Why Can't I Thrive?

Romans 7 is starting to make more sense in the light of living from the heart vs. living from the intellect. I am seeking to understand what part of me “died” in verse 9. There seems to be a principle of mutual exclusivity about which can be alive within me – sin or “me”. The catalyst that creates this situation is the presence of the Law.

For many, the logical conclusion to assume is that we should remove the catalyst so we will not experience the problem. But that is never considered as an option by Paul or any other Biblical writers. Because of that I think it is safe to assume that it is not a viable option but a deception promoted by the enemy of God. Since the Law is simply a description of God's character, to get rid of the presence of the Law is to try to get rid of God from our lives which is exactly what Satan set out to do from the very beginning and what the whole War is all about. Satan wants to replace God on the throne of the universe and control everyone according to his own destructive, selfish ways. We can already see the results of that arrangement all through the world, so it makes no sense to purport that the solution to our problem with sin is to avoid the Law. To avoid the Law of God is to avoid God who is the only one who can save us.

I am still pondering and praying about the identity of the “I” that died when the commandment came in referred to in verse 9. He says that he was once alive until the Law showed up. I must remember that this is written in the context of addressing the group of people who “know the Law” in 7:1. The word translated “know” is used in many ways in the original and one of those ways is the “know” that a man and woman share in the deepest level of intimacy together. Paul, in the first part of this chapter talks about intimacy and even arousal with the results of producing offspring, both because of intimacy with our “flesh” or “intimacy” with the risen Christ.

What is it within me, what part of me is “alive” when intimacy is involved? I am starting to believe that Paul is referring to that part of me in my spirit at the heart level where I experience the liberating sense of freedom, joy and aliveness. If that is true, how does that apply when Paul says he “was once alive apart from the Law”? (v. 9) It seems that Paul may be thinking back to when he was younger and before he got heavily involved in the religious training that ended in him becoming a zealous Pharisee and vicious persecutor of the people who loved Jesus. He remembers when his spirit was more free and his heart felt more alive, maybe as a child. At that time his ignorance of “the Law”, due to simply being a younger and not yet trained in the Law, left him free to enjoy life and feel free and happy as a child should. But “when the commandment came, sin became alive” and he died – that is, his free spirit and relish for life were lost when he began to focus on keeping the Law in order to be right with God.

He goes on to emphasize very strongly that the problem in this situation (in which all of us legalistic types find ourselves) is not the Law itself.

I can easily imagine the natural reaction of a person who “knows the Law” would have upon reading this letter to them from Paul for the first time. They would have a natural defensiveness of their position on how to properly live the Christian life through emphasis on obedience and they would feel very suspicious of what Paul is trying to convey here. They would feel that Paul is trying to attack the idea of obedience and diminish its importance and thereby imply that the problem is coming from the Law. They would even go so far as to accuse him of implying that the Law is the cause of the struggle in their life. This is typical thinking for a person trained in legalism (typical religion) which a great many of us have been, even many who want nothing to do with the church anymore. The underlying problem is that we still have the false ideas about salvation embedded in our brains causing us to feel, like Paul, that the most important part of us has died.

Unfortunately, in pulling away from the church, from religion and from God, what we are really saying is that the problem is “the Law”. We assume that if we can get far enough away from the condemning presence of the Law that we will be able to feel alive again. But there is a very fundamental flaw in that thinking. Because the Law, though it makes us feel very condemned, is not our real problem even though it very much feels like it. And when we pull away from proximity to the Law by trying to disattach ourselves from everything that reminds us of it, we end up also pulling away from the only real Source of life itself. If one stops to think about it, pulling away from the Source of life is not a way to begin feeling more alive again.

But a real problem begins to emerge when I think about it in this way. If the Law makes me feel condemned but the Law is simply a description of God's character, then I will logically assume that God is the one condemning me. But that is not actually true at all. Jesus stated unequivocally that He did not come into the world to condemn but to save. (see John 3) And Jesus and the Father God are not different in any way as far as their attitude toward us. So it seems at first to be an irreconcilable dichotomy that I feel condemned by the Law which is a description of God but it is not true that God is the source of my condemnation.

This is exactly the deception that Paul refers to in verse 11. He is exposing the real source of our problem and unmasking the deception under which we have been held in legalism. Sin – whatever that is – is the culprit that caused me to feel like my spirit died, my sense of freedom and aliveness that God designed all of us to enjoy and that we sometimes had glimpses of when we were young. It is sin that hijacked my heart and replaced it with a hard heart and a contaminated, perverted spirit. It is sin, not the Law of God, that is doing all the damage in my soul. But because it deceptively did it through my intimacy with the Law (and through abusive people claiming to know the Law) I am led to believe that it was the Law doing all this to me.

This condition is called living in the flesh. (v. 14) When in this condition we find ourselves in slavery, in bondage to sin that is inescapable. We mistakenly believe that we can figure out a way to escape this slavery and try all sorts of schemes to revive our heart and feel alive again. But every attempt is doomed to failure because we simply do not have the wherewithal to save ourself. We are under a supernatural slave-master who never allows his slaves to escape and viciously punishes those who attempt to do so.

The rest of chapter 7 is a detailed description of what is looks like to try to save myself while my heart and spirit are hijacked by sin. I want to be alive, I want to feel good again, and those very desires demonstrate that I believe the Law is right and true. After all, the Law is simply a description of the underlying principles that must be in place to thrive and feel fully alive. But we cannot get there from here by trying to keep the Law directly because our heart is still hijacked. The only way to feel alive and free is to live from our heart as we are designed to live. But when our heart is under the control of selfishness (the core essence of sin) it is “dead”, and it is impossible to capture that sense of freedom and joy that are the only things that will satisfy the deepest cravings of our soul. We find ourselves hopelessly caught in this awful trap and, like Paul, if we are honest about our real feelings we are ready to exclaim with him, “Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?” (v. 24)

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