Romans 7:1–6 (ESV) —
1 Or 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? 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. 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.
NOTE: The analogy is not perfect, but the point is the death annuls a contract. In this case the believer has died to the law (and sin). The believer is now free from the law and the corresponding impact of the flesh which was aroused by the law. We do not have to obey the flesh. We died spiritually to the law and the flesh. We are free to serve God in a new way outside of the way of the written code.
The above paragraph is the truth. The difficulty is living it out. What does it mean to live free of the law if we still have the sinful flesh within us? I don't know the answer, but I do know that I have the ability to try now, which I never had before. And if that is all I can do, I will do at least that much.
PONDER:
Do I even try to live according to the Holy Spirit? Has anything changed within me?
PRAYER: Father, continue to teach me what this means and how to live it out. I fail in many ways, but I want to succeed and I want to honor you with my life.
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