2 For example, by law a married woman is bound to her husband as long as he is alive, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law of marriage. 3 So then, if she marries another man while her husband is still alive, she is called an adulteress. But if her husband dies, she is released from that law and is not an adulteress, even though she marries another man. 4 So, my brothers, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit to God. 5 For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death. 6 But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.  

NIV

Paul's focus here is directed to the Jews in this church in Rome for he speaks to the men who know the law. This is not to say that some Jews were not of the opinion that the Gentiles ought to study the law so that can be better believers, much like the Jews that traveled to the area of Galatia telling the Gentile believers they needed to become Jews first, get circumcised, then they could accept Jesus as the Messiah. However, that is a conjecture on our part and what we know is Paul is telling those who know the law that it no longer has any authority over them. Again, the law itself has not been canceled for it still holds the key to showing us our sins. If there was no law, Jesus canceled it, then we would never know about sin. We would be living in ignorance and be condemned. This analogy of marriage reveals the need to reckon ourselves dead to sin. The old self within us was a dead man walking because we married to sin. That is the importance of dying and being born again. They could not divorce themselves from the law, and neither could we. But when we die to sin, we are no longer under the authority of the law, but now we belong to God, and he has given us the right to be called his children. This is an either-or situation, as we cannot be adulterers having a relationship with the law and with Christ. How can a dead man be married to the law? Because we died with Christ and have been raised to a new life, we must live according to this new life in Christ. We must be careful not to create any of our own laws, which are seen as rules and regulations that we might believe are based on scripture. In other words, living by the do’s and don’ts of Christianity. It is not for us to judge others, but over the years we have heard believers make outlandish statements about if we drink or smoke or dance or go to the movies, etc., we are not truly Christians. Back to the law, we must go in order to be saved seems to be the rule of thumb. How is this possible since we have been saved by grace, and grace alone? Of course, we do not want to go around finding ways to displease God, however the only way we can please him is to believe in the one he sent, and that also is the only doing, the only work God requires, and he prepared that in advance for us because before the foundation of the earth Christ died for our sins. That can be difficult to wrap our mind around, but it is fact, and we do not live in assumptions, but facts, because we have the word of God, the one we can count on being full of truth. Of course, in the reality of the flesh, the Lamb of God was slain some two thousand years ago, at the exact right time of God. However, because time does not exist in the heavenly realm, the Lamb was slain before the world's creation, before time began. Nevertheless, the point is that we live in Christ, being slain ourselves, dying to sin, and being raised into this new eternal life in Christ. We died to live.