Have you ever been there? Ever lived in POP Christianity? This passage seeks to help us walk in newness of Spirit.

II. We have been delivered from the Law.

A. The law dominates life as long as the person is alive. The illustration in the first three verses helps us understand our situation. There was a woman who had an evil husband. She was locked in to him even though she yearned to get away from him, since he was abusive, unloving, brutal, and unfaithful. But she was under a law that said, "once you are married, you stay faithful to your husband, otherwise you will be called an adulteress." And the penalty for adultery was to be stoned to death.

But the old man dies. She is sad, but she is also happy, because she is now free from her husband. But further, she is also free from that law which bound her to her husband. Suppose she falls in love with a handsome prince who loves her? Can she marry him? Absolutely, because the marriage law no longer applies to her after her husband dies. "The law [only] has dominion over a man for so long time as he lives" (vs. 1).

I just received a letter on Friday from American Education Services which had held at least $10,000 worth of loans for Jonathan Schuppe. The letter said, "The board of Directors of AES is sorry to learn of your loss and wishes to inform you that the educational loan guaranteed by this Agency has been paid in full." Why was it paid in full? Because Jonathan is no longer living; the law no longer applies to him.

B. We are free because of death. Verses 4-6 apply this simple illustration to our lives. The woman pictures us. The law which bound the woman to her old husband is the Law which binds us to the old man. But there has been a death. The previous chapter (6:6) states that we died with Christ, and that when we died with Him, our "old man" specifically was "done away with." Here’s the verse: knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin. When Christ died on the cross, in the mind of God, you and I died with Him. And in that death, our old life lost out. Our old man was crucified with Him. The death takes out the old life in some way so that we are now enabled to serve in newness of spirit. What does all this mean and how did all this happen? I’m not sure I understand all the details. And I assure you there are books written on the definitions of these words, and what these things mean. But the point is clear – that something died, our former self died, and as a result, we are free. However it worked out, whatever God did, there has been a death.

As a result we are now free from the law that bound us to the first husband and are consequently free to be married to the new husband, Jesus Christ. Some commentators argue that the first husband stands for the law. But the woman was not married to the marriage law, but to a man, and the law bound her to him. "But what about verse four which says that we were made dead to the law?" It was the law that we died to wasn’t it? Yes, but we died to it, not because the law itself died, it’s still around and working fine, but because the first husband died. It was the law that kept her married. But now she is "released from the law" in verse two and "free from that law" in verse three. Verse six adds, "we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by" meaning the old man. So we died to the law in the sense that it had no further application to our lives. The moment we trusted Christ, the old life, with all its obligations was terminated, so that we could start a new relationship with a different Person – the One who loved us and died for us.

She was poor, grew up on the wrong side of the tracks, in a small shack, with her mother and Grandmother. Didn’t have much opportunity for advancement, since advancement rarely visited that side of the tracks. After high school, she found several minimum wage jobs to help feed her increasingly sick mother and dying Grandmother. She finally landed a job at not much above minimum wage in a shoe factory. To avoid any trouble or misunderstanding, her new employer handed her a 17 page manual which contained rules and conditions she was expected to agree with and work under. He agreed to pay a certain amount of wages per week, with provision for sick pay, vacation, coffee breaks, proper working conditions, and a couple of other fringe benefits. She was to agree to work 48 hours per seek, be at work before 7:30 AM and produce a certain amount of work. Other expectations were also listed, and she was to agree with them all and sign the last page of the employment manual. Failure to abide by the rules would break the contract, and she would be subject to discipline, loss of pay, and/or termination of her contract. She signed the contract, placing herself under the law and began her job.

It didn’t go the way she expected; it went much better. Within the year she had fallen in love with her employer, and he with her and he had proposed, she had accepted, and they got married. In the process, she found out to her surprise that he was one of the richest men on planet earth, and so the day of her marriage, she became an instant millionaire, as well as the talk of the town.

Question: what happens to the contract that she signed in the employment manual? Answer: The moment she becomes his wife, she ceases to be his employee. She is no longer under the contract. She does not punch a clock; she has no set of rules to observe; she is free, free to spend all her time with her husband. She is free to develop a brand new life.

Do you see the point? This is such an important issue, because the Christian life is designed to be like a marriage, not an employee’s manual. The truth of the matter is that WE ARE THAT WOMAN! We have married the BOSS! The Christian life is a communion with Someone you love, not a set of directives with a time schedule. The Christian life is listening to a Person, not setting out on your own to do the best you can. It’s walking, talking, sharing with Someone who died for you. It’s a honeymoon! And perhaps one of the ways to evaluate your life is to ask whether you are living more on your honeymoon, or more under the employee’s manual.

III. We have been delivered from sin’s enabler. The problem is that people want to re-connect themselves to the law. They want to live under the employee’s manual, because they have done that for a long time, it is easier, and it seems the right thing to do. You know, everybody ought to do their best – and follow the rules.

The problem is that when one puts herself under the law, she soon discovers one thing – how powerful her sin nature is. You can’t fathom how rebellious you really are, until the law comes to do its work in your life.

A. Sin and Law are connected (5). Up until now the implication has been that there is a very close connection between the law and sin. Notice verse 5: For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death.

See that phrase, "by the law," "aroused by the law?" Sinful passions are aroused by the law. It’s as if the Law serves to create and encourage the very things it commands us not to do. Thus because of the law we have sinful passions at work in our members to bear fruit to death. That’s the opposite of what you would expect. That’s the opposite of how people live. They figure that the law helps direct us to be better, to at least steer our boats in a better direction. How does the law work to bring death? There must be something wrong with the law.

B. The Law brings the knowledge of sin (7).

Paul asks the question in verses 7 and 13, "is the Law sin?" "Is there something wrong with the Law?" "Does it have a fatal flaw in it?" And then he recoils in horror at the thought. "God forbid; don’t even think that way." But, having said that, there is a connection here, a very strong, serious, damaging connection.

The connection comes in the purpose of the law, what it does to us. It is designed to make sin known to us. Paul says he would not have known sin, except through the command of the law. He would not have known that he was coveting and disobeying the 10^th commandment unless or until he heard the preaching of the commandment that covetousness was wrong. Denny says, "the desire for what is forbidden is the first conscious form of sin" (639). Commandment 10 is often the first command we disobey. It talks not about what we do, but what we think, what we want, our hearts. We saw this in our first child. He was attracted to a diffenbachia plant next to our front door. He at ten months would crawl up to it and give it a healthy stare. Then he would reach those chubby paws out toward the nice green plant. And I would say, "no." He would usually withdraw his hand, and then look again at the plant with a healthy stare. After awhile, the hand would again go out toward the desirable, forbidden plant. To me, a significant indication that he knew what he was doing was that a couple of days later as he reached out for the plant, he stopped his arm, and then looked around to see if anyone was watching him, and then continued going for the plant. "The desire for what is forbidden is the first conscious form of sin."

The consciousness of sin arose over the conflict between his desire and a law that said, "no." He wanted that; we want that; and the command says, "no, don’t covet." You would think the normal reaction of a healthy individual would be to say, "Oh, OK, I won’t desire it." "I didn’t need it anyway." But that’s not the way we work.

C. The Law provides sin an opportunity (8-9).

8 But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead.

The law provided an "opportunity" for sin to enter our lives (8, 11). The word "opportunity" is sometimes used to indicate a "base of operations" in a war. The command, then, provided sin with a base of operations in its attack against our souls (Vine, 102). And that opportunity it took with zeal and "produced in me" all kinds of evil desire. It not only got me to covet once, but it got me to covet creatively, in many different ways and times. The law engaged the body to "do" what it had not thought about, or had not been that zealous about doing. Apart from the command, sin does not possess the same amount of strength. It’s a power that dwells in us, but it seems to be weaker, and we are not aware of it, until the command arrives to stir it up. Apart from the law, sin was dead – it didn’t have the amazing power in our lives that it suddenly developed when the commandment came. Apart from the command we don’t realize the immense power sin can wield in our lives.

It was 40 years ago now when I entered a subway in NY city for the first time. I was going to see my girlfriend who lived in the Bronx at 10 pm one night.

"I was alive" means that I was free and happy, my conscience didn’t bother me or condemn me. I thought I was living for God and doing well. But when the commandment came, when I heard that I should not covet, and realized that my whole life was oriented toward covetousness, sin sprang into life, and I died. Paul is probably thinking about a real and vivid experience that he had. When the command came, sin attacked him with an amazing power, and he died. "There is a deep tragic pathos in the brief and simple statement; it seems to point to some definite period full of painful recollections" (Giffort as quoted in Denny, 640). Here I was going along happily when all of a sudden a commandment came into my life and right behind the commandment appeared a monster, sin. I thought sin was dead. I thought I was doing pretty well in dealing with it, but it sort of got in the door by hiding behind the commandment and when it came in, I could not believe its strength. It killed me. I sinned, doing exactly what the commandment said not to do.

"Death is personified here as in vs. 17: this tyrant of the human race is the only one who profits by the fruits of the sinful life" (Denny, 638).

D. The Law results in death (10-11).

Here is a strange statement. The commandment was for the purpose of life, but actually, in reality, brought about death. There is a huge difference between the purpose of the Law (to bring life) and the outcome of the law (to bring death). The commandment promised life to those who obeyed. It said, "do this and you will live." But it couldn’t enable the listeners to obey. And so in practical living, the commandment was always overcome by the power of the sin that entered with it into our lives. The result is, as James Denny says, "the commandment defeats its own intention; it has life in view, but it ends in death" (Denny, 640).

11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me. The reason for the dichotomy of verse 10 is not because the commandment is bad, but because indwelling sin is so bad. When a commandment is laid on the table of life, sin discovers a base of operations and employs the command to deceive me and kill me, just like Satan did to Eve in the garden. It’s the commandment that enables sin to develop its power. Sin can misuse the commandment to deceive and kill. "It deceived me." The word deceive is in a very strong form. This isn’t a small lie. This is massive re-arrangement of the truth. This is a rebuilding of everything and putting it into a different world view. Satan is called by Jesus the "Father of lies." He is the pro when it comes to lying. Massive, incredible lies that are to totally opposite of reality that you would wonder why anyone would believe him. And yet, we all do. The first sin came shortly after the first command, "don’t eat of that one tree." And the sin came because Satan used the command as a platform for his deception.

E. The Law is HOLY – Sin is the Terrorist (12-13).

The Law is holy, and the commandment holy, righteous, good.

Holy speaks of character. Its commands match God’s character. There is nothing less than absolute stunning beauty in the commandments.

Righteous speaks to relationships between people as well as with their God. The law speaks the truth, reveals the best thing to do.

Good speaks to its purpose in our lives. Its only goal is to do us good. It intends to give to everyone life more abundantly. But what comes out of this perfectly designed gift from God is our ugliness. It clearly brings out the crap in our lives.

So did something good ruin my life? No, it wasn’t something good. It was sin, this old lying thing that didn’t have much power until the commandment came. All of a sudden I could see the unbelievable awfulness of sin, because it could use and did use that which was holy, righteous, and good to ruin me. It’s not that sin uses nice things for its purposes; it’s that it uses things which are holy and righteous to get its job done. It is determined to kill us by any means.

We now see the Divine intention, which was to show sin in its true colors, to demonstrate the deadly nature of sin by working evil through that which is good. "Sin turns God’s intended blessing into a curse; nothing could more clearly show what it is, or excite a stronger desire for deliverance from it" (Denny, 640-641). The nature of sin is to hide so that we don’t see it. It’s normal nature is to deceive us and trick us. The law reveals this process and intensifies it. Thus, when a person puts himself under the Law, he will only find out how incredibly powerful the sin within him actually is (Vine, 105).

That’s the situation. God wants us to learn to live in newness of Spirit, like the bride of the factory owner. This means learning to live free from the Employee’s manual. How do we do that? Chapter 8 is going to give us more details. But this chapter says it will not be by trying to follow pop religious Christianity and live by means of the law. That’s the way doing-it-yourself becomes undoing-it-yourself.

05/22/05, BBC, am