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As I look over the context of this chapter and then the larger context back into the last chapter I see a circle being closed in this verse. Paul is addressing those who have been brought up to trust in religion and rule-keeping and external performance for salvation just like he had been, These kind of people would be very easy to shut down mentally if one tries to tell them they are slaves – that would be so offensive to them they would immediately dismiss it as ludicrous. Instead, Paul uses the marriage analogy which is much more interesting to them, particularly since they have spent years arguing about the technicalities of valid reasons for divorce.
After carefully drawing in their attention and making some very unexpected declarations in that context, he goes on to relate his own experience and feelings as one who has a very similar experience to theirs. He knows what it feels like to grow up legalist and he also knows the emotions and frustrations of trying to make the transition to being a real Christian from that beginning. The assumptions and beliefs deeply embedded in the mind and heart of one who has been brought up in a strict, conservative religion have a strong influence over one's thinking even after they accept becoming a new Christian and are converted, at least as much as they can be externally, to following the teachings of Jesus.
That is just where much of the problem lies, however. Many people, even today, have become converted to “believing” and following the teachings of Jesus but they have little heart connection with Him. This is not to accuse or condemn them (I am one of them myself) but is simply to point out their condition and where they are in their journey. For a person to switch from one set of beliefs to another really involves very little heart work, though there may be initially an awakening that prompts them to make the switch at first. This is why so many people describe their Christian experience by retelling the story of their conversion over and over again but do not have a great deal to say about anything new and fresh flowing out of their heart. It is because their heart has again gone into hiding and the head, or left brain, has again taken the control (which is what they have always been taught to do); there is little to no growth in emotional maturity and intimate bonding to Jesus at the personal level.
Throughout the rest of this chapter Paul describes the affects this kind of living has on the religious experience. In one word it could be described as extremely frustrating. And it is perfectly normal to be frustrated, for the left brain was never designed to perform the functions that the right brain (the heart) was created to do. Anytime something or someone is expected to perform in a way they were not designed for there will always be the potential for a lot of frustration. Paul experienced this frustration to the point of crying out in total desperation by the end of the chapter for someone to deliver him or he will die. If we want to get un-stuck in our own experience we too will need to come to the point of frustration that is great enough to cause us to cry out in helplessness and desperation for supernatural intervention. We have to come to the point of realization that our methods, beliefs and attempts to be righteous, impress or influence God, or whatever other angle we are trying to leverage with Him are completely ineffective at doing anything for our long-term salvation. Our only hope is to completely give up on our form of religion and throw ourselves totally on the mercy of God to save us.
In this chapter I also see Paul doing something very interesting and important in the area of how our brain functions. While the left brain learns by words, reading, intellectual processing etc., the control center of our brain – the right side – cannot learn by those means. The right brain assimilates and learns how to act and respond to situations primarily by imitation, stories and pictures that evoke emotion, and also music. As I look at this chapter it suddenly occurs to me that Paul is taking these left brain-dominant people on a track they are not used to following by relating his own story. He is sharing his emotions (right brain) of what it feels like to be a frustrated Christian just like they are, and then in the story he relates to the intensity of their own emotional frustration that they have likely been suppressing for most of their life in their attempts to live out a left brain dominant religious experience. Joining them in their own emotions, Paul is drawing them out as he identifies with their feelings. This is the most effective way to help someone find a resolution to an emotional sand-trap. They need someone to join them in their predicament and then show them how to return to peace and joy since they have never “learned” with their right brain how to get out of that problem. Paul is joining them in their despair, expressing it more eloquently than they themselves have ever done, and then going on in chapter 8 to “show” them how to return to joy in the Holy Spirit.
Another thing I would like to notice in the text from the beginning of this post is the idea implied in the word “bondage”. The base of that word is “bond”, which alerts me to the two kinds of bonds that all of us experience and which binds us to each other and to God. There are two basic categories of bonds – fear bonds and love bonds. Much of which is passed off as love bonds are only fear bonds in disguise parading as love. These bonds are linked to the deepest levels of our brains and influence nearly everything we do, think, feel and become. I have come to realize some time ago that fear has been substituted for love in most religion and has come to be accepted as the correct motivation for linking us to God. That is one of the worst lies of the enemy which keeps us deceived and trapped in the very frustrations that Paul is describing in this chapter. God is not interested in service from fear, force or intimidation; there is no love or pleasure in that kind of bonding. We cannot “please” God (bring pleasure to His heart, a spontaneous smile to His face) by fear-motivated performance of duty or any other kind of fear-based activity or beliefs. This is a very useful filter that I have used many times to expose problems in otherwise very correct-sounding presentations of “truth”. When I begin to detect elements of fear-motivation as a means of manipulation by the presenter I immediately feel red flags going up and become quite skeptical of the validity of the message, no matter how perfectly substantiated it may be with proof-texts and sound, logical arguments.
Recently I wrote about the Law being an external description of the internal essence of God. Being in the external realm the Law is used as a communication tool to tell us the truth about who God is. But because it is in the external realm it also lacks the power and influence to draw us into a saving relationship with God. In fact, as Paul points out in this chapter, it appears to have almost the opposite effect when it comes in proximity to sin. Sin uses the presence of the Law to trigger hidden explosives in our flesh that cause us to react in sinful ways even when our mind knows better. This seems to be the main source feeding the frustration described in this chapter.
But I look at this verse and question why Paul says that the Law is spiritual. I think that maybe it would be helpful to say that the Law is describing something/Someone that is spiritual – maybe that is what the meaning is here. I'm sure there are a lot of other things to draw from this, but that seems to make sense to me right now.
The circle that I see Paul bringing back to close in this verse is the idea of slavery and being sold into bondage. In the previous chapter he spent a great deal of time addressing the other group from chapter 1 while the chapter 2 group may have felt a bit of disdain and distance from their predicament. The Jews particularly were very sensitive and strongly reactive about any notion of them being in slavery. When Jesus implied that the Jews needed freedom from slavery they reacted very violently, protesting that they needed no such deliverance. They answered Him, "We are Abraham's descendants and have never yet been enslaved to anyone; how is it that You say, 'You will become free'?" (John 8:33)
But I see in this verse in Romans Paul again putting his finger on the real underlying problem that every human being cannot escape. These people who find themselves married to the wrong “husband” and living in a stern, straining religious life are in fact at the roots no different that the other group of open sinners who more easily recognize their condition of enslavement. Paul personalizes it by sharing his own experience of transition through this same phase of growth and explains that as long as we are living in the flesh, whether we are open sinners or very good-looking religionists, we are in the same quandary of being in slavery, sold into bondage to sin. The key ingredient that is common in this bondage is the fear-bonds that hold both groups tightly in the flesh. Though the external symptoms may look radically different, the internal problem is the same. As long as our hearts look at God through the filters of fear we will remain stuck in the flesh, sold into bondage to sin.
That is the problem with our relationship to the Law. The reason that the Law seemingly activates the worst in us instead of causing us to love God and come to Him is because we see it (and Him) through the eyes of fear to some degree or another. This is involved in creating the two main groups that Paul is addressing in this book. The first group reacts in fear by openly rebelling against their skewed picture of God and plunging into all sorts of sin and self-indulgence to try to find satisfaction for their emptiness. The religious “right” take a different tack, but because they are still viewing God through eyes of fear they plunge into a life of attempted obedience, appeasement, manipulation or even Spirit worship in their attempt to get themselves saved. But because their hearts and minds are still viewing God through distortions and lies of the Accuser they have the underlying motive of fear which always brings torment to their hearts in one way or another.
There is only one way to enter into salvation and it does not use fear to bond us to God and to each other. God is love, and His Son Jesus is a perfect reflection and demonstration of that love. That is why the only way to heaven and to God is through Jesus. We must be swallowed up in that love and flushed clean of all the fear and its associated torment. Ultimately the great divide will not be drawn between those who performed well and those who didn't, but between those who have allowed love to suck them up into its vortex of passion leaving everything else behind, and those who cling to their fears and reject the notion of love being enough.
Father, this is too big for me to wrap my mind around. Please capture my heart, my affections and suck me up into the passion that You have for me. Make me an instrument of influence, and example of Your transforming grace and the power of Your love today. Live in my heart and make these words a reality in my life.
