Romans 7
25 verses
Romans 7 opens with the marriage analogy to establish the believer's freedom from the law through union with Christ's death: as a woman is freed from the law of marriage by her husband's death, so the Christian has died to the law through the body of Christ in order to belong to the one who was raised from the dead, bearing fruit for God rather than for death. Paul's insistence that the law is not sin but rather the revealer of sin is demonstrated autobiographically: the commandment 'you shall not covet' exposed the covetousness that sin was producing through the law's very prohibition, so that the commandment which promised life proved to be death. The famous inner conflict of 7:14-25 — I do not do what I want but the very thing I hate, I do not do the good I want but the evil I do not want — has generated centuries of debate about whether the 'I' represents Paul's pre-Christian experience under the law, his post-conversion struggle with remaining sin, or Israel's representative experience. The repetition of 'I' (ego) fourteen times in this passage and the present-tense verbs favor a reading of ongoing Christian experience; the passage is not the last word on the Christian life but the necessary diagnosis before the solution of Romans 8. The wretched man cry — who will rescue me from this body of death? — is immediately answered by the thanksgiving: thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. The summary of verse 25 holds together the two realities simultaneously: with my mind I serve the law of God but with my flesh the law of sin — the tension that Romans 8's Spirit-life resolves without denying. The chapter is essential to Paul's argument because it establishes that the problem of human failure cannot be solved by the law itself, no matter how holy and righteous and good the law is, and that the solution must come from outside the law through the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead.
VERSES IN THIS CHAPTER
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?
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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8
But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead.
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9
For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.
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10
And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death.
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11
For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me.
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12
Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good.
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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.
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His timing, His methods, His purposes — all beyond our comprehension, yet perfectly good.. My grandmother used to quote ...
14
For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.
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15
For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.
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16
If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.
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17
Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
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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.
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19
For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
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20
Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
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21
I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
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22
For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
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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.
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24
O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
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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.
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