Condemnation Reversed

For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (Romans 8:3-4)

And He said to him, "'YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.' "This is the great and foremost commandment. "The second is like it, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' "On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40)

I think I am starting to see even more the relationship between two of the questions I have been dwelling on for the past few days: “What did God do that the Law could not do?”, and “What does it mean that He condemned sin in the flesh?”

The Law (10 commandments) describes in very sparse terms what a life would look like if one had love. That makes sense since it is a description of God's character and God is love. However, the Law cannot awaken or create love in me, especially since my perception of the Law is skewed through the distorting lens of my sinful flesh. What awakens within me under these conditions is condemnation and fear. Fear is the primary element of the enemy's kingdom and condemnation is one of his favorite weapons against us. Condemnation causes debilitation, reduction in energy and hope, torment and ultimately our demise. It severely limits my ability to thrive and deprives me of vital sources of life which progressively reduces my ability to function. It increasingly fills my heart with fear, dread and torture of soul, discouraging me and drawing away my life forces, both mental and physical. Condemnation tends toward and ultimately takes me to death.

The Law has no ability to stop this process; in fact, it is unintentionally an accomplice in this process through the deceptiveness and distortions of sin living in my flesh. I will never be free from this distorting lens of sinful flesh for as long as I live in this present world, but there is a provision supplied whereby I do not have to remain in this debilitating condition of slavery to sin.

So here is what I see that God did that the Law could not do. He introduced a new element into the mix by means of the life and death of Jesus Christ whereby my sinful flesh becomes the object of debilitation instead of my heart. He also empowers me by means of the indwelling presence of Jesus to receive the new element of selfless love. The presence and outworking of this supernatural love from my heart (the base of operations for my life where Jesus takes up residence) becomes the fulfilling of the requirements of the Law.

Love now becomes the motive for my life that displaces fear as my driving force. My relationships shift from being fear-bonded to being love-bonded. But another important thing begins to happen. By taking on the likeness of sinful flesh and from that vantage point, Jesus turned the debilitating effects of condemnation against the flesh instead of against my heart as indwelling sin has always done. In this new condition the indwelling Christ within me continues to introduce love, assurance, peace and all the other characteristics of heaven as He fulfills the requirements of the Law from His vantage place of living within my heart. And the effects of these new emotions and motivations becomes just as debilitating and disruptive to the man of sin in my flesh as the effects of condemnation had previously been on my heart from the working of sin in my flesh and mind. Sin in the flesh is now the recipient of condemnation instead of my heart.

The war is not over however. Sin is still very present and persistent in my flesh and it will not be uprooted until at least the Second Coming. It is still quite capable at any time of taking over control of my life again at any point in time should it be able to out-maneuver or deceive my will into accepting its suggestions. Then it will immediately commandeer my life and quickly move to try to undo all the positive progress that Jesus has worked to accomplish in my heart and mind. It will then impose an immense load of guilt and condemnation onto my heart as a result of the very things it has caused me to do through its suggestions in an attempt to regain its stranglehold over my heart and try to convince me that this is my true identity. It will attempt to throw me into feelings of hopelessness and despair and cause me to surrender complete control of my life back to my flesh and the familiar depression and darkness that have so long been my existence. It will fill me with fear and shame and insist that Jesus does not live in my heart and will not accept me back or forgive me. It will point me to the Law again through its distorting lens and declare that as a sinner my only option is to live in condemnation and fear and that there is no realistic alternative except to find as much pleasure from other sources as I can.

This is where the left brain can be most helpful when the right brain is overcome with negative emotions and lies about reality. If the mind (left brain intellect) has been filled with the truth about God and now fixes its attention on the promises and Word of God in spite of all the lying feelings in our emotional being, then the mind can take control of the will in spite of our overwhelmed feelings and choose to believe God's words. I can lay hold on God's forgiveness by blind faith and based on God's Word alone claim the reality of God's presence even though I may not be able to sense it. The healing life of God will then begin to dispel the clouds of deception that fill my heart and reveal that Jesus has not really left my heart after all, that He was only hidden from view by the cloud of condemnation imposed over Him by the lies from my sinful flesh.

The Word of God brought into the mind will act as a light in the darkness of our emotions and we can again see that our faith was not without reward. We can choose to receive repentance which is awakened within us by dwelling on the kindness and goodness of God. (Rom. 2:4) Repentance will open the door for the healing love of Jesus to be unleashed in our heart re-awakening our emotions of love and gratitude and reigniting the fire of God's passion in our life which is our vital connection for thriving.

Jesus acts like a mirror in our heart that catches the broadcasting beam of condemnation from our flesh and beams it right back at the flesh instead of allowing it to wreak its damage in our heart. With Jesus active and alive in our hearts the flesh is kept at bay and contained so that the new motivations of selfless love, praise and gratitude can become the well-spring from which a new life of glorifying God will begin to prosper “so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” (Romans 8:4)

(next in series)

The Law and the Sarx

I have sensed for a long time that there is at least a hint of what our original function was before the fall in the descriptions given in Romans 7 & 8. I am quite certain that I do not have enough wisdom to uncover completely what that looked like and I suspect no human may have access to that much insight, I'm not sure. But I think there may be enough clues still in place, pieces of broken “machinery”, misapplied parts of our internal makeup, that with some curiosity and a willingness to listen to the Spirit of the One who originally designed us that we might get some idea of what we might have looked like internally before sin messed up our wiring.

The reason I say this is because repeatedly the Bible refers to the Law as something that is good, that reflects God's character and that there is something inside of us that seems designed to want to align ourselves with it. I believe that is the remnants of our original design and function still in place that is no longer usable in the way it was before the fall of humans into sin. But the very existence of an innate desire to want to be in harmony with the Law and with God was certainly part of humanities original natural design.

What I have wondered for a long time is, “How did the 'flesh' function before sin hijacked it?” I know from this side of the fall that the flesh will not be salvageable, though I also believe that we will get a replacement body for our literal fleshly bodies at the Second Coming of Jesus that is far superior than what we now have. But is that new body going to be just like the one Adam started out with or will it be a step up from that, an improved version?

I don't think it is a safe assumption to believe that Adam's pre-sin body was just the same as ours. There is strong evidence that his original body was clothed with light and he very well may have had powers and functionality that we would now consider supernatural. But on the other hand, maybe his body was version 1.01 of the potential that it could have become if he had remained true and loyal to God instead of swallowing the fatal lies from the serpent. I use the word “body” somewhat loosely because I mean all his mental and spiritual faculties as included.

I went back and listened to a talk by Jim Wilder yesterday about the “sarx” because I remembered that he had some very helpful insights on this and I had not listened to it for a long time. I was nearly overwhelmed by the time I finished listening to it because it was so directly relevant to where my study is right now. In fact, near the end of his talk he read all of the verses I am now studying using language that shed a great deal of light on this issue. He spent the whole study explaining the “sarx”, which is the Greek word translated into the word flesh in this passage and he showed how we received it in the first place. He gives it the descriptive name of “picker” to help understand its misfunction in our lives. I would highly recommend listening to it, even several times, or purchasing a copy of it online. He also has other talks on this subject that are extremely helpful as well in his Kingdom Munchies Series.

I cannot recall anyone ever talking about what possibly the legitimate function of our flesh might have been before the fall. But it seems that it has possibly exploited something in our original wiring that was used to keep us in harmony with the Law/character of our Creator. Something in connection with our will and our safeguarding, virus protection software that we were created with must have in some way relied on a connection to the Law to keep us in perfect synchronization with God and His perfect will.

As I thought about this this morning the idea came to me that everything in God's creation is designed to operate on the circuit principle. The very essence of love, which is the most complete description of God, is other-centeredness, selflessness and service for the good and benefit of others. All of creation was designed using this template and as long as we are in synchronization with that we thrive and experience peace and joy and satisfaction and fulfillment.

Sin has altered and attempted to reverse the circuit model and inserts a virus into our soul that causes us to believe that satisfaction and happiness will be found in selfishness, sucking life from others to nurture ourselves, making our primary focus our own needs and cravings, and helping others only as a means of getting something in return. It demands that life for ourselves can only be found by hoarding it, extracting it from wherever we can find it, and focusing first on our own satisfaction and happiness.

Maybe this gives me another clue as to how the Law originally fit into our design. If inverted religion causes a person to try to be good and righteous by directly focusing on the Law and attempting to keep it perfectly in order to impress and influence God to “save” them, they are attempting to operate the circuit of life in reverse. That might imply that before the fall the Law was used in an opposite function from what it is in dysfunctional religion today.

In my simplistic thinking I try to picture the mind/body/spirit setup as various compartments or functions with unique relationships to each other. Some time ago I posted a picture diagram of the soul that attempted to illustrate this. What I am now thinking is how the direction of flow in that circuit must have been affected by the entrance of sin which introduced the “selfishness factor” and caused the whole system to seriously malfunction in all sorts of unexpected ways. But where was the Law in the original design? Since it is good and is not dispensed with or set aside in salvation, how are we to relate to it in returning to our original schematic?

The flesh, or sarx, seems to have usurped the function of the Law from our original design. Or maybe it was inserted into our system between our mind, or heart, and the Law that caused a permanent distortion effect. However it happened, part of the problem is found in the various descriptions found all through Romans of those who are trying to serve God by a direct and primary focus on keeping the Law. But because of the presence of the sarx functioning in our life, that is not possible for anyone after the fall. But what I wonder is, was it even possible before the fall? Or is at least part of the problem the reversal of the direction of flow in the circuit?

I believe there was obviously an important function for the Law in our circuit before the fall. But it fit in so seamlessly that it was hardly recognizable. In a properly functioning circuit with the direction of flow in the proper orientation, the Law, it seems, would act more as a subconscious resource for the rest of our system. Or maybe it was accessed externally somehow through an internal portal or connection point so it could be used as sort of a data bank for our virus software to rely upon. In this original setup the Law was not the object of our primary attention but was a subconscious resource that supplied us the protection we needed to stay in synchronization with God's heart and character.

This concept seems to make a lot of sense since the whole process of salvation is God's working to restore us to our original design and function. And one of the most important procedures in the plan of salvation is where God writes His Law into our hearts. Evidently He is in the process of getting the pieces back into proper relationship inside of us, though that may not be all that is involved. In addition, the direction of the circuit must also be returned to its correct orientation or the circuit will still malfunction.

It is not completely clear in my mind yet, but it seems that the correct orientation and direction of flow might be something along this line.

Our primary attention – where we focus our headlight so to speak – is on the spirit part of our makeup with particular attention to listening to and synchronizing with the Spirit of God that keeps us in tune with His heart and feelings and passion.

This becomes our primary source of power that we depend on to satisfy all of our emptiness, cravings and needs for strength.

This primarily engages our right brain which is the control center of our whole being. However at the same time our left brain must not be ignored or sidelined completely, though it should be reset to remain in proper relationship with our right brain (which I believe is also referred to as our heart).

This sets up a condition or orientation in us where we can begin to really live from our hearts instead of relying on our head knowledge to be the control center for our daily life. With our heart in constant communication with the Spirit of God and being empowered with the selfless love of God flowing through our spirit, we can then begin to operate our circuit in the correct direction of flow and in harmony with the Law as it was originally designed to function.

In this arrangement, our left brain acts more as an advisor and counselor to the right brain instead of as a dictator or an abusive spouse. I think that maybe God designed two very differently operating sides in our brains to work with each other as an illustration of how a marriage between two very different kinds of people can operate when they are in proper relationship and keep a rich atmosphere of love in their lives.

So where does the Law fit into this salvaged system? I believe that it is in a sense saturated all through the system as well as accessible from an objective source. The intellectual mind can fill its library full of instructions and information about God's Law. Remember, God's Law is simply an external description of the principles that govern reality, not just a list of 10 terse commands. All of the true principles found in science and physics are also included in God's Law. The Law is simply a description of reality and the principles on which it functions. The descriptions of these principles can be stored in the libraries of the left brain for access by use of the right brain as needed. The more stocked that library is with truthful information the more freely the Spirit of God can access it for use by our spirit whenever the information is needed for use in times of decisions or crisis.

Those times of need are often very emotionally charged times. Maturity is the process whereby our right brain learns to quiet itself during times of intense emotion so that it does not cut off access to the resources of the left brain when they are most needed. The more mature a person is the easier it is for them to “act like themselves” during any intense emotions. Acting like ourself in this context means to act under stressful emotions the very same way we would act if we were not experiencing those emotions. That is one of the important reasons for maturity.

What Paul is describing in Romans 8 is what a circuit would look like while it is being restored to its original design. Because we still are saddled with the dysfunctional sarx that is constantly trying to advise our hearts and control our desires and choices, we have to always put up with its insistent and convincing clamorings while learning to always ignore them in favor of keeping tuned to the Spirit of God.

We have to have our focus changed from a focus on “keeping the Law” in order to be right with God to living “in Christ” Who is already right with God and has made us right with God “in Him”.

In the born-again life we still have a responsibility to keep our focus on listening to the Spirit with our hearts while ignoring the constant suggestions and logical ideas of our sarx. Our sarx will always suggest ideas that sound very logical, good and right. It represents itself as the good inside of us and its suggestions are always for our benefit and highest good. It purports to be a reliable source of counsel for living a good Christian life and its constant suggestions always sound very plausible and correct. But because it has a hidden distortion factor built permanently into it, whenever we follow its suggestions the results are always less than healthy and worse than that, someone's heart, those around us or own own, always receives a blow of death.

This helps explain the last verse in Romans 7. I often wondered why Paul would say he served the Law of God with his mind while at the same time he was serving the law of sin. But that is a description of the function of the sarx, especially a religiously oriented sarx. It focuses the left brain on the Law of God while the heart is kept in second place and its emotions also manipulated by the sarx. That of course causes our heart to get a very bad reputation and so we justify our dominant left brain's control of our soul by pointing to the fact that whenever we follow our heart we always get into trouble.

What we don't realize is that, in fact, our left brain is also being controlled by the sarx, only in a far more subtle way. By believing that, given enough information and right training, we can learn to make right decisions we are actually living the life most like the directions received from the sarx.

The sarx causes us to believe that we are capable, at least sometimes, of making right decisions on our own. This is most prominent in left brain dominant religion where we rely on our extensive knowledge about God and truth to make our decisions. But this is really living in the flesh, being manipulated by the sarx while fully believing that we are serving God and obeying Him. It is the problem of the religiously active people Jesus described who are so surprised at not being allowed into the kingdom and it is the problem that Paul has taken the whole book of Romans up to this point to uncover and address.

The sarx that we received at the fall has usurped the place of the Law written in our heart. It demands to be the relied on as the data source for our virus software. It sounds so right that we almost always fall for its suggestions because it feels and looks like the right thing to do, whether we are religious or not. It will always be present and active in us until the Second Coming at the earliest, so we have to learn how to live in a vital, dependent connection with the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus while still putting up with the clamoring of the sarx inside of our head. But it is only the principle or law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus that will truly set us free from the principle or law of sin and death under which the sarx operates.

(next in series)

Heavenly ISP

I need to have a better ISP connection with heaven. Oh, you don't know what an ISP is? Well, if you are reading this on the internet you most likely would know what ISP means. But then again you might be a little suspicious since the ISP's that you use can't get you a connection all the way to heaven.

What I am realizing is that my connection to God may have a great deal of similarities to my connection to the internet. Ideally it would be nice to be able to look at things first-hand without even having to use an electronic link. I would much rather see and associate with friends in person than to just look at images on a screen and translate graphics shaped into letters and words to “listen” to what they want to communicate to me. An awful lot is lost is these very simplified forms of communication, but it is much better than no communication. So I am willing to use these means until the time when we can dispense or bypass them for the real thing.

You can probably get a feel for where this is going by now. I wish that I could physically just crawl up in God's lap and tangibly feel His arms around me and literally look into His eyes and experience His overwhelming love firsthand. But I understand that is far too intense for me to even survive right now and there are other extenuating circumstances that have to be resolved before I will be able to enjoy that kind of personal proximity to God.

So in the meantime He has set up an ISP for me to communicate with Him using words and pictures etc. But just like my computer's ISP connection, I have some issues and problems that need to be addressed.

Right now I am using one of the slowest and most frustrating connections in the world of internet connections. I have to use a dial-up modem connection to send or receive anything from my computer since we live so far out in the boondocks that the phone company doesn't want to run better wires this far. At the prices they are already gouging us with I would hate to see what they would demand for even better connections. Then to add to that, the modem in my laptop computer is evidently not designed for such a slow connection so it tends to limit it to an even slower speed than what my main computer can do. That is only because when I learned that newer modems run much slower in these circumstances than older modems I installed an older modem into my main computer so it would run slightly faster. But either way, I am limited to some of the slowest baud rates that most people can tolerate.

It would be very nice to have a broadband connection or even better yet a satellite link so I could access the internet world on nearly a realtime basis. But as you know the prices for those luxury options are what I consider obscene. So I have to just practice lots of patience and restrict my activities to what is feasible under the circumstances.

But what does all that have to do with my ISP with heaven? Well, I think it has a lot of parallels when I stop to think about it. It occurred to me as I have gotten into studying Romans 8, that maybe a lot of my problems with my spiritual growth is my severely restricted connection line just like my frustrating home ISP situation.

My heavenly ISP (In Spirit Power) may have such a small connection with my heart that the enormous blessings and resources available “out there” simply can't get through the bottleneck of my slow and stymied heart portal. The modem in my heart that is supposed to receive and send information, emotions and passion is so seriously miswired that I am fortunate that anything at all is actually getting through. I am about to take an in-depth examination of Romans 8 and what it means to live according to the spirit and to be led by the Spirit of God. I am realizing that I am not experiencing the full freedom of access to God's heart that I desire and that is very frustrating for me. But I also know the problem is not on God's end so it must be addressed at this end.

Of course the problem is also that I am not an electronics engineer, either in this mortal life or in spiritual life. I don't have a clue as to how to rearrange the wiring to improve my connections, either in my computer, my phone lines or my heavenly ISP connection. That is completely out of my skills and abilities and I am at the mercy of those who have those skills as well as their relationship and attitudes toward me.

For my home ISP connection I suspect, based on the worldly way of doing things, I would have to shell out a great deal of money that I would have to first earn somewhere, to induce some big, heartless company to set up some new equipment or wiring or whatever to make a faster connection possible. Then on top of that they would expect me to continue to bribe them each month with extravagant amounts of hard-earned money to continue to provide me with this connection or they would quickly cut it off and leave me disconnected completely from all the resources available to others on the internet.

I don't believe that God has that kind of attitude toward those who want to get set up with a broadband connection with Him. However, there must be some kind of arrangements that need to be made for me to enjoy a fuller and fast connection with Him than what I am now experiencing. It is not something that just falls into place just for the wishing or I would already be enjoying it. I don't yet have all the answers to this question, but I hope to uncover them soon as I continue to study Romans 8 where there are all kinds of exciting revelations about having a high-speed connection through the dedicated ISP of heaven.

Isn't it interesting that Paul used the words he did with no clue that the acronyms would work perfectly thousands of years later with technology that couldn't even be imagined in his day. I see that sort of “coincidence” repeatedly and believe that it is sometimes a revelation of the humor of God. I can almost see the little smile playing on His face when someone comes upon one of these little surprises and is startled by the instant fit that some illustration has to spiritual realities. It is just like Him to do those kinds of things.

Questions for Definitions

Romans 8

1 Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.

3 For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh,

4 so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

5 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.

6 For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,

7 because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,

8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

I want to look at more definitions and descriptions to help clear things in my mind. There is definitely a number of opposites here but I also know that they are not usually understood very well.

What are the things that are done for us – in spite of us – to us?

Opposite that, what part do we have – what choices can and do we need to make in this situation?

Most of the time I think we confuse the two areas and work very hard on producing the results that can only come out of God's part, that will occur naturally after He does something inside of us. At the same time, we may be neglecting to do the things/choices that God will not do for us and in neglecting those choices or decisions we hold up progress and thwart God's intentions for our lives. I know I feel like that is my own condition right now, though I feel like I am in the dark about what it is I am neglecting.

Just what is involved in living in the flesh – living according to the flesh – as described here?

Opposite that, what is needed for us to live in the spirit – live according to the spirit?

The answers to these questions are crucial to understand because the results of living one way or the other (there is no other options) are either death or life ultimately. Whether we believe that we have a choice or not, or whether we make a deliberate decision to look at the options head-on or not, does not take us to any other options. We can ignore, deny, argue, rationalize or anything else – we will still make our choice whether by default or intentionally. The unavoidable reality is that we are either living each day according to the flesh or we are living according to the spirit with the end results of those two options being formed in our hearts to be realized sooner or later.

Again, I believe the answers can be found in the context and I would like to spend some time taking these questions back like a big magnet and seeing what they pull out of the previous passages that will help define what they mean. I would certainly enjoy doing this with more people than just myself, but at this point I will have to be content to continue discussing these things as a monologue. The Spirit is always eager to share and reveal truths to my mind, but I know that He is even more eager to apply what I am learning to my heart. I want Him to do that at a much deeper level and more pervasively than what has happened so far.

God, reveal Yourself to me in Your word more clearly. Also help me to be more open and less resistant to all of the channels You want to use to affect my healing and training and shaping. Show me Your face as I learn and experience more deeply what it really means to live according to the spirit.

(next in series)

What Did God Do? part 2 - The Law

I am feeling nudged back into a deeper look at the questions raised about a week ago. I just went back and read that post What Did God Do? and realize that so far I am only scratching the surface. These are not issues that I feel so much compelled to explain as a means to convince others to agree with me as much as they are issues that I feel very compelled to clearly understand myself, and even more importantly to experience their transformational power in my own heart and have them demonstrated more openly in my relationships with others.

What has been circulating in my mind ever since I woke up this morning is the question raised before, “What did God do that the Law could not do?” I only touched on it previously and I need to sit on it much longer and look around in the context to see what the Law was “trying” to accomplish but could not.

As I look back over the previous chapters I find some places where the Law seems to be trying to do something. We have to keep in mind the qualifier from 7:12 that “the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good”. Therefore, whatever the Law is attempting to accomplish it must be something good and right even though it may not be succeeding.

...They show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them. (Romans 2:15)

The Law supplies the conscience with the information it needs to operate. It is implied here that the Law is a natural law just like gravity, heat, or the laws of motion that is governing our very existence.

...You bear the name "Jew" and rely upon the Law and boast in God, and know His will and approve the things that are essential, being instructed out of the Law, and are confident that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of the immature, having in the Law the embodiment of knowledge and of the truth. (Romans 2:17-20)

The Law (the requirements of God) is viewed by some even today to be able to empower them to become “the embodiment of knowledge and of the truth.” It is implied here that there is a lot of knowledge and truth about God in the Law.

You who boast in the Law, through your breaking the Law, do you dishonor God? (Romans 2:23)

God is honored by those who are in conformity with His Law.

For indeed circumcision is of value if you practice the Law; but if you are a transgressor of the Law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision. So if the uncircumcised man keeps the requirements of the Law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? (Romans 2:25-26)

The Law here seems to have power to give meaning and value to certain rituals or symbols depending on other factors like perfect obedience.

...(The Jews) were entrusted with the oracles of God. What then? If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it? May it never be! Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written, "THAT YOU MAY BE JUSTIFIED IN YOUR WORDS, AND PREVAIL WHEN YOU ARE JUDGED." (Romans 3:2-4)

The Law was entrusted to the Jews. It has something to do with the faithfulness of God and it is somehow used to vindicate God's truthfulness.

What then? Are we better than they? Not at all; for we have already charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin. (Romans 3:9)

The Law is indiscriminate in exposing sinners. It is the great equalizer.

Now we know that whatever the Law says, it speaks to those who are under the Law, so that every mouth may be closed and all the world may become accountable to God; because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin. But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no distinction; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:19-23)

The Law silences all mouths (assumed to be those in opposition to it as well as those who try to justify themselves with it) and makes all the world accountable to God (instead of the Law?). It cannot be used to justify any flesh in God's eyes. It is used to produce a knowledge of sin. It is a witness to the righteousness of God. It has something to do with the glory of God.

For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the Law. (Romans 3:28 NAS95)

Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law. (Romans 3:31)

The Law has something to do with “works”. While it is not the same thing as faith it is not neutralized by faith but established by it.

For the promise to Abraham or to his descendants that he would be heir of the world was not through the Law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if those who are of the Law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise is nullified; for the Law brings about wrath, but where there is no law, there also is no violation. (Romans 4:13-15)

The Law does not produce heirs of God among people on this earth. The Law somehow produces “wrath”. The Law exposes violations.

...For until the Law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. (Romans 5:13)

The external revelation of Law creates the condition in which sin is “imputed” against people.

The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more. (Romans 5:20)

Apparently the Law was introduced to accelerate the exposure of sin.

For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace. What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? May it never be! Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness? (Romans 6:14-16)

Being “under law” empowers sin to be a slave-master over you. But that does not mean that not being under law makes you at liberty to sin (transgress the law). When that is done we only demonstrate that we are obedient slaves under our master of sin.

Or do you not know, brethren (for I am speaking to those who know the law), that the law has jurisdiction over a person as long as he lives? For the married woman is bound by law to her husband while he is living; but if her husband dies, she is released from the law concerning the husband. So then, if while her husband is living she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress though she is joined to another man. (Romans 7:1-3)

The Law has something called “jurisdiction”. The Greek word meant “to rule:--have dominion over, lord, be lord of, exercise lordship over.” Not a very loving-sounding disposition conducive for a healthy marriage relationship. The Law identifies categories of sin like adultry.

But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter. What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? May it never be! On the contrary, I would not have come to know sin except through the Law; for I would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said, "YOU SHALL NOT COVET." But sin, taking opportunity through the commandment, produced in me coveting of every kind; for apart from the Law sin is dead. I was once alive apart from the Law; but when the commandment came, sin became alive and I died; and this commandment, which was to result in life, proved to result in death for me. (Romans 7:6-10)

The Law apparently has bonds that cause us to feel bound, restricted, not free. Being under the Law is described as the “oldness of the letter”. Law is definitely not sin, but causes us to know about sin – particularly on the inside when it exposes the thoughts and motives of our heart. The Law is not life-giving but is manipulated by sin to result in death. But it is the sin that produces the death, not the Law.

Therefore did that which is good become a cause of death for me? May it never be! Rather it was sin, in order that it might be shown to be sin by effecting my death through that which is good, so that through the commandment sin would become utterly sinful. For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. (Romans 7:13-14)

Paul is very careful to point out that the Law is not the cause of death. The Law is good but is diabolically used by sin to effect death. When this is more clearly understood then the Law becomes the means whereby we can become aware of the utter sinfulness of sin. The Law is spiritual, not itself tainted by any sin.

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. (Romans 8:1)

The Law results in a feeling of condemnation in those who try to live under the Law while trying to please God with conformity through obedience.

For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, (Romans 8:3)

When we are living in the flesh – as described in chapter 7 as those who make it their first priority to know and keep the Law instead of living by faith – the Law is weak and really helpless to empower our obedience. Therefore, we are always trying to get strength from ourselves to keep the requirements of the Law. What God did through His own Son was provide a different method for fulfilling the Law with a reliable and constant source of power outside of ourselves. That means is called being “in Christ Jesus”. It is spirit-oriented but does not ignore or nullify the requirements of the Law.

...so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (Romans 8:4)

This again makes it very plain that God is not at all attempting to sideline the Law in any way. What He has done is to provide a means whereby the Law can be fulfilled in us if we will walk in the spirit and be led by the true Spirit of God. Then the Law will be demonstrated in our lives, thereby establishing the importance of the Law.

Since the Law is a description of God in a nutshell, it should not surprise us that God does not want to get rid of it. That would be the same as God wanting to commit suicide. He wants us to be restored to His image that He originally created us to reflect, not eliminate His own image that is described in the Law.

The word “salvation” means to restore to an original, pristine condition. That is also the same meaning of the root word for “heal”. The root of salvation/salvage comes from Latin and the root word for “heal” comes from a Germanic background, but they both mean the very same thing.

God is using the healing process to restore our souls and spirits to their original blueprint as created in Eden so that He can restore the family system of relationships that heaven has always been based on. Our relationship to the Law is really a symptom our relationship to God and must be based on love-bonds in place of fear-bonds. That love has to be first received into our hearts by knowing and experiencing God's passionate love for us so that we can exercise that love, and in turn we can respond in a live of joyful obedience – natural obedience – even spontaneous obedience to the requirements of the Law.

That is what God does that the Law cannot do.

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