Rehashing Romans 7 and 8 (again)

“He is [a Christian], which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the Spirit [of the Law], and not in the letter [of the Law]; whose praise is not of men, but of God.” (Rom. 2:2).

For a long time I have noticed a huge disconnect between our traditional focus of the Romans chapter 7 Law and the Romans chapter 8 Spirit. As the issues were in chapter 6, the issues of chapter 7 are between obeying or abandoning ourselves to the Law of righteousness through the Spirit and obeying or abandoning ourselves to the law of sin through the flesh. Is this not the same message from chapter 8? Why have we confused Paul’s whole thought process as he spread out the science of salvation for us?

“Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants [Gr. doulos “slaves”] to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?

But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.

Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of [Gr. douloō “enslaved to”] righteousness.” (Rom. 6:16-18).

But how did they become abandoned to Jesus and enslaved to righteousness, and delivered from abandonment to Satan and enslavement to sin? How did they yield themselves to Jesus? They heard the gospel and their hearts surrendered to Jesus. Jesus and Him crucified for them was “that form of doctrine” that Paul preached and that they obeyed from their hearts. The Romans’ hearts were moved to love mere abstract letters, intellectual principles, and philosophical laws. Were they not moved to love a living Person who made their hearts burn within them by His love for them and love for His Father?

And, indeed has anything of the heart’s issues changed from 2,000 years ago? Can any need of the human heart ever change? All of this Saul studied in the desert, and got the victory of it while he was still wet behind the ears (see Galatians 1:11,12,17,18), as all of us still are. And the knowledge he received came “by revelation” (Eph. 3:3; Gal. 2:2), straight from the heavenly throne of “God through Jesus Christ” (Rom. 7:25).

In all of Paul’s apparent bashing the Law (and I emphasize “apparent”) we must keep in the back of our mind his exaltation of obedience to righteousness, obedience to the Law of God. Exalting the Law John perfectly agreed to, even it all of his exaltation of love. “Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the Law: for sin is the transgression of the Law.” (1Jn. 3:4).

Nevertheless, the issues of chapter 8 seem not so much to be about the LAW of God versus the law of the flesh, as it is between the SPIRIT of God versus the lust of the flesh. But, is the Romans 7 and 8 switch between Law and Spirit only an appearance and not reality? How are Law and Spirit the same? Does Law transform into Spirit, as Proverbs 6:20-22 give the clue? God is a Spirit. Doesn’t His Law—His omniscient, omnipotent, redemptive will and character—become His omniscient, omnipotent, redemptive Spirit? I ask this because chapter 8 is the eternal solution for the chapter 7 age-old problem. But, exactly how is Romans 8 the solution?

Chapter 7 ends with establishing the enslavement to the Law of God in Christ as the only path to life, rather than remaining enslaved to the flesh and on the path to death. It was a war between Saul’s search for a spiritual mind rather than his spiritual hormones, his spiritual hormones wielding a major opposition to the power of the Spirit. After looking at it more closely, I believe we have not connected the two chapters together correctly, and therefore have not seen the common thread running through them both. That common thread is that Jesus is, and before creation He always was, the Word, the Spirit of the Law, “I Wisdom… Counsel is Mine, and sound wisdom; I am understanding; I have strength…. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth.” (Prov. 8:12,14). The Spirit of Christ is the Spirit in the Law, the Word of God through the Testimony of Jesus that is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword piercing our soul and spirit. The Law testifies of Him. No man spoke the Word like this Man because He was the Word.

“And the Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon Him…

And shall make Him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and He shall not judge after the sight of His eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of His ears:

But with righteousness shall He judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and He shall smite the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips shall He slay the wicked.

And righteousness shall be the girdle of His loins, and faithfulness the girdle of His reins.” (Isa. 11:2-5).

“I lift up My hand to heaven, and say, I live for ever. If I whet My glittering sword, and Mine hand take hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to Mine enemies, and will reward them that hate Me.” (Deut. 32:40,41).

“Out of His mouth went a sharp twoedged sword.” (Rev. 1:16).

It has been Christ’s Spirit that meets with our spirits as we comprehend Him in the written letters, as we hear His voice and see His face in His sacred scriptures (see 2Cor. 4:2-4,6). Christ is the mind of the Spirit that knows us by the spiritual mind that He quickens in us as we abide in Him by His grace toward our sinfulness, and all who join with the Lord are one Spirit with Him (see 1Cor. 2:10,11,16; 15:45; 6:17). We can say literally, “Christ in you, the hope of glory”.

It was His Spirit under the inspiration of His Father that was in the prophets of old. “Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow.” (1Pet. 1:11, cf Dan. 10:5,6). It was the Father’s Spirit in the prophets as in Jesus’ disciples, then and today, who would speak before governors and kings. It is “the Spirit of your Father” and “the Spirit of His Son” (Matt. 10:20; Gal. 4:6 cf Rom. 8:9). And it was the Son of God who has always been the Minister of the Father’s Spirit to fallen mankind. “And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns [all power] and seven eyes [all knowledge], which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth.” (Rev. 5:6). 

Please accept the liberty I have taken in the following insertions that I borrowed from other parts of the Bible to add clarity and connection to, and to help us carry-over between, the apparently widely disparate transitional verses, Romans 7:25 and 8:1 (they are each other’s contexts). And please see with me what thought Saul of Tarsus was communicating there, even though he left words out for brevity or for whatever reason he had for doing so. For the ease of distinguishing, Romans 7 and 8 are in red font; my thoughts and other scriptures are in black font.

Rom 7:1  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?

Rom 7:2  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.

Rom 7:3  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.

[Simple enough. The woman leaves one man and marries another without divorcing. This is unlawful.

And likewise, when anyone has not wrestled with the Law, with its guilt and shame and its fearful condemnation, and has not bowed to its claims—but then such a person desires to the claims to be married into Christ and to be a virgin child of God, then that person has broken the law of the kingdom, and God calls that “virgin” an adulterer. Saul is saying that such a person’s pride has never been humbled into the dust. The sharp, living Law of God has never convicted him of his dead heart and his filthy, unslain “good living”. He has skirted the curse of the Law and the discipline of the Schoolmaster of Galatians 3:24. Such a person has attempted to enter into Christ for His justifying peace by some other way than falling into the hands of the living, life-giving God. Such a person has said, “I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, to add drunkenness to thirst”, “I…shall see no sorrow” (Deut. 29:19; Rev. 18:7). Before marrying into Christ that person must receive an exceedingly strong conviction of sin in order to see himself as God sees him. And then, as Saul did, he must lift up his voice to God and cry for mercy and help, “O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from this body of death?” (Rom. 7:24). His desperate prayer from the whole heart satisfies the Schoolmaster and moves Him to bring that person to His designated Teacher, Christ, for His justification.]

Rom 7:4  Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the Law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another [that is, the Spirit of God comes by His condemning Law slaying us, and the Spirit of Christ comes from His expired, spiritual body, quickening us], even to him who is raised from the dead, [our spirit married to Christ’s Spirit, is raised with His, to sit in heavenly places with Him, while on earth we walk with Him as Enoch walked by faith. We are, freed from our dead disposition to God’s will and to our humanistic relation to His Law, and are bound to the will of our godly, Law-loving, God-loving Deliverer] that we should bring forth fruit unto God. [“And so it is written,… the last Adam [Christ] was made a quickening spirit” (1Cor. 15:45, cf John 20:19-26,30,31), and we are made a living soul, if we daily taste of Christ, who is the tree of life in the paradise of God (see Luke 23:43; Hebrews 6:4,5; Revelation 2:7].

[What may confuse people is how Saul seems like he dismisses the Law. Saul says, “…the motions of sins…were by the Law” (Rom. 7:5). And he wrote to the Corinthians, “…the strength of sin is the Law” (1Cor. 15:56). But he also wrote to the Romans, “Do we then make void the Law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the Law.” (Rom. 3:31). What must Saul mean by his apparent contrariness with himself? He is saying that the Law-keeping is not the cause of salvation, but certainly the result. He doesn’t conclude the disillusioned Romans 7 soliloquy of his salvation without having long wrestled with the Law, and surrendered to its powerful authority.

Rather than being confused, he must be saying that if we don’t come to Christ through the Schoolmaster, if we don’t eat of the True Vine that is continually being pruned by the Gardener, then we don’t come to Christ at all and sup with Him. And then any Law-keeping without Christ is invalid before God. Law-keeping with Christ is the power of Satan for our continued subjection to sin, and our damnation if we persist in doing so. We must first face God via His Law before we can face Christ via His purified, decimated body, all of which must happen before we can satisfy the Law and God by the life of righteousness. First we come to God, then to the great Red Heifer sacrifice who was burnt to nothing; then, after being more deeply humbled there by His accepting upon Himself the tonnage of His Father’s wrath against us, we go back to God for our confession, His examination of our humbling—and the blessing of His Spirit. Saul defends Law and grace, grace and truth, justice and mercy, because both are necessary for our salvation. Both are diametric opposites, top and bottom dead-centers in the cams of our chariot of fire that speeds us to sit in heavenly places with Christ.] 

Rom 7:5  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. [This spiritual death is the Judge’s sentence upon everyone who is spiritually an adulterer due to seeking a relationship with Christ without first wrestling with the almighty conviction of God’s Law. They thus end with a look of religion, but remain bound to the old relation with their carnal, proud, heartless, loveless, humanistic belief system, per verse 2.]

Rom 7:6  But now we are delivered from the Law [freed from “the Law”—the satanically manipulated, abusive, impossible to obey, controlling version of God’s Law, our rebellious relation to God’s will and, through our natural, first birth, full of the world’s resistant, humanistic relation to His written Law], that being dead wherein we were held [we, in our fallen, rebellious state, our spirit that had been under the control of the accuser’s manipulations against God’s Law and Spirit, and creating in us a spirit loyal to Satan; our rebellion, bound and being slaughtered before the Law, and now delivered from Satan’s presence and power of self-indulgence and self-centeredness; we come under the control of the new presence of Jesus, His Spirit (see Psalm 139:7), and His holy power, self being slain by the vision of His self-sacrificing, spotless body]; that we should serve in newness of spirit [our new, regenerated spirit married to Christ’s holy Spirit (vs. 4)], and not in the oldness of the letter [now fully divorced from Satan’s dead spirit of rebellious humanism. We are delivered from the Law, yet we can keep the Law (“with the mind [understanding] I myself serve the Law of God”, vs. 25). The woman didn’t become dead to the law of marriage, her husband did. God ended his life, thus freeing her. When she remarries, she is right back to being under the law of marriage again, this time with a new Husband—the Spirit of Jesus, the church’s Wonderful Counselor and Comforter].

[Saul here finishes his chapter 7:2-6 introductory outline and he begins the details of his science of salvation.]

Rom 7:7  What shall we say then? Is the Law [of God] sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the Law [of God]: for I had not known lust, except the Law [of God] had said, Thou shalt not covet.

Rom 7:8  But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the Law [of God] sin was dead [exactly like “Where no law is, there is no transgression” (Rom. 4:15), and, “Sin is not imputed when there is no law.” (Rom. 5:13)].

Rom 7:9  For I was alive without the Law [of God] once: but when the commandment came [to my conscience], sin revived, and I died.

Rom 7:10  And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. [“For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” (Heb. 4:12).]

Rom 7:11  For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it [the commandment] slew me [my self-preserving measures for my comfortable living without the Law]. [Sin (and Satan) that were in Saul caused him to distort the aims and purposes of God in His Law and, therefore, to rebel against it. And because the righteousness of God and His Law had that amazing power over his self-confidence, and over his carnal hope and peace, Saul says…]

Rom 7:12  Wherefore the Law [of God] is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. [Saul is making his first step toward ultimate, total surrender.]

Rom 7:13  Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But [it was God making use of my condition of] sin, [so] that it might appear sin[ful], working death in me by [His commandment] which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. [God is righteous to use our sinfulness, and even the tempter himself, as His pawns (see 1Ki. 22:22; Dan. 4:35; Eph. 1:11), as He anciently used many enemies of Israel, including Nebuchadnezzar, “My servant” (Jer. 43:10), as His tools to destroy the incurably rebellious Jews and to purify the curable rebels. “If I whet My glittering sword, and Mine hand take hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to Mine enemies, and will reward them that hate Me.” (Deut. 32:41).]

Rom 7:14  For we know that the Law is spiritual [Gr. pneumatikos “ethereal”]: but I am carnal, sold under sin [and Satan].

Rom 7:15  For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate [Gr. miseō “detest”, “persecute”], that do I.

Rom 7:16  If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the Law that it is good. [Saul is not justifying himself. This is not him rationalizing away his culpability or criminality. When he consents to the Law, he is not flippantly assenting. His unbelieving heart is simply recognizing the much greater character of the Law. He is agreeing with the Law; he is unwittingly talking to the Law’s almighty Architect. Faith in Saul is struggling to be birthed. All that the determined, strong-minded, strong-willed Saul can do is to agree with God that his own corrupting, confusing, confounding, and grotesque nature from deep within his naturally, rebellious heart conceives a power that obstructs his best efforts to obey the Almighty. Saul consents that his old nature deserves to be sentenced to death.]

Rom 7:17  Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. [His realization is, “The Law is good”, “but sin…dwelleth in me”. But, again, this is not a flippant conclusion. Saul is wrestling with this, and determined to please God.]

Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh [Saul is learning to distinguish between his yearnings, “me”, and his yearnings’ enemy, “my flesh”. He is seeing the difference between the selfish flesh and his groaning for the selfless spirit. He is envisioning the possible lively, justified saint and the current reality of a dead, unconverted soul. Saul is bowing to the requirement of making distinction between God’s heretofore illusive spiritual power that could generate the energy and effort to serve the convicting Law of righteousness, and man’s normal serving the deadening law of empty religiosity, going through the religious motions, and keeping up with conflicting human moral norms for the sake of human approval and harmony],) (I know that in me) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

Rom 7:19  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.

Rom 7:20  Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin [and Satan] that dwelleth in me. [He is forced to admit that he’s not an overcoming child of God. All of his Pharisee membership amounts to nothing. All of his being a Jew by nature, gives him no extra power from above to keep God’s commandments.]

Rom 7:21  I find then a law[, that is, another powerful spirit dominating Saul], that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. [This wasn’t just a statement of intellectual discovery, but a statement of reality in life. To Saul, the Law was a living force from above in everyone who God was preparing for His kingdom.]

Rom 7:22  For I delight in the Law of God after the inward man: [It’s good that a sinner delights in God’s Law, but that’s not good enough. To be a victorious son of God there must be more than a delight in righteousness. There must be a new heart. Saul has a heart that has surrendered to, and delights in, the authoritative Law of the Schoolmaster, and assents to its goodness; but his heart has yet to surrender to the power of conviction and grace from Christ’s cross, per Galatians 3:23,24]              Rom 7:23  But I see another law in my members [another powerful, dominating spirit, undermining my determination to do right, and weakening my will to obey the Law of God], warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin [i.e. the other dominating spirit from the previous verses 14 and 17,] which is in my members.

Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death [to the rulership of sin and its attendant curse of God]? [By that helpless plea, surrender to Christ just happened in Saul. Saul made his first true prayer to God through the Minister of God’s Sanctuary. Saul’s cry into the dark was caught by Jesus and given to His Father. It was the first prayer from Saul that he made with all his heart, a true prayer of faith that went all the way to the ears of the Lord of sabaoth. For without the powerful faith of Jesus it is impossible to please God. The only Deliverer from sin was God through Christ.] 

Rom 7:25  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. [Wait a minute. Wait a minute!  What kind of a statement is this? What just happened?! Saul doesn’t say he is saved. But, Saul must be saved! He has peace with God! “Being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Rom. 5:1). But, how? Saul, I so identified with and with great assurance followed your desperate situation point by point when you couldn’t be what you wanted to be, expectantly awaiting the illusive mystery missing link for everyone’s transformation from the unsaved caveman existence to the saved and civilized sons of God! But you didn’t reveal your last step before having peace with God, the thing we all need most! The trail that was so plain just disappeared into the woods! How, Saul? How were you saved, so that I can do the same things and be saved, too? You jumped a giant chasm from verse 24 to verse 25, a living death to eternal life, without giving any details! Saul, I don’t see you doing any propitiatory act for your peace with God. Is this salvation without performing any sacrament? Is it a salvation without propitiating God or some other human work? Sudden conversion? Salvation out of the blue? Saul went from perfect disaster and years of failure to perfect solution and peace and joy. Saul, don’t leave my carnal, unbelieving mind hanging like this! Surely there is something I can do to help make salvation happen! Surely there’s something I’ve got to do, besides admitting to my total inability to be good, and seeking the face of God with all my heart? That’s too simple. It must be wrong. And I don’t like it. It makes me uncomfortable, and it offends me. It relies too much on God to save me and not enough on my trusty self. It requires everything of God, and not enough of me, for my transformation.

Saul’s victory comes from previously surrendering his self-will to the authority of the holy, just, and good Law of God, per verses 9 and 10, and now surrendering his heart to the mangled and Spiritless body of the Lamb of God, per verse 4.] So then with the mind [humbled, repentant, and, a mind fixated on the truth, after having taken the time to make honest analysis and assessment of his total lack in spiritual things, and now transformed by the new heaven-sent, powerful spirit of faith from the resurrected Spirit of Christ] I myself serve [Gr. douleuō “am enslaved to”] the Law of God [through the Spirit of Christ streaming from God’s Law, per verse 6]; but with the flesh [my prayer-less, thoughtless and unsurrendered reactions, that will return if ever or whenever I fall away from faith, (I serve)] the law of sin.

[Just as Saul distinguished between himself and his old, unresponsive flesh (Rom. 7:18), likewise he distinguished between himself and the Father’s power over him through Christ in him, his new, quickened spirit, the Spirit. Setting apart from himself both the spirit and the flesh, Jesus’ Spirit from above and Satan’s spirit from below, Saul acknowledged that he was only a pawn under the control of either of the two great powers contending for the supremacy of man. The new mind/spirit that enabled him to do the righteousness of God was not from himself, but an influencing power over his regenerated nature. He was no longer under the hopelessly enervating, listless Schoolmaster + self combo of constant failure, but under the energetic, freely obedient, Schoolmaster + Christ combo. His new nature was all heavenly—Christ’s righteousness—a robe sent from heaven, not a fiber of which was of any human devising. Saul’s experience here was simply putting into practice the example and lesson from Jesus’ discourse to His disciples just prior to His offering. “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in Me.” (John 15:4). “If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.” (John 15:7). “If ye love Me, keep My commandments. And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you for ever; even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him: but ye know Him; for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.” (John 14:15-18). “I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without Me ye can do nothing.” (John 15:5).

Jesus is and has always been the Spirit of life in the Law, the Intercessor of His Father’s Law, that we by Him might live the truth, being that each word is pure and precious we might live by every word of it. As Jesus is the Truth, the Word of God, He is the “word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it” (Isa. 30:21). As Joshua led the children of Israel into the land of promise, Jesus is the Bishop of our souls who will guide His sheep into all truth (see 1Pet. 2:25). “Divested of the personality of humanity and independent thereof” (14MR 23.3), Jesus is the Voice from the Law, so that “when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee” (Prov. 6:22). Jesus is the true Shepherd to the sheep who discern His voice (see John 10:4,5), who are His called and chosen and faithful (see Rev. 17:14). Jesus is “the faithful and true witness” (Rev. 3:14), and His faithful testimony is “the Spirit of prophecy” (Rev. 19:10).

Saul, having submitted to the Law of God and then to the grace of Christ, and the Spirit of Christ now controlling his heart and will and thoughts as the life-giving “Spirit [of the Law]” (2Cor. 3:6, cf vs. 3; Luke 24:32,27), a new relation to the righteousness of the Law, the righteousness of God, was born in him. “O how love I Thy Law! It is my meditation all the day.” (Ps. 119:97). We happily, naturally, practice behaviors that our friends have. We love those practices and we do them well with exactness and carefulness and precision. Likewise, we naturally avoid practices that our friends hate, and if forced to do them we do them poorly, begrudgingly, and inefficiently.

Within the confines of the Law and the Spirit, and under His influence Saul comprehends the full gospel and can elucidate the science of salvation. Saul’s great fulfillment comes from obedience to God and His Law as Christ uses the Law to subdue his flesh. But Saul’s great challenge to obedience remains his flesh, if it stops being subdued by the Law.]

Rom 8:1  There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit [that is, the Spirit of Christ giving Saul the faith of Christ. Christ’s presence is creating His Spirit in Saul. This faithful following after the Spirit of Christ comes by surrendering to the Father’s condemning Law and to Christ’s gracious, expired body. (Revelation 5:6 shows the Lamb of God who had “poured out His soul unto [an infinite] death” (Isa. 53:12), and then seven weeks later poured out His heavenly Spirit from His heavenly throne. This Law and cross double presentation removed Saul’s old spiritual paradigm that kept him under the power of his flesh, bringing him to a new relation to God and the openness to Him in Romans 7:25. now God through His only begotten Son was Saul’s authority. And Saul’s birth pangs to get to the new authority of God follows the same template as the Jews’ of Jeremiah 30 and 31, by which the new covenant was promised to all who would surrender. “And she being with Child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered…. And she brought forth a man Child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron.” (Rev. 12:2,5).

By a faith gestating under months of God’s condemning authority, Saul saw Christ and Him crucified, and he bowed his will completely. Saul received the Lamb’s eternal death dispensed in His eternal life that came with His own eternal Spirit that was eternally streaming from His infinitely purified body. In Romans 7:25 Saul received the bright red Heifer turned ashen, “the Beloved” “made to be sin for us”, and physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually cut off by His Father and children. Saul saw that by being made to be sin, Jesus was for ever “made an High Priest” “for sin” (Eph. 1:6; 2Cor. 5:19; Heb. 6:20, cf Heb. 7:28; Rom. 8:3) following the demise of the Aaronic high priesthood (see Num. 19:3; 20:26-28). Saul saw how firmly God established His promised redemption by an oath. “The LORD hath sworn, and will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.” (Ps. 110:4). “The word of the oath, which was since the Law, maketh the Son [a High Priest], who is consecrated for evermore” (Heb. 7:28). Now the Son “abideth a Priest continually” (Heb. 7:3), “He ever liveth to make intercession for” us (vs. 25). Since the beginning, interceding for us is all that Jesus has ever lived for].

Rom 8:2  For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus [Christ’s greatly needed and desired, dominating Spirit, which Saul found in the Law and the cross, anointed him to apostleship. “Thou shalt stand before Me: and…be as My mouth” (Jer. 15:19)] hath made me free [“delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God” (vs. 21), “delivered from [our rebellious relation to] the Law [the overpowering servitude to uncleanness and its compounded, corrupting outcome of “iniquity unto iniquity” (Rom. 6:19)], that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter” (Rom. 7:6). “Then are the children free” (Matt. 17:26), so that “then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free” (Gal. 4:31)] from the [previously dominating] law of sin and death [and from a life devoid of the divine nature of Christ. “He led captivity captive” (Eph. 4:8). Saul is now married to a better Law. He is married to a Law other than the God’s Law without His reconciled Spirit through His approved Propitiator and Mediator. Saul is married to the Law of faith coming from the Spirit of Jesus in His Ten Commandments, per Romans 7:4, 25. “The Law” (Rom. 7:9, cf vs. 10,13), “The Law [of death]”, which is “the strength of sin” (1Cor. 15:56), has transformed into “Thy Law” (Ps. 119:97), “Thy [living] Law”; and Saul is able to take “heed thereto” (Ps. 119:9). After wrestling so long and hard for “obedience unto [Gr. ‘leading to’] righteousness [as opposed to “sin unto (‘leading to’) death” (Rom. 6;16)], Saul finally has the power to obey; and he rejoices in it. He is married to the original Law of heaven that existed before sin was born in the highest covering cherub. Saul is married to the everlasting covenant, an everlasting Saviour and an everlasting science of extracting grace from the Law by abiding in the distilling, dynamic righteousness of Christ (see Deuteronomy 32:13).]

Rom 8:3  For what the [stone] Law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh [without God’s Spirit], God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh [like our flesh, weakened by thousands of years of sin], and for sin [sin was in the crosshairs as His target], [Jesus] condemned sin [while] in the [(His own weakened)] flesh: [leaving us an example that we should walk in His steps]

Rom 8:4  That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh[, who distain pleasing self in any way], but after the Spirit [of Christ, whose communion and refreshing imbues the soul with power from on high for divinely backed, redoubled effort that overcomes sin. “He shall save His people from their sins.” (Matt. 1:21)].

Rom 8:5  For they that are after the flesh[, those who work for righteousness from their own resources, and apart from the Spirit of Christ,] do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit [who work not of their own resources, but who have wrestled with the Law until they surrendered to its infinitely high and ominous claims upon rebels, and who abide humbled, repentant, trusting in Christ for His power in them to do right—they think of, they entertain, they love] the things of the Spirit[, the things of Christ].

Rom 8:6  For to be carnally minded [to live without the Law and never need repentance] is death; but to be spiritually minded [in the communion of the Holy Ghost, them dwelling in Christ and Christ dwelling in them, through bowing to His Father’s powerful condemnation, and then trusting in Christ’s powerful justification,] is life and peace.

Rom 8:7  Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the Law of God, neither indeed can be. [Through faith the spiritually minded don’t make void the Law of God. All who have bowed to His Law and who have trust in His Son are the only ones on earth who establish God’s Law.]

Rom 8:8  So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. [Without faith to come to God through His Son it is impossible to please the Father. “If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.” (Heb. 12:7,8). The carnally minded have no part with Christ.]

Rom 8:9  But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His. [This scripture defines “the Spirit” as “the SPIRIT of your Father” (Matt. 10:20) and “the Spirit of His Son” (Gal. 4:6) and our adopted spirit “crying, Abba, Father.” (Rom. 8:15, cf 1Cor. 2:11). Therefore, we can deduce: SPIRIT + Spirit + spirit = the “one Spirit” (Eph. 4:4) of the Bible.]

Rom 8:10  And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness [To be in the Spirit is to be in Christ (See Jer. 15:19;Rev. 1:10-13). The Spirit in us is Christ in us, our hope of glory. Christ is the Spirit. “…which vail is done away in [Jesus] Christ. But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the vail is upon their heart. Nevertheless when it shall turn to the Lord [Jesus], the vail shall be taken away. Now the Lord [Jesus] is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord [Jesus] is, there is liberty. But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord [Jesus], are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord [Jesus].... But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of [Jesus] Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.” (2Cor. 3:14-18; 4:3,4).

If the Spirit of Christ is in us, we are dead, our bodies are dead to sin, but we have life and our spirits. Receiving His Spirit, we are alive to righteousness].

Rom 8:11  But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you. [“God is a Spirit.” (John 4:24). Made in God’s image, we have a spirit as God has a Spirit. “For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the SPIRIT of God.” (1Cor. 2:11).]

Rom 8:12  Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.

Rom 8:13  For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.

Rom 8:14  For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.

Rom 8:15  For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.

Rom 8:16  The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:…

 [“For if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things. Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence toward God.… And he that keepeth His commandments dwelleth in Him, and He in him. And hereby we know that He abideth in us, by the Spirit which He hath given us.” (1Jn. 3:20,21,24).

By His SPIRIT God abides in “the Spirit of His Son” (Gal. 4:6). And by His Spirit Christ abides in us. The SPIRIT of the Father imbues the Son, for Christ does nothing of Himself. Thus the Father and Son abide in us by Their one united Spirit, “the Spirit”.]

Rom 8:23  And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body. [The unconverted need the redemption of their spirit. But all who have already received that redemption, still await the end of redemption, the redemption of their body, to wholly remove the presence and pull of sin in their members, when He will change their vile bodies to be fashioned like His own glorious, /

Rom 8:24  For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?

Rom 8:25  But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.

Rom 8:26  Likewise the Spirit [quickening our spirit] also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the [tandem Spirit + spirit] itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. [“The Lord is that Spirit” (2Cor. 3:17) who lives ever to make intercession for us before God and in His Law. The Lord gives us the groanings which we cannot of ourselves generate. Therefore, we, and not a third person of the Godhead, possess those groanings, per verse 23, while we cry, “Abba, Father” (Rom. 8:15), while Jesus within us keeps our hearts and minds as we pray to the Father and study His Law.]

Rom 8:27  And He that searcheth the hearts [(God)] knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit [(Christ in us)], because He maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God. [The word of God, the great Judge, is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and discerns the honesty or pretense of our thoughts and intents. And through the intercession of Christ all who bowed before the condemnation of God’s Law trusting only in the Saviour receive from Him thoughts and intents of the heart that operate according to the will of God. Everyone else God doesn’t hear, per Prov. 28:9]…

Rom 8:33  Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth.

Rom 8:34  Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.

Rom 8:35  Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?…

Rom 8:37  Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us.

Rom 8:38  For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,

Rom 8:39  Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.