If someone yells, “Don’t Look!” What is it that you do right away? Everyone looks. It’s just human nature.
And that’s the point. If someone says, “Do not covet!” Which is envy. What do we do? We envy. It’s because our eyes are fixated on it. And the sin nature raises up in us.
It’s not that our sin nature wasn’t there. It always has been. But when someone says, “don’t,” there’s something in us that raises up and says, “I’m going to do it anyway.”
So the law which says “don’t do this,” which reveals to us God’s righteousness, actually awakens sin in us at new levels. That’s the problem.
As per Paul’s illustration, we’ve been married to the Law. And the Law basically tells us, “don’t,” and so what do we do? We do exactly what we know we shouldn’t. So we have all of these laws, and they bring imprisonment. Because the laws awaken in us sin, and sin leads to death.
So what do we do? Because we are “married” to the law?
The good we want to do, we won’t.
The things we don’t want to do, that’s what we find ourselves doing.
And yet we’re bound to this thing. That is, until death.
But if we die, then we are released from his bondage of a bad marriage to the law.
And Paul shows us, that’s what Christ’s death enables us to do. When we are baptized, we are baptized into his death. Because he is God in the flesh, we unite ourselves with his death,
What does that mean? We are dead now according to the law. That marriage is over. And the law has no authority over us anymore.
Now it doesn’t mean we are single and alone. But rather that we are baptized, we are united with Christ’s death, and so are free from the Law. But just as Christ is raised, we too will be raised, and now we are “married” to Christ. Not in the physical in any way. But we are covenant bound and united with Christ.
We don’t just stay married to the law, and then “married” to another. That would be adultery.
But rather through death, one marriage is over, and the new one starts. But this is only done through the death and resurrection of jesus Christ. And in baptism, we UNITE with Christ in that death and we UNITE with Christ in His resurrection, sealing that covenant of love.
And while the Law says “don’t do this” and “don’t do that,” the command of Jesus is simple: As I have loved you, so love one another.
Because of this new life we have in Christ, and not the Law, our new goal is to walk in this newness.
It’s like we’ve been living on a dump all of our lives. And now reality has come and rescued us, and we now live in a palace with all of its adornments. It would be foolish to go back to the dump in our royal robes and dig through trash, when we can live in the fruitfulness and abunance that there is living in the palace with everything available that is needed.
We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life (Romans 6:4).
The significance of this chapter is understanding the meaning and importance of baptism. Also that we are no longer married to the law, but joined with Christ and bound to grace. Therefore we walk in newness of life.
What a powerful gift when you really think on it. Without Christ, we would still be married to the Law, held its slave, stuck in sin and promised death. But now we have been given the way to have life and life eternal.
Or do you not know, brothers[a]—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? 2 For 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.[b] 3 Accordingly, 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.
4 Likewise, 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. 5 For 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. 6 But 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.[c]
The Law and Sin
7 What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. 9 I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. 10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
13 Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. 15 For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. 17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.