Just so, we are not built that way. We need to be built over. A new
life needs to come in. And when the law has brought us to that point,
and we cry out with Paul, “Wretched man that I am!” then the law has
done its proper work. The tragic thing is that most Christians stop
right there in their reading of the seventh chapter of Romans. They
do not go on to the glorious word of deliverance. There is a way out.
Paul has been in bondage under the law of sin. But a new law enters,
and he exclaims, “The law of the Spirit ... made me free from the law
of sin and of death.” What is the new power of that law of the Spirit?
“_Life in Christ Jesus._” What happens when the law of the Spirit is
working, when we are enjoying the freedom indeed wherewith Christ hath
set us free? _The requirement of the law is fulfilled in us._ This law
of the Spirit, of the new Life in Christ Jesus, hath set us free from
the law of sin and death, in order that we might keep the law of God.
And it is kept in us just as long as we walk in the Spirit. God’s plan
is that we should walk in the Spirit all the time; that is “abiding in
Christ.” The struggle of the seventh of Romans is a struggle _under
the law_, it is human effort apart from grace. It is not given as the
normal Christian experience, but a parenthesis between two passages
of glorious liberty, placed there to show what bearing the keeping
of the law has upon the Christian’s experience. The normal Christian
experience is freedom from the dominion of sin.
What Grace Says
“Sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under law but
under grace.” The secret of victory, therefore, is to keep under grace,
which is walking in the Spirit. How is this to be done? All Christians
who have real assurance of salvation see clearly that we are saved by
grace. Law has condemned them. Law says “Do,” and we cannot do.
Grace says, “Jesus Christ has done it for me.”
“How much in the matter of my salvation has he done?”
“All of it.”
“How much is there left for me to do?”
_Nothing._ “Faith does nothing”; faith believes that Jesus has done it
all.
Now this is exactly the case with Christian living, and the keeping
of the law of God. Whenever a Christian sins, sin is having dominion
over him, and that means that he is living under law where he does not
belong, and needs to get under grace. Here, just as in salvation from
the penalty of sin, grace means that Jesus Christ is doing it all.
What is left for me then in the matter of winning victory over sin?
_Nothing._ Faith believes that Jesus is doing it all. That is grace,
and nothing else is. For if my effort enters, it is not of grace, but
partly by the work of the law. That is making void the grace of God,
“for if righteousness is through the law, then Christ died for nought”
(Gal. 2:21).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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