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11. I sometimes think that Paul must turn over in his grave (or perhaps do flips in heaven) when he sees how so many have misinterpreted Romans 7 to mean exactly the opposite of what he was trying to say. The conundrum he presents in 7:7-25 is a hypothetical person who wants to keep the Law but lacks the power to do so because he or she does not have the Holy Spirit. Unfortunately, the picture has resonated so strongly with the experiences of so many Christians that they can't seem to read the plot to its resolution in Romans 8.
In my opinion, Paul's position on sin in Romans 6-8 is not remotely ambiguous. After all, how does he start this section? "Should we remain in sin so that grace might abound? Absolutely not!" (Rom. 6:1). It sure sounds like he does not believe sin should typify a believer.
Let's try that again in Romans 6:15: "Should we sin because we are not under Law but under grace? Absolutely not!" Hmm. That's strange. Sounds like he's saying sin should not typify the life of a believer.
How about Romans 6:12: "Do not let Sin be ruling in your mortal bodies." Very strange. It sounds like he is saying that my body should not participate in sinful activities. That sure sounds like sin should not typify the life of a believer.
Romans 6:13 confirms this understanding. "Do not continue to present your [body] members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness but present yourselves to God as living from the dead and your members to God as instruments of righteousness." This is not about a legal fiction where, as Luther said, we are both "sinner and saint at the same time as long as we keep repenting." [10] Paul is talking about the way we concretely live in the world -- how we use our "members," our body parts.
12. While I'm on this point, let me make a quick side trip to Galatians 5:16: "Walk in the Spirit, and you will never fulfill the desires of the flesh." It is worth noting the grammatical constructions here. The first verb is a present imperative -- an ongoing command -- "Be walking." The result is a clause known as the "subjunctive of emphatic negation." It has two words for not in it, which in Greek is an emphatic "no."
Once again, Paul seems to say in strong terms that sin should not typify the life of a believer. This is not a legal fiction, as Luther argued. In Hebrew, "walking" is the word for ethics (halakah). This is about how you live. After all, what are the fruit of the flesh? Galatians 5:19-21 tells us. The deeds of the flesh range from sexual immorality to idolatry.
As a side note, I believe part of our problem in appropriating Scriptures like these is that Western culture has become so introspective, particularly after the Romanticism of the late 1700s and early 1800s. Whereas Paul's understanding of something like envy was probably much more concrete than the "navel gazing" that we hyper-individualistic, introspective Westerners might think. Even Jesus' focus on the heart in Matthew 5 was not likely as hyper-introspective as we can be.
We remember that Paul thought he did pretty well at keeping the Jewish Law before he gave his allegiance to Jesus. In Philippians 3:6, he says that he was "blameless" when it came to the righteousness in the Law. [11] It is a reminder that, in the minds of most Jews at this time, keeping the Law to a standard acceptable by God was considered achievable.
13. My puzzlement at the popular misinterpretation continues as we work our way through the last part of Romans 6 and into the first part of Romans 7. Paul repeatedly contrasts what we "used to be" before the Spirit and what we are "now." Take a look at these contrasts:
- "Thanks be to God because you used to be slaves of Sin... having been freed from Sin, you became slaves of righteousness" (6:18).
- "Just as you presented your members as slaves to uncleanness and lawlessness leading to lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness" (6:19).
- "When you were slaves of Sin, you were free to righteousness. But now, having been freed from Sin and having been enslaved to God, you have your fruit to holiness" (6:20, 22).
- "When we were in the flesh, the passions of sins (aroused through the Law) were working in our members results that bore fruit to death, but now ... we serve in the newness of the Spirit" (7:5-6).
- "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death. God has accomplished the impossibility of the Law that was due to the weakness of our flesh... so that the righteous requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us" (Rom. 8:2-4).
Notice how consistent Paul's repeated sense of sin, righteousness, and holiness is throughout Romans 6-8. We used to be slaves to Sin. Our "members" -- our bodies -- used to do things they shouldn't do. We were in the flesh.
But now, we are set free from the flesh. We are no longer slaves to sin. We are now slaves to righteousness. This is a result of the Spirit. Our members -- our bodies -- now produce fruit of righteousness and holiness in our lives.
14. We need to emphasize the point. Over and over throughout Romans 6-8, Paul repeatedly says that believers should no longer be slaves to the power of Sin. We should step back and point out why this was important to his overall argument in Romans. His opponents were accusing him of teaching "let us do evil that good may come" (Rom. 3:8). He had a bad reputation among Jews, as James reminds him in Acts 21:21 -- rumor was he was telling Jews not to keep the Law. They saw him teaching a sinning religion.
Accordingly, Romans 6-8 have as their primary rhetorical goal to show that his theology is not "pro-sin." Those who say that he encourages people not to keep the Law are dead wrong. "Do we nullify the Law through faith?" he poses in Romans 3:31. "Absolutely not!" he responds repeatedly. [12]
Paul is absolutely against sin. That is his point in these chapters. In that sense, the popular interpretation of Romans 7 is diametrically opposed to Paul's fundamental purpose in this section.
15. With this overwhelming context in mind, let's finally turn to Romans 7:7-25. In these verses, most Pauline scholars believe that Paul is picturing the situation of someone who wants to keep the Law but does not have the power of the Spirit in order to do it. [13] Let's track his train of thought.
7:14 -- "The Law is spiritual, but I am fleshly (carnal), having been sold under Sin." We should immediately sense that something is up. Why? Because throughout the last part of Romans 6, he aligned being a slave to sin to the time before we came to be in Christ.
In fact, in the verses right before this one, he has been talking about the beginnings of his spiritual awakening. "I wouldn't have known sin except for the Law" (7:7). "I was alive apart from the Law once" (7:9). He's telling his past story. [14]
So when he gets to 7:14, he is talking about our default human state starting out -- not his present condition. [15] He is not talking about the state of the person who has been baptized into Christ and has received the Spirit. He is telling the story of "everyman" in his or her spiritual pilgrimage. We all start off "in the flesh," a slave to Sin.
7:15, 19 -- "I don't know what I'm doing, for I don't do what I want to do but I do what I hate... I don't do the good I want to do, but I do the evil I don't want to do." As with 7:14, Paul is dramatizing the plight of the person who wants to do good but cannot actually do it because they are still a slave to sin. They have not yet been freed from the power of Sin and become a slave to righteousness.
A quick reminder of 6:17 is in order: "Thanks be to God because you used to be slaves of Sin but you obeyed from the heart the type of teaching to which you were committed. And having been set free from Sin, you were enslaved to righteousness." See where Paul has located himself in the storyline in the last part of Romans 7? It is before a person has come to be in Christ.
In fact, this same progression -- leading to the "Thanks be to God! -- takes place at the end of Romans 7. The struggle of the person who is a slave to Sin reaches a climax.
7:22-25a -- "I delight in the Law of God in my inner person, but I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind and making me a captive to the law of sin that is in my members. O wretched man am I! Who will rescue me from the body of this death? Thanks be to God! Through Jesus Christ our Lord!"
The drama now reaches its peak. Note again. In Romans 6 Paul has implored the Romans not to let sin reign in their "members," in the actions of their bodies. If Paul were talking about his current experience in these verses, he would be in a lesser spiritual state than he is instructing the Romans to be.
No! This is the situation of the person who is still a slave to Sin. This is a person whose "members" are still instruments of unrighteousness. He gets to the same climax alluded to in Romans 6:17 where, "Thanks be to God!" the new believer is set free from the power of Sin. How does this happen? It happens "through Jesus Christ our Lord."
Romans 8 follows directly on this victory! [16] "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus for the law of the Spirit of life has set you free from the law of Sin and death!" We have now reached the resolution of the tension Paul portrayed in the last part of Romans 7. The situation of when we "used to" be slaves to Sin is resolved. We are now at the part of the story where we have been freed from Sin and are now slaves to righteousness.
Indeed, now we can keep the Law by the power of the Spirit! "God has accomplished the impossibility of the Law that was due to the weakness of our flesh... so that the righteous requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us" (8:2-4). Sin no longer reigns in our mortal bodies. We no longer yield our members as instruments of unrighteouness. We are no longer sold under Sin.
Indeed, we are no longer "in the flesh," for "those who are in the flesh cannot please God" (8:8). Now, we are "in the Spirit" because the Spirit of God dwells in us (8:9). Note that Paul expects this to be true of all believers. He is not describing what he thinks will take place after a second experience. In a perfect world, this situation would be true of everyone in Christ.
However, as we will see in the next chapter, the problem is that we often find Christians who are still to some degree in the flesh. In Romans 6-8, Paul gives the ideal and the way it should work. But leave it to the Corinthian church to mess things up! In the next chapter, we will see how it is often necessary for us as believers to move on to the spiritual from the carnal. Once again, we find a place to argue that most Christians can find themselves at a second moment of grace.
16. We shouldn't leave this chapter without a quick mention of Romans 12:1-2, a classic entire sanctification text. "Present your bodies as a living sacrifice -- holy, pleasing to God -- which is your appropriate worship. And stop being conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mindset so that you can verify what the will of God is -- the good and pleasing and complete will of God."
Do you see that this instruction alludes back to Romans 6? In Romans 6, Paul urged the Romans to present their "members" as instruments of righteousness leading to holiness. He told them not to let Sin reign in their mortal bodies. As he now starts the exhortation of Romans 12-15, he returns to that theme. Our bodies -- which were formerly slaves to sin -- must now be given completely to God. Our flesh is crucified (Gal. 2:20). We die to Sin and now live to God (Rom. 6:2). We are no longer conformed to this world.
Now, we walk in the Spirit and do not fulfill the desires of the flesh (Gal. 5:16). Our mindset is transformed and renewed. Note that Paul is not focusing on ideas or worldviews here. The transformed mind to which he refers is made clear in the chapters that follow. Far from ideology, he has in view a mindset of mutual submission and love of one another. Indeed, Romans 13:8 sums up what a renewed and transformed mind is -- it is a mindset of love toward others.
Now we can not only see clearly what the good, pleasing, and complete will of God is. We are now empowered to do it through the power of the Holy Spirit. God has made possible the impossible through the sin offering of Christ Jesus so that we can now fulfill the righteous requirement of the Law.
Of course, experience demonstrates that most Christians are not quite there at first. In theory -- in theology -- we all should be. But in practice, there is often a middle zone where a Christian is still fleshly or carnal. It is to this uncomfortable middle zone that we turn next.
[10] simul iustus et peccator, semper repentans.
[11] One of the most transformative articles on my interpretive journey with Paul was Krister Stendahl's "Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West," now in Paul Among Jews and Gentiles (Fortress, 1976).
[12] The difference between Paul and some other Jewish believers is that he did not consider Israelite-specific laws to be binding on his Gentile converts. He also seemed to believe that the unity and mission of the church took precedence over keeping these Israelite-specific laws. Although he did not express it in this way, he was laying the seeds of what later Gentile Christians would think of as the "moral law."
[13] It's an ancient literary device known as prosopopoeia.
[14] I actually think he is telling the story of everyone, not his story specifically, but I don't want to distract from the main point here.
[15] I have heard individuals say something to the effect of, "He is using the present tense. Therefore, he is talking about his current state and what is happening in the present." I'll try to be kind. This statement reflects an utter lack of understanding of Greek tenses. They are not primarily about time. In fact, some argue they are not about time at all. In any case, the Greek present tense can be used in several ways (including to talk about the past). This argument doesn't even pass first-semester Greek.
[16] You might note that I have left off the final part of 7:25 for clarity's sake: "So then, I myself with my mind serve the Law of God but with my flesh the law of Sin." This sentence summarizes the pre-faith condition of the person who does not have the Spirit but wants to keep the Law. However, because this summary comes after the climax of Paul's train of thought, some mistakenly think it condemns us to never have victory over the power of Sin. Again, this interpretation completely undermines Paul's train of thought in these three chapters.
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Preface: A Sanctification Story
1.1 Filled with the Holy Spirit (part 1)
1.2 Spirit-fillings in Acts (part 2)
2.1 What is holiness? (part 1)
2.2 What's love got to do with it? (part 2)
2.3 What is perfect love? (part 3)
3.1 What is sin? (part 1)
3.2 All sins are not the same. (part 2)
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