Daily Devotion in Romans 7

Artwork in Acts from a 1611 KJV

Daily Nugget:
In Romans 6, Paul lets us know that when one trusts Christ as Saviour, the sin-desiring “old man” is dead (Romans 6:6). That part of us that was removed when one is saved is no longer unrestrained. Also, the believer’s new nature does not want to do what is against God’s desires. On the right side of salvation, one no longer must serve the flesh’s desires.

Romans 7 takes that understanding and explains how we are no longer under sin’s dominion and the Old Testament laws that identified the sins. Paul likens the new arrangement of being saved to a new marriage (Romans 7:2-3).

In a marriage, one is bound to one spouse as long as they are alive. Before we were saved, we were bound to sin until that nature died. It led us where we allowed it to take us: into bars, adulterous relationships, bitterness, blasphemy, and a host of other regretful places. Our sinful nature was in control.

A saved person, however,  is “… dead to the law by the body of Christ…” (Romans 7:6). Our first “spouse” “died” when we got saved. That “husband” contained over 600 Old Testament laws.

The law is important, however. It shows us what God likes and dislikes.  From it, we learned that lying is wrong, as are adultery, deceitfulness, disobedience, rebellion, hatred, and on and on the list goes (Romans 7:7). Without the law of God, we would not have known the whole mind of God concerning sin.

The law is very hard, however. It curses and condemns us for the sins we have committed. When accepted, Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross pays for our sins, and now one can have grace and mercy. As Matthew Henry put it, “The sentence of the law against us is vacated and reversed by the death of Christ, to all true believers.”

For the believer, the “old man” is dead. We can be “married” to another. The second spouse is Christ. We are not bound to the “old man” and His laws. Yes, the old and new nature will still battle for control (Romans 7:18-19), but with the altered mind a Christian has, one can be free from the power of sin (Romans 6:7).
“For he that is dead is freed from sin.” Rom. 6:7
“For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.” I Corinthians 2:16

Today’s Thought: 
“If you are saved, you sin by choice, not by chance.” — Barbara Brinkworth

Words to Understand:
Carnal: lead by physical, mental, or social needs
Concupiscence: strong control; desire
Dominion: lording over; control over
Flesh: human nature
Ordained: set apart for a purpose

Today’s Reading:
Romans 7
1 Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth?
2 For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband.
3 So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man.
4 Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God.
5 For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.
6 But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.
7 ¶ What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.
8 But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead.
9 For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.
10 And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death.
11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me.
12 Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good.
13 Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful.
14 ¶ For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.
15 For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.
16 If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.
17 Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
19 For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
21 I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
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 which is in my members.
24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
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.