27 - Under Sin, Under Law, Under Grace

B.W. Newton The "Patmos" Series No. 27 Under Sin, Under Law Under Grace InRomans 6:1-23,Romans 7:1-25 The great endowment of the Church having been set forth in Romans 5:1-21 of everlasting Righteousness and Life given in Christ Jesus, it was open to this caviling of the evil heart. "Why should we avoid sin if it has been set aside by God as though it existed not? If it give opportunity for the exercise of the grace of God let us sin that grace may abound!" This might be the wretched objection of the natural heart, for there is no doctrine that is not open to such cavils: yet, whether men abuse it or not, we must not refuse the full testimony of grace. All we can say is "God forbid." The wretched suggestions of Satan turn these things to evil, and if the evil heart will do so, it must: but they that believe will receive these things rightly, and increase with the increase of God.

Romans 6:1-23, Romans 7:1-25 : Romans 6:1-23 should be read as one chapter with two divisions; forming a separate section of the Epistle and showing the relation of the believer to Sin and his relation to the Law of God.

Sin is personified in Romans 6:1-23, having a claim upon us of penalty to be borne. The Law is "personified" in Romans 7:1-6, having a claim upon us of obedience; and we cannot free ourselves from either; but the Apostle here shows how we are justified from both. In Romans 6:1-23 Sin stands in the relation to us of a master, and we so entirely the property of that Master that we have no power or title to free ourselves from the claim it has over us. One thing alone could free us, and that is Death. A master has no title over a slave when dead, but not until then is he free. Now here it is said "Christ died unto sin once," i.e., Sin had a claim against Him! Not personally, but because He had taken by substitution the place of His people; so, because Sin had a claim against them, it had a claim against Him when He stood in their stead. They would have remained in bondage forever, unless God had sent One Who could answer the penalty by His death and after that rise again, thus showing Himself superior to the power of Death. And when we see this—that what Christ has affected was made ours by God—we are enabled to use the words of this passage and say "We have died and we live again!"

It is a chapter of declaration and of exhortation. The declaration is made by God concerning a thing that has been done. He does not exhort us to be alive, but says we are so, and declares it as our blessing! We see in this the difference between the first and second Covenants. Of old it would have been an exhortation. The Law would say "Make yourselves alive unto God; meet God’s holiness; obey His precepts; so you shall live." But how could one in whom Sin essentially dwells do this? When Christ was sent it was on the ground of the impossibility of this, and God by one act freed His people from the place of Sin, and by one act brought them up to a place of Glory. When Jesus rose into the presence of God, God viewed His people as "atoned for" in Him Who was raised. He triumphed gloriously in bringing down the strong household of the enemy and leading His people into His own holy habitation. It is utterly impossible for such to be the slaves of Sin again. We do not say it is impossible to commit a sin or a trespass, but to be the slaves of Sin. If they sin it is not as belonging to Sin’s household but to the household of God; to a new family. And in order to show this, the Apostle says "Sin shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under Law but under Grace." The believer might say "I have sinned against light and knowledge, and I fear I am again brought under the title of my former master Sin." It is not so. This would have been the case under the Law, but the believer is in a different position. God, having called him by His grace, He is able to say even to Satan, "This is a brand plucked from the burning, he shall not go back again under the claim of his old master."

Thus, Romans 6:14 so used, becomes one of the most comforting and confirming in the whole Scripture. It discloses the great secret, how it is the believer does not fall back into Sin’s household again. May we holily remember that God has set us free in order to be His servants, as belonging to His household, (Romans 6:13, Romans 6:18-19, Romans 6:22).

Now as a pledge of these truths, "Baptism" is given and the argument is grounded on this type. We are planted in the waters of death, which typically represent the death of Christ. He died under the full weight of the damnatory wrath of God. We never know that. The waters are to us the likeness, but only a likeness of death. God shadowed forth to us mercifully and peacefully that, whereby He seals to us visibly the blessings which He has verily performed for us. And seeing that we are not allowed to remain under, but are raised up out of the water, we are "raised in the likeness of His resurrection." We are not yet personally in resurrection, but we wait for the fulfillment of this type; knowing that what God has thus promised will be fulfilled in due season. This is one thing that Baptism typifies to us. It is not an ordinance to bring to God, but for those who have been brought and who are able to confess that, whereunto they are brought: and Baptism in any other way is disobedience. Yet, in the professing Church, this ordinance is made a means of bringing to God if received by a priestly hand! This is a lie of Satan. God never appointed Baptism for that end, but as a sign and seal of the blessing already received through personal faith—a past blessing received in Christ—so no wonder the Church is overrun with false doctrine!

Baptism is a seal of the blessing received in the second Person of the blessed Trinity, and does not refer to the work of the third Person as is usually supposed. There is need of discernment here. If we confound the work of one Person with that of Another, all the doctrines of "grace" are confused and foundation truths are touched; so that it is needful to keep all the truths of Redemption in their proper place: to the Father what belongs to the Father; to the Son what belongs to the Son; and to the Holy Spirit that which belongs to Him. Being brought to God in Christ, we belong to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost. Their Name is placed on us in Baptism. The source is in the Father; the channel in the Son; and the application through the Holy Ghost; so that we now belong to the "family of God." Accordingly, God has undertaken to work till we are really brought home into the full power of that which is essentially ours in Christ and to be fully ours forever! Such is the blessed standing of those who believe; and to them comes the exhortation "Yield your members as instruments of righteousness to God."

Romans 7:1-6. Then, there is another power against us; something very different indeed from Sin. Sin comes from us, but the holy blessed Law of God comes from Him; and just because it is holy, it is against us, and it brings Curse on us seeing we are unholy.

Now, says the Apostle, this also was met by the great Substitute! Did He not die under the curse of that Law? Did He not meet its claims? Therefore, believers have died to that Law and no longer belong to that husband. In Chapter 6 the figure was of master and slave: here (Romans 7:1-6) it is of husband and wife: but in either case says the Apostle, the tie is broken by "death."

Romans 7:7-8 This section reveals the relation of God in making man acquainted with Himself and also with the flesh, and should be read as one chapter. Man is here presented in four conditions. The first was seen in Adam when he quitted Paradise. How little he knew of his real death-like condition before God; how little conscious of the condemnation and sin under which he was! He had found mercy where he expected judgment for his first transgression, but the effects of it were not yet proved; he was still a stranger to the evil of the "flesh." Sin was as it were slumbering. It was in the heart like a viper coiled up, but the moment it was touched by a fresh commandment it revived. When God says "Do this," the flesh desires not to do it, and vice versa. This is the necessary result of the fall; that every natural feeling is at enmity with God, though it is not every heart that is aware of the strong flow of evil against God within. This condition of human nature is described in Romans 7:9. "I was alive without the law once." "I" represents humanity, and Paul said this as identifying himself with humanity in that condition. It was the experience of man; and inasmuch as he was man, so far it was his experience. Had he lived when Adam did, before the Law was brought to bear on man or the holiness of God fully revealed, he would have "felt alive" and quite unconscious of his "death" before God; but "when the commandment came, sin revived and I died," i.e., felt himself brought back into the same condition of curse as Adam when he ate of the tree. This is the second condition of humanity. And suppose a person in that state to be caused to delight in the inner man in the Law. This can only be by God being pleased to create in him the "new man," and this He does the moment anyone believes. It has new affections; new feelings; new joys; entirely contrasted with all man naturally is. This "new man" is to be distinguished from the Person of the Holy Ghost, because it is created by the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is God. This "new man" is not God. It is a "creation" of the Spirit of God but not the Spirit itself. These should be carefully distinguished. In a believer there is the old self—all that he is naturally—but there is also the new self-instinct with spiritual life. Not called into exercise perhaps, but, just as a weak babe has undeveloped powers of life in it without strength or vigor, so is it with the "new man" created through the Spirit. And God is pleased to deal with this "new man," because He desires a believer should be able to understand what His ways are; and in this second condition God acts towards him by means of His holy Law; not revealing to him His Grace in Christ, but keeping that apart, and exercising him by the knowledge of His own holiness as revealed in The Law.

Suppose I could take from you as believers all that you know about Redemption in Christ—all the power of the Spirit of grace now given in measure to all who believe—there would then only remain in you the "old man" and the "new man," And suppose I then made to you a revelation suddenly of all the claims of God’s holiness in vivid power, so that you saw the terrors of the Holy Law according to the sensitiveness of the "new man," what misery this would be! You would say "This holy Law I ought to meet in all its length and breadth, for it is holy, just, and good; but, He is so holy, He requires a spotless unblemished service; no taint must attach to it." Then, looking at yourself, you would see the "old man" with all its evil; and that, not in weakness but in giant strength! In the "new man" is weakness like as in a babe, but in the "old man" is mighty power and developed energy as in a giant; and the heart would soon find that these things were so opposed, that even if there were a feeble desire to serve God in the "new man," it would be in an instant overpowered by the giant life and power of the "old man."

It is the figure of a babe chained to a giant. The babe may struggle, but the giant quickly overpowers it and is sure to drag it where he likes! It would say "I delight in the Law of God after the inward man, but I see another law in my members warring against the Law of my mind, bringing me into captivity, etc., (Romans 7:22)." And its cry would be "Who shall deliver me from this body of death?" Now this cry is what God desires should be elicited. He seeks to lead to this exercise of soul. Probably the nearest approach to this experience was in the case of the Apostle Paul during the three days after he believed in the Lord Jesus and before Ananias came and the Spirit was given to him. Most likely during that interval he was greatly exercised by the knowledge of God’s Law. He had delighted in it ignorantly, and in his natural state thought he had kept it; but now it bore on him in a different way. The "new man" in him began to apprehend it, and to see what the power of evil within him was, and he no doubt uttered that bitter cry before Ananias came "Oh wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from this body of death?" as though chained to a dead body. And it was not until he knew of Redemption that he found peace, and said "I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

[Thus it will also be with the remnant of Israel whom Paul represented. It will be some time before the ways of Redemption are explained to them and the Spirit given personally to dwell in them. Though quickened, and their sin forgiven; yet, considerable time will elapse before they are brought to the peaceful knowledge of Redemption; and they will probably go through something of this experience.]

It is true "the flesh still lusts against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh;" and this conflict will continue to the end even in the most advanced believer; but there is not conflict only. The real question of the passage is not one of God acting merely by means of Law on the New man, for God does not now try the soul by Law, but presents to it the fullness of His Grace in Christ.

Suppose Sinai confronted us, and God presented His Law, saying "Keep this;" how different our condition! We should be met by that instead of the Grace in Christ Jesus as the Mediator of the New Covenant! But, when God sees us now in conflict, He says "My Law has been kept; it has been glorified and made honorable; and as an instrument to bring to Myself it is no longer used!" ’This explains how the "condemnation" can be put away. We see how the giant "sin in the flesh" as the Apostle calls it, received its death blow and is judicially set aside, for "God sent His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, and condemned sin in the flesh" —i.e., poured damnatory wrath on this evil corrupt thing—on the Cross. (Romans 8:3). To "condemn" does not mean to express disapproval but, "damnation!" It is a strong word of judgment. "Sin in the flesh" is our name by nature; thus, damnatory judgment has passed on ourselves; on our evil flesh. So, though the "old man" is not actually abolished; though it still struggles; it is judicially set aside and slain. It is so regarded above in the courts of Heaven; and it is a great point to see this while the flesh struggles. Its continuance is a question of time only, but it is set aside judicially, as fully as if every feeling and sensation of it had passed away!

Then the believer desires another thing. If the flesh be judicially slain while it actively struggles; and if the "new man" be like a weak babe, the believer says "Oh that some strength might be given to the babe to resist the practical power of the giant Sin."

Well, God does this by giving "the Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:4). There is a motive principle of sin in the "flesh" and there is also a corresponding principle of good in the "new man" through the Spirit, so that strength is given to the babe. God feeds it by His truth and nourishes it by faith and His promises, so that it grows and disputes the title of the "old man." It is now able to resist the practical power of sin and to obey what God commands without being prevented from measurably carrying out its desires; and in the power of the "new man" through the Spirit the believer can serve God. Instead of being a prisoner under the power of the giant, he is able to drag it along as a rebellious struggling thing; and, according to his strength in the Spirit, he will less and less feel the burden and be able to walk in new paths though still carrying the evil burden. When we see the guilt of the flesh, we think of the Cross of Jesus; and when we see its power over us, we turn to the Law of the Spirit of Life which is given to sustain and cheer. God regards us as in the Spirit and not in the flesh. We are considered by Him as identified with the new thing and not with the old; and this encourages and gives us confidence to serve Him.

Then comes the fourth condition "Human nature" in Resurrection (Romans 5:11), when brought into the likeness of Christ in Glory, and the "old man" actually as well as judicially set aside! Thus, there are four conditions of humanity here described:

I. When unacquainted with the Holy Law of God.

II. When met by the claims of that Holy Law.

III. When there is an acquaintance not only with Law, but with Redemption in Christ and the power of the Holy Ghost.

IV. When made like Christ in Glory. When St. Paul wrote he was in the third of these conditions. He will be in the fourth when his body is raised and glorified. So with us as believers: yet it is profitable to consider the others, for they teach a lesson which will endear to us the preciousness of Redemption, and lead us to appreciate more the real character of the evil with which we struggle and to be less disposed to fret under it. The Spirit is also the Spirit of "sonship," crying "Abba Father." Of old it was the Spirit of "servantship" leading to fear; not slavish fear, but the feeling a right-minded servant would have towards his master. Eliezer was a faithful servant to Abraham, but his relation was not the filial feeling of Isaac. Although saints of old were truly sons, yet, as to their feelings and the way in which they were dispensationally treated, they differed not from servants. They were as it were, at school until Christ came, when they were brought home to their Father’s house as sons and heirs and able to say "Abba Father."

Then follows the practical place in which those are set who have these blessings; one in which there is "groaning." Although "the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to be revealed," yet there are sufferings. God might have removed all. The work of Christ gave full title for it, but He has been pleased that they should continue, for ours is a salvation of Hope; and we, through endurance, wait for it. The circumstances around too, are very contrary to the blessing promised; for Creation is "made subject to vanity," i.e. to frustration. Everything both outwardly and morally God has been pleased to subject to frustration because of Adams sin; and, by reason of our being linked to that which is thus subjected, "we groan" even naturally.

Besides this, when God has given the greatest present gift to us in the world, even the possession of His own Spirit as the Comforter—I say the greatest gift in the world, for Christ is in Heaven above—when that Spirit comes, He also causes us to "groan," because He makes us more sensitive of the evil around. Not with a mere natural superficial feeling, but with a deep-seated remembrance of it which we carry about with us day-by-day; so that there must be the "groan." But we must take care that our reliefs in these things are not of Nature: "sparks of our own kindling," (Isaiah 1:10-11). The reliefs of God are great and precious, and one reason why He has allowed sorrow to remain is, that He may show His power in bringing comfort into the circumstances, just as by and by: He will cause all to pass away forever. These reliefs of God are of great importance to consider. The chief of them is Hope. Faith and Hope have a wondrous power to sustain under all disastrous circumstances; enabling the believer to glorify God yet to look steadily at sorrow; to say "We wait for something that will not fail or disappoint when it comes." Unless there were endurance there would be no room for Hope. Divine power keeps it there like a little spark floating on the billows, and it glorifies God by looking to Him Who alone can help, and thus enables us to feel that "all things work together for good."

Circumstances of misery and sorrow also afford opportunities for service in relieving "the groan" around: and that is one reason why the believer is left h re. God might easily relieve it Himself; but He waits to see whether those who have the sympathies of His heart will do it and take His place; as it is said "It is more blessed to give than to receive." He loves not to hear the "groan," but waits to see whether our ear will hear it because we desire to act for Him; and chat He will own in the Day of glory. The close of the chapter gives the great assurance of His unchangeable love from which "nothing can separate." As the soul contemplates surrounding circumstances, it would be terrified if left to look at them apart from God: but if we had a vivid apprehension of God’s glory in the Heavens and then of the vastness of His power in the depths below—for there are "heights" and "depths" —if God were to withdraw the veil, we should tremble and shrink, and say "Shall not these separate us from Him?"

Nay, says the Apostle. These are all creatures; but God knoweth us in Christ Who is not created; and "nothing shall separate us from Him!" Thus the soul can rest, and say "If God be for us, who can be against us?" "In all these things we are more than conquerors through Him Who loved us!"