Romans 7

Bible Passage:  Romans 7

A Marriage Made In Heaven…

The last week and the weeks ahead are joyous times in our church as there are 3 weddings.  It has been a long long time since something like this has happened.

The topic of “Marriage” came to mind as I was reading today’s passage.

It seems strange at first that Paul used “Marriage” as an illustration to show us that we now belong to God and should no longer sin.

From verses 1 to 6, Paul explained that we are or should be no longer under the power and control of sin.  Just like in a marriage – when we take the wedding vow – it means that we are joined to our spouse as long as they are living – but is released when our spouse passes away.  Now when we are baptised, our old man is buried – we are counted as being “dead to the law” and thus – can now “remarry”. And our new vow is to God.

In the past, we were once controlled by our sinful nature “But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.” (Rom 7:6).

I am sure for the newly married couples, the idea of a life-long blissful marriage to our spouse is a wonderful thing. And we are excited and all flushed about it.  But what about those of us who have been married for a long time?  Is the initial flame still burning bright? Or do we think that we are “老夫老妻” (old husband old wife) and there is no need for any “spark” or “passion” in our lives.

Our passion and zeal for God should never diminish over time.  Our “marriage” to God is not for a moment or for some years.  It is for eternity.  And we must treasure and work at it – and not sin – so that our vows to God are broken.

Our Lifelong Struggle

No…. I am not talking about marriage 🙂

But if we were to read from verses 14-23 – I am amazed how accurately Paul describes me…. and I am pretty sure almost every person in this world.

For many a Christian – it almost always seem that there are two different persons in us.  There is one person who longs for all things good, holy and will strive to keep God’s laws.  We want to be loving, sacrificial, humble, honest.  In our minds, we think about devoting our lives to God’s kingdom and not our own selfish ambition and comforts.

But when the crunch comes – we are no where near that person.  Instead, another person appears. One that is far from my aspirations.  In fact, we become quite the opposite of what we want to be.

And Paul hits the arrow on the head when he says: “For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do.” (Rom 7:15)

There seems to be no way out at times.  We repeat the same mistakes over and over again.

But Paul reminds us once again in verse 24:

²⁴ O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? ²⁵ I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!

Indeed – it is only Christ who can change us and help us change from the old man.  It is only Jesus who can keep us keep our vows.

We have the law to remind us of what is sin.  But more importantly, we have Jesus to help us overcome sin.