Sermon Brief
Date Written: March 8, 2012
Date Preached: March 11, 2012
Where Preached: OPBC (AM)
Sermon Details:
Series Title: A Journey thru Romans
Sermon Title: Dead to the Law!
Sermon Text: Romans 7:1-6 [ESV]
Introduction:
Now we have learned a lot so far in Romans. In Rom 3-5 we learned about justification and what that means for the believer. We learned that through faith in Christ Jesus we have been declared NOT GUILTY in the courtroom of God!
This means that ‘in Christ’ we stand blameless before God and he does NOT hold our sin against us, but instead it is purged and the penalty of that sin is forever taken away from us…
We have also learned that when we come in faith to Christ that we are freed FROM sin… we learned that freedom FROM sin does not mean that we live sinLESS lives, but what it means is that the bondage of sin no longer has its hold on us… we have been freed to serve Christ!
Paul was sharing this with the Roman believers, but was dealing with two ends of the spectrum in his travels and he wanted the Roman believers to understand things from BOTH ends…
ON one hand Paul had people teaching that because of the ALL powerful grace of God that they could live their lives ANYWAY they wanted and God’s grace would abound more and more…
They believed that because they had been freed from the power of sin, and the grace of God covered them, that they could live as they chose… Paul’s answer… and the truthful answer to this teaching is ABSOLUTELY NOT!
We ARE freed by the grace of God, but we are not freed to live as WE choose, but we are freed to serve the One who has freed us… we are freed FROM sin… we are shown grace and mercy so that we can live FOR Him, not for ourselves!
This is a lot like the liberal society we live in today. If it feels good, God surely would not want to cramp your style, he is a loving God and he won’t want you to be unhappy… so do what you want, in the end God’s love is going to make all things right!
To this we have to stand up and say… ABSOLUTELY NOT! God is loving, but God’s saves us to live FOR Him and not for ourselves, and if we are seeking to live for ourselves and as we choose…
then have we really made a profession of Jesus as LORD of our lives OR have we simply professed a decision we made on our own power!
For those professing faith in Christ and living a changed life… it is NOT done under their own power, but they are changed through the blood of Christ! Only thru Him can we know salvation, mercy and grace…
Paul dealt with the liberals… but Paul also had to deal with the legalists as well as there were many who were teaching that faith in Christ was only the 1st step to salvation…
For all who came to Christ, they must then begin to adhere to and perform under the law of Moses… for them it was Jesus AND the Law that made people Christians.
The problem with this is that when the law is NOT upheld or observed properly, they would teach that one could fall away from God because of their failure in the law!
Peter addressed the Jerusalem counsel about this very matter by basically telling them how dare they tie such a heavy burden around the necks of the Gentiles when the Jews had not been able to bear the burden of the law themselves…
These people were teaching that Christ alone was NOT enough, but you had to faithfully observe the law of Moses… many of them were heavy supporters of all male Gentiles new believers be circumcised as part of the Law of Moses…
Paul knew that salvation in Christ did NOT require the keeping of the Law… this is because Christ Himself had said that He had come to be the fulfillment OF the law! God had shown Paul that living in accordance with the Law as the Jews had tried to do (and failed miserably) for generations was NO longer the case, but this was a hard message to get across…
This “Law” was the centerpiece of the Jewish life and it was going to be hard for Paul to teach them to believe that Christ alone, WITHOUT obligation to the law was enough to save…so Paul uses a logical argument to get across this teaching to those who are opposing him on this matter!
So this morning, I want us to look at Romans 7:1-6 and see how Paul unfolds how that ‘in Christ’ we are no longer under the power of the Law!
That we are not subject to performance under a rigid set of regulations and rules, but that we are in a relationship with a Savior, and our allegiance is NOT to a set of rules or regulations but to HIM!
Let’s look at what Paul has to say in v.1-6
[show Rom 7:1-6]…
1Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? 2For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. 3Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress. 4Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. 5For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. 6But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.
Paul’s Sets Up His Argument: v.1
In v.1 – Paul says
1Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives?
Here Paul is laying out the beginning of his argument… actually it was a continuation of his teaching to the believers!
He is saying, “Hey guys, I know you! You know the LAW, and I know that you cannot claim ignorance in this matter…”
The phrase Paul uses to begin v.1 “Or do you not know…” [ESV] OR “…are you unaware…” [HCSB] – this phrase is one that reveals Paul’s emphasis on those he is trying to teach…
He is basically saying, “I know that you understand this…” OR maybe Paul was saying, “…surely you know/understand what I am talking about…”
To Paul this teaching was obvious fact…it was something that could not be repudiated. Paul knew that for those ‘in Christ’ the law NO longer was master over them!
However, for many, this teaching was too hard to hear or understand! After all, the Law had been given BY God and God had instructed that His law was for all time… for all generations… how could they now just turn away from it and abandon it?
But I want us to remember back to the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus said, [show…Matt 5:17-18 [HCSB]
17“Don’t assume that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. 18For I assure you: Until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or one stroke of a letter will pass from the law until all things are accomplished…”
Jesus wanted the people to know that He did not come to destroy what God had set up… God was not changing His mind, but what was happening [in Jesus] was actually the fulfillment of the law. In other words, Jesus was saying: “Hey guys, this is what God intended all along…”
Christ fulfilled what the Law could only masquerade! Christ brought the righteousness that the Law could never bring… and so Christ was able to fulfill what the law could not!
But this was a hard teaching because to the Jew the law was the centerpiece of their lives, and now Paul was teaching that the Law was secondary to Christ…
I want us to understand that Paul NEVER taught that the Law bad, but only that Christ superseded the Law and fulfilled the requirements OF the law!
Paul understood he was up against a very difficult task of teaching something that went against everything they had ever been taught... so Paul decided to use an illustration to set up his point! Let’s look at v.2-3
But before we move onto Paul’s illustration, I want to share how this applies to us today! I am speaking to both the believers who profess Christ as Savior AND to those of you here this morning and you do not have a saving relationship with Christ Jesus.
When it comes to believing we will make it to heaven OR even believing that we are serving God in the proper manner… we all lose our way from time to time! Many of us find ourselves struggling with EXACTLY the thing Paul is preaching and teaching against here in this passage!
We believe we must adhere to some set of rules or regulations…
We believe we must perform a certain way or do certain things…
We believe that if we do not live a certain way OR perform in a certain way OR perform certain things… that we will fall out of favor with God!
In many ways we fall prey to the same basic teaching that these people were struggling with… we find ourselves believing it is about how we perform that please God!
Well, as Paul says, MAY IT NEVER BE! If our salvation and Christian walk was based on our service and how we perform… HOW LONG WOULD ANY OF US LAST!
You see, it is not about what you DO for Christ that saves you! AND it is not what you DO for Christ that keeps you saved! You are saved out of His grace and mercy… His unmerited favor!
You are saved FROM sin and its power over you… you are freed from its power to serve and honor God. You are NOT saved to ‘perform’ for God…
On the contrary, God saves you out of His love and grace provided FOR you… anything you DO in service to Him is not to gain His favor, but it is out of love for the One who has saved you!
Simply put, YOU perform for God because he has saved you! You are not saved OR even kept saved by your performance… we must understand that there is a huge difference!
So let’s NOT confuse the issue, this is not just about the believers of the 1st century, but this applies to YOU and ME today…as so many of us STILL believe we must perform for God! NOW… let’s get to v.2-3
Paul’s Illustration: v.2-3
2For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. 3Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.
Now here Paul is describing a very normative setting for marriage in the 1st century Jewish mindset. Paul states in v.2 that a woman is bound to her husband by law… this was how Mosaic Law had been set up!
Under the Mosaic Law, the woman had no rights, but was under the submission of the husband! If a woman wanted a divorce she could NOT get it on her own, but only the man could divorce his wife…this meant that the woman was in a place where she was NOT in control…
The woman in the marriage of the 1st century Jewish tradition had no hope other than in her husband. She was bound TO him and at his mercy…
She was bound by a law she could not control… her fate was NOT in her own hands… she could do NOTHING to control that outcome!
But here in v.2 Paul states that if the man dies then the woman is released from that bondage to her husband… by his death she is set free! She is set free, and has choices… has control of her fate and she can choose to marry again if she wishes…
v. 3 reveals the negative result of NOT keeping the law in this instance… Paul tells us that if the woman marries another man BEFORE her husband is dead then she will be called an adulteress… the woman may TRY to take her own fate into her hands, but the results are devastating…
BUT if the husband dies then the woman is freed from the tyranny and bondage of the relationship with her husband and SHE is set free to marry again if she chooses.
Paul has said that: As believers in Christ Jesus, we are DEAD to the law and freed to serve another… that other being Jesus Christ! But does this jive with the illustration we just read?
When we hear Paul say that, then read this illustration it MAY seem a bit confusing. It seems as if the ‘husband’ is the one dying … and being the one who kept the wife in bondage because of the law, wouldn’t the husband represent sin? So why is it that Paul says that we have died to sin?
Well, although the analogy does not play out exactly, I believe Paul was NOT trying to make the analogy completely fit into the marriage picture… this was not an illustration about MARRIAGE… Marriage was simply the chosen ‘law’ Paul used!
When we study this we can see that Paul was using this illustration ABOUT MARRAIGE to set up THE ONE basic truth that we ALL must understand!
Paul’s basic truth is this: Death FREES us from the bondage of the law…
The woman is set free by the death of her husband, and she is free to marry another man without the sin, shame and reproach of being cast as an adulteress…
What Paul is illustrating here is that death brings about a separation from the Law… the death Paul is speaking of here is definitely the death of Christ on Calvary… for that IS the Gospel! Christ on the Cross and risen from the grave…
However, it is also a picture of who we are ‘in Christ’ because Paul tells us that when we profess Christ as Savior that we join Him in His sufferings… in His death!
Paul had mentioned this back in Rom 6:3-4:
3Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
We have died to this world and died to sin and died to the Law… because we have died WITH Christ, and we have been raised to live a NEW life!
We are dead to our old way of life, to our old habits, to our old sinful passions… they no longer have rule in our lives! And like any DEAD person… the law no longer has power over us!
Paul was using this illustration to prove to those who KNEW the law… a very difficult precept to accept… he wanted them to understand this very basic principle!
He believed that if he could get them to understand this basic principle that they would be able to grasp the much deeper spiritual principle that he was addressing…
But Paul does not stop with the illustration, he moves from his set up… to his illustration… and then we find in verse 4 that Paul begins his EXPLANATION of the doctrine.
Paul’s Explanation: v.4
[show v.4]…4Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God.
This was Paul explaining what he believed to be painfully obvious… this is why he begins v.1 with the phrase, “…or do you not know…”
Paul begins his explanation by noting that as the husband died and set the wife free of her obligation to keeping the law… that LIKEWISE Christ died so that we would be set free from our obligation to the rule of the LAW…
Just as the wife was now free to join with another man… we become free to join with another master!
Paul made it a point to stress just WHO that new master was in his phrase, “…to Him who has been raised from the dead…” speaking of Jesus Christ!
Thru His death we are freed from obligation to the Law and because of His resurrection from the dead, we are freed to serve Him!
But again, we must understand that we are not freed from sin and freed from the bondage of the law to do as we please, but we are freed to serve Him and to be fruitful within the Kingdom.
This tells us that God call all His children for a purpose! We know that Christ called all His disciples for a purpose… for a mission… to serve!
Paul uses this opportunity to remind those who have professed Christ as Savior here that they too are called to be productive in their walk in Christ!
Paul says that because of Christ’s death on the cross we are freed FROM the obligation of the law and we are free to serve another… that ‘other’ is Jesus Christ AND we are called to bear fruit for Him…
This phrase, “…that we may bear fruit for God…” that Paul uses here is not specific in nature, but points toward the overall life of the believer! It points to a life that brings glory to God…a life that is productive or OBEDIENT within our service to the Kingdom.
How does this apply to YOU today… Believers this means that you have been freed from the obligation of ritual and regulation when it comes to pleasing God!
As believers we don’t have to worry about our PERFORMANCE being the standard we are held to… but we can know that we are freed from the law to SERVE God!
Our service to His is obedience to His calling, but it is not about performance but is all about the relationship!
Paul’s Conclusion: v.5-6
5For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.
In v.5 Paul reveals that when we are placed in a performance based relationship that we will ALWAYS come up short…
Paul shares a little here about the law that reveals our human nature. In v.5 he says, “…our sinful passions, aroused by the law…” this would seem to make the law a bad thing…
But really what this does is reveal how depraved WE are as humans. It basically reveals the age old adage that we have heard all our lives… You want what you cannot have!
If you want to see someone go crazy FOR something, tell them that they cannot have it… and it really doesn’t matter what it is… forbid it and people want it and will do anything to get it!
Here Paul says that the law… which set boundaries and limitations revealed the sinful passions that were in our hearts already. Because the law forbid it… we desired it even more, and when we were living in the flesh… when we were living apart from Christ it brought us into sin…
Paul says that this sinful desire was “…at work in our members [our body-our heart-our attitude] to bear fruit for death…” Now in 6:23 Paul has already revealed that the wages of sin is death… so if our body was working FOR something and its fruit was death… what was it working for? Sin… sinful passion… sinful desires…
However, Paul comes full circle here and clarifies the wonderful news of the Gospel and what it means for those of us ‘in Christ’… look at v.6 with me
6But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.
Notice how Paul transitions from v.5 to v.6… he uses the phrase, “…but now…” a phrase that indicates a change! A phrase that indicates that something is different…
Paul says, “…but now we are RELEASED from the law, having died to that which held us captive…” this is Paul re-painting the point of his initial illustration… do you remember the principle we discovered there?
The bondage of the law is severed in death… Paul says here that we have died to that which held us captive… we have died to the Law!
And because we have died to the law… we have also died to the performance based idea of pleasing God! We do not have to work to gain favor with God… God’s mercy is revealed in Christ on the Cross and we have salvation through God’s ultimate love for us!
Conclusion:
What does this mean for us? How does this apply to our lives? Well for us today, this means the same as it did 2,000 years ago when Paul was teaching it…
This means that we don’t have to perform to gain salvation…
This means that we don’t have to perform to STAY saved…
This means that God has done all that needs to be done… God has provided the mercy and grace needed to save us and to keep us saved!
This means that there is NOTHING we can do to earn God’s favor, but that in Christ we find God’s favor thru his grace and mercy!
This means that it is all about the relationship we have with Jesus… Let’s put it this way, in ANY relationship we have today… whether it is our marriage, our family, or our friends… we want to please them!
We don’t want to disappoint them… so we seek to do what is good for them, we seek to do good for them… we do this not because of what they will do in return for us, but we do it because of our love for them!
Now I want us to understand something here… we will never be able to live up to a performance based standard in serving God, and so out of His grace God sent Christ to ‘perform’ what we could NEVER do…
We are saved because of Him and we are kept saved because of Him… ALL of who we are is wrapped up ‘in Christ’!
But this does not mean we cannot or should not seek to DO THINGS for Him… we should do things for Christ out of our love FOR Him, and not because we think it will ‘score points with the “Big Guy”’
So while we are not under the obligation of the law to ‘perform’ we do so out of love and obligation to Christ for His sacrifice and love shown to us…
Today you may be sitting there thinking that God would NEVER have anything to do with you… You may be thinking that God would never look at you because of what you have done wrong in your life!
You may think that you have FAR too much to do for God to ever make up for how bad you have lived…
But I pray that today you have heard the message that performance is NOT what God is seeking. God is seeking surrender… God does not want your deeds or good acts… God wants your heart!
God knows that if you will give your heart to Him, that He can clean it and make it right… he can then use you for the good works He created you for… THEN you can do the good works God has called you to do… NOT to save you or make you good enough… but to reveal your love FOR Him!
As Bro Ken comes… I want to ask ALL of you here who do NOT know Christ as Savior to surrender. You cannot DO enough to earn His love or His forgiveness, but if you surrender your heart to Him today… you will gain BOTH… won’t you come…
Christian… today you may sit there thinking you have failed God and that God can’t use you because of your failures…but I want you to know that God loves you and can use you! But he is not looking for your performance! God is NOT looking for your ability to serve Him… God is looking for your AVAILABILITY to serve Him!
I call on you to surrender your heart to Him this morning… surrender to the calling he has on your life! Begin to serve Him out of love and submission to Him… step out and come as we begin to sing… would you stand with me as we begin to sing our hymn of invitation…
