1 Is it not clear, my brothers (I am using an argument to those who have knowledge of the law), that the law has power over a man as long as he is living?
For the rule is a light, and the teaching a shining light; and the guiding words of training are the way of life.
Or are you without the knowledge that all we who had baptism into Christ Jesus, had baptism into his death?
But now we are free from the law, having been made dead to that which had power over us; so that we are servants in the new way of the spirit, not in the old way of the letter.
For I have a desire to take on myself the curse for my brothers, my family in the flesh:
Am I talking as a man? does not the law say the same?
Say, you whose desire it is to be under the law, do you not give ear to the law?
You may be certain, my brothers, that it has frequently been in my mind to come to you (but till now I was kept from it), so that I might have some fruit from you in the same way as I have had it from the other nations.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Romans 7
Commentary on Romans 7 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 7
We may observe in this chapter,
Rom 7:1-6
Among other arguments used in the foregoing chapter to persuade us against sin, and to holiness, this was one (v. 14), that we are not under the law; and this argument is here further insisted upon and explained (v. 6): We are delivered from the law. What is meant by this? And how is it an argument why sin should not reign over us, and why we should walk in newness of life?
Rom 7:7-14
To what he had said in the former paragraph, the apostle here raises an objection, which he answers very fully: What shall we say then? Is the law sin? When he had been speaking of the dominion of sin, he had said so much of the influence of the law as a covenant upon that dominion that it might easily be misinterpreted as a reflection upon the law, to prevent which he shows from his own experience the great excellency and usefulness of the law, not as a covenant, but as a guide; and further discovers how sin took occasion by the commandment. Observe in particular,
Rom 7:14-25
Here is a description of the conflict between grace and corruption in the heart, between the law of God and the law of sin. And it is applicable two ways:-