## Exposition of the Epistle to the Romans

J. N. Darby.

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150 In Romans 6 the practical consequence is gone into, the state and condition reviewed experimentally. Now there is deliverance from sin, and the bearing of the law upon the question is gone into; and thus experience comes in. The doctrine as to how we get out of the power of sin is stated distinctly in chapter 6. We may note here that in the first division of the epistle (Rom. 1:18; to 5:11) we have no practical conduct as the fruit of grace. We have full exhortations in Romans 12 and the following chapters as the result of the whole truth, specially indeed of chapter 6; but in the former part the result of our walk in judgment is stated, but no connection of walk with the grace there spoken of. You have the full complete clearance of the guilty sinner, all having been proved to be under sin and guilty before God, but no consequences drawn as to conduct. The righteousness of God is declared in clearing from guilt and forgiving, in justifying the ungodly, peace with God, standing in His favour, and the hope of glory as the consequence; God Himself joyed in; but no consequent walk. God justified the ungodly righteously, and they had peace. Salvation is stated by itself, as far as brought to us here by grace. Here, where the state is spoken of, divine life is fully spoken of; not indeed the details of practice in the way of exhortation, but the principle of divine life in power, delivering us from sin, and setting us in divine liberty in our walk; a liberty, that is, which comes from God, and in which we yield ourselves to God as those that are alive from the dead.

The point settled in the end of Romans 5 is, that by One man's obedience the many in connection with Him are made righteous. The conclusion the world and fleshly reasoning would draw from this is, that if it be so we may live on in sin. To this the apostle answers in what follows. His obedience was unto death. It is by having part in Christ's death that we have part in this righteousness. But having part in death (that is, dying) is not the way to live on in what we are dead to. How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein? Our very profession of Christianity by baptism was that of being baptised unto His death, having a part in it, made one plant with Him in His death.

Our resurrection with Christ is not spoken of here; that involves union with Him. But we have been buried with Him by baptism unto death; the old man is a judged and crucified thing, by our very profession of Christianity, that, as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, we also should walk in newness of life. It was not now merely a holy blessed life in all that was good, true as that was in Christ's own life down here; but divine power came in when, for us, He was dead, and bringing Him into a new place as man according to all the glory of the Father engaged in His resurrection: so our life was to be a new one, analogous to that. And if it be true that we are planted in the likeness of His death, the other will follow, as surely as life in resurrection by the glory of the Father followed in His case. In its full result this is true even of our bodies. As yet this consequence is not fulfilled; but in His death, as Christians we have avowedly and professedly taken part, so that death to sin is our settled portion down here.

151 We draw the conclusion as to life, morally now, in full power hereafter. But death to sin we have professedly taken our portion in, "knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin." The body of sin is, I apprehend, sin as a whole. The word translated "destroyed" means annulled, rendered powerless. That body (which if alive as the old man, is the seat of lust and doer of sin) is crucified, so as in this character to be set aside and annulled; it has closed its existence. He that is dead is justified from sin. It is not here "sins" or guilt; a man who has died may have to answer for sins, but you cannot accuse him of "sin." He has neither evil lusts nor a perverse will. And the question now is of our state and condition.

But we see the power of death destroyed by the resurrection of Christ. He is risen, He dies no more; death has no more dominion over Him. For His death was not a mere natural consequence, so to speak, of His state. He came about sin, to take our place as sinners, and died to sin. It was with the object of grace to us, and in respect and view of sin that He died, and did it once, when He had, for our sakes, need to do it. But He did it once for all. It was a work which He had to do in respect of sin, and He has done it - has no more to do with sin. Sinners He will judge, no doubt, but He has done with sin, as occupied with it, once and for ever. Up to the cross, He, the sinless One, had to do with sin; on the cross sin was the whole question, though for the glory of God He was made sin; but now He has done with it once and for ever. He lives past having to do with sin. There is but one thing, even viewed as man, which constitutes His life, one thing which fills its outgoings - God. In that He lives, He lives to God.

152 In His life down here He served God perfectly, and lived by the Father, and every step was perfect, having God His Father always before His mind; but He had to do with sin all around Him; He was pressed by it, grieved, a Man of sorrows through it, He had for us to be made sin. Perfect in love manifesting God, perfect in obedience as Man come to do His will, still He came about sin, and was necessarily assailed by it in all around, and, as I have said, was finally to be made sin for us, when fully proved the sinless one Himself - He who knew no sin. But now He has done with it for ever. He died to it here, passed (perfectly accomplishing His work) through death out of the whole scene where He had to do with it, in resurrection into a new state as man, where, in thought, object, and life, He has to do as to His state of life with God only. In that He lives, He lives to God. Nought where He is but what is filled with God - so filled that nothing else can be there save what ministers to His glory. It is not merely the perfectness of His intention (this was always as perfect as His walk; in this sense He always lived to God), but that in which and to which He lives, where for His soul nought else is. It is a blessed thought of man's life, and shews, though the flesh be always the same, what the true Christian state is. Compare 2 Corinthians 1:9; 4:10, 12. His death was a single act in which He died to sin; His life a perpetual present, in which God is all from His soul to His object.

So we are to reckon ourselves (our old man being crucified with Him) dead to sin, and alive to God through Him. It was a new and free life; for the believer was entitled to reckon himself dead unto sin; it was his condition and place as a believer to do so. If we are alive, we are alive to God, not through Adam at all, but through Jesus Christ our Lord. Thus it was wholly new, and, reckoning ourselves dead to sin, entirely free - able to yield himself to God. Compare Romans 12:2; and read "intelligent" for "reasonable." It is not that sin in the flesh has not its lusts; but the believer as such does not let it reign in the body to obey it in its lusts, seeing he is free in the power of a new life; for so the believer is accounted free to walk in the power and after the things which belong to this new life. He holds the reins, and does not allow sin to use the body for its lusts - the lusts of sin. Nor does this freeman give up his members to be instruments of righteousness unto sin - that evil thing to which he was once a slave. He yields himself to God as one alive from the dead, for, as to his life born of Adam, he had died to sin, but now lives, and yields himself and his members as instruments of righteousness to God.

153 For sin has not dominion over us, because we are not under law, but under grace: a grave and important sentence. Being under law leaves me under the dominion of sin. What we want is a free life, free from bondage to sin; for he that commits sin, says the Lord, is the slave of sin. Law gives neither life nor freedom nor strength, nor even an object which may turn our hearts elsewhere. It forbids, rightly and necessarily, the sins, but gives no life nor power. But under grace we have power. Life is given, strength is given, and an object is given; none of which, as we have seen, law gives. Thus, under grace, sin has no dominion over me; under law it has. It is beautiful to see, while it is all grace, still how we are given to yield ourselves to God - true freedom, in which sin has no dominion over us; and, while the power comes from on high, we are really set free, and allowed to give ourselves willingly and freely to God.

Here, then, the apostle takes up this freedom and reasons on it - freedom, not in the old and sinful Adam, but, in that I am alive to God through Jesus Christ, I am free. The law forbids sin and lust, but does not deliver. I am not under it. I am freed from the dominion of sin, and not under law; freed from the dominion of sin, because I am not placed under law but under grace. Shall I then sin because I am not under a law which forbids it, and which curses me if I do it? God forbid.

And now he returns to the great principle of the Gentile condition. If I yield myself to sin, as a slave, to obey it, I am its slave; and sin reigned by death without law being there. Death was the natural and appointed wages of sin, and that as the judgment of God. We could not say obedience unto life; for if we obey, we are alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord, but it has the fruit of practical righteousness. And note the character here of what is opposed to sin; not in itself righteousness - the doing right as known by conscience or law - but obedience. We are alive to God, and that is, and must be always, obedience. We cannot live to God otherwise than in obedience. So Christ lived. He was the obedient Man - came to do God's will. His Father's will was the motive of all He did. He lived by every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God. His path, consequently, was practical righteousness, and the pattern of it. So the apostle thanks God that, whereas they had been slaves of sin, they had obeyed from the heart the form of doctrine delivered to them.

154 And here we learn the spring and character of this obedience. It is the obedience of faith, the reception of the word of God into the heart. This forms the link of obedience between the soul and God. The same reception of the word gives life. Of His own will begat He us by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures. It is life, it is an obedient life, in truth, the life of Christ in us; and He is the obedient Man. Thus made free from sin - for this is the great point here - they had become, yielding themselves up to obey, slaves to righteousness (using "slave" as a figure he excuses, for it is true liberty, but to make it plain to flesh's infirmity of understanding); for as they had formerly given up their members as slaves to uncleanness and to lawlessness, only to be lawless, letting loose an evil will which bore no fruit, so now he exhorts them to yield their members (for they were free) slaves to righteousness. But here there was a blessed result, holiness, a separation of heart to God in the true knowledge of Him, the soul brought into His image, as expressed in Colossians 3:10 and Ephesians 4:23, 24 (there more in its nature, here in practical growth, but the same general truth).

The apostle continues the figure, and appeals to their consciousness of what had passed. They had been slaves of sin, and in no way subject to righteousness. What fruit had they then in the things they were now ashamed of? It was fruitless wasting of their members in lawlessness, and the end death. But now, free from sin - his great theme, as we have seen - free in the sense of out of bondage, no longer sin's slaves (such alone is the sense of the words here), and become slaves to God, entirely given up to serve Him, we have our fruit unto holiness; not only the end everlasting life, but by the way growing in knowledge of God, and likeness to Him, and separation of heart to Him from all evil, according to what He is. Walking in the path of obedience to Him, and so with Him, the soul is in that delivered from the power of evil, which is in will and lust, neither of which is its obedience.

155 This is an immense privilege, this growing up into the knowledge of God and intimacy with Him, acquaintance with God. Will never can do this. But in our right place with God we grow in His knowledge, we live more in those things that are found with Him - that He takes pleasure in; and that is holiness. Obedience is not holiness, a heart given up to obey God; but it is the path in which holy affections, springing from Him, and free before Him, are found. The end is everlasting life, received in its full result in glory, as it is in the purpose of God. But that is the gift of God. The path to it is the path of obedience and holiness, but itself is the gift of God. Death we have earned - it is the wages of sin; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. It is not merely that eternal life is the gift of God, but the gift of God is nothing less than eternal life. Death is purposely looked at in its simple character of death. No doubt it is judgment on sin here in this world, and implies, unless redemption comes in, the judgment which comes after. It is the present effect of judgment on sin, and the divine officer and witness of sin, to conduct us to judgment, according to wrath revealed from heaven. But here it is the end of life which fruitless sin worked. It does lead to judgment - judgment of works done while living. God gives eternal life.

To recapitulate this important chapter. First, in reply to continuing in sin, we have found part in death, Christ's death, in order to be justified; that is not living on in such a life, but the contrary. Christ has died, and we esteem ourselves dead (compare 1 Peter 2:24; 4:1), the Christian being thus alive to God in the power of a new life. The first principle then, in which the flesh's judgment of the effect of the obedience of One constituting us righteous is controverted, is that we have part in the righteousness by having part in death, by being associated with Christ in His death (that is, in death to sin, which, clearly, is not living on in it). And we are to reckon ourselves dead, and alive to God in Jesus. But then comes the difficulty. We are not really dead, though called on to account ourselves so: how can we be free from the power of sin? This brings in the contrast with law. Law did not give power over sin in the flesh. It forbade its working and fruits, as it ought to do, but gave no freedom from it, no power against it. But sin shall not have dominion over us who believe, because we are not under law but under grace, and grace does give power - does set free. I am not to let sin reign; and this frees me from its dominion. I am made free from sin, that is, delivered from captivity to it. Being free, I am to yield myself to God and righteousness, give myself up to Him, and my members, once instruments of lusts, as instruments of righteousness. It is the freedom of grace and divine life in power.

156 This is the general doctrine: Christ having died, we reckon ourselves dead as if we had done so. He who is become our life, the true I, has died. I have died - have been crucified - with Him, and, as a Christian, do not own the flesh to be any more alive at all. I speak of all that has happened to Christ as if it had happened to me, because He is become my life, and I live by Him; as a son (whose father had not only paid his debts, but made him a partner) would speak of "our capital, our connections," because he is partner, though he brought nothing in, and all was done and acquired before he became partner; so we in much truer, because living, association with the Lord. Only, as I have remarked, we have not ascension, nor union with Him, nor resurrection with Him, which involves it; but the death of the old man, and life in Christ, and so freedom from sin - the full answer to the allegation that having righteousness in Him gave license to sin. One important remark to make here is, that the true question is one of power. A rule of right is not power over an evil nature. Of this we shall see more; but even here we find that the reigning of sin in our mortal bodies, having dominion over us, is the real question. In point of fact we are not under law; but that is subsisting power in life, grace which gives it, for a mere (however just) claim of righteousness from one that was a sinner. The first answer to the allegation that being constituted righteous by Christ's obedience gives licence to sin is, that we have been planted in the likeness of His death - have been crucified with Him. This applies to sin in the nature. But, besides this, we have grace contrasted with law, giving liberty from the dominion of sin and the slavery we were under to it, which law did not. We are free to live to God.

157 On this follows a full discussion of law. We are free from law, following the same great fundamental principle that we have been crucified with Christ. Now law has power over a man as long as he lives. This is illustrated by the case of marriage, and the law or bond of husband and wife, which lasts evidently as long as one lives, and can no longer; the survivor is free to be to another when one is dead. It is of all importance to the understanding of this chapter to see that the whole subject treated is the bearing of the law - the connection of a soul with it. First, the doctrine on the subject and the distinction of a soul being under law, or connected in life with a risen Christ; and then the experience of a soul quickened and renewed in its desires and delights, but not knowing deliverance by the knowledge that it has died with Christ, and is now connected with another - Christ raised from the dead. The description of the deliverance follows, and the condition of the delivered soul in Romans 8.

Law has power over a man as long as he lives - and cannot have it longer; the person to whom it applies exists no longer. If one to be punished for crime dies, law can no longer reach him. We have seen, in Romans 6, that the fact of not being under law does not cause to live in sin; but that, being under law, one has no power to resist it. It requires, but it does not free from the dominion of sin. But we have become dead to the law by the body of Christ. Had the law reached ourselves, it would have been death, but it would have been condemnation also.* But we are delivered, being dead to the law, by the body of Christ. The figure is changed. Death puts an end to the bond, but it is we who die; yet not actually we, but Christ effectually for us; and now we are united to Him who is raised, that, the power of life being there, we should bring forth fruit - not merely be dead to sin - unto God.

{*Compare 2 Corinthians 3, and Galatians 2:19, 21}

Having thus died as Adam's children, in that Christ has died, we are no longer in the flesh, in that nature or place and standing before God. We do not stand as Adam's children before God at all. We have died as such. We say therefore, "when we were in the flesh" - a thing we could not say if still in it; when we were, the motions of sin which were by the law wrought to bring forth fruit unto death. The prohibition of a will or lust, though right, does but provoke; it makes you think of the object, and does not take away the lust; it does not change the nature. Were I to say to a lover of money, "You must not desire that gold," it would only awaken the desire. Do I resist a wilful child? He only pushes the harder against the obstacle opposed to him. The motions of sins are by the law - a poor way of holiness or righteousness. They wrought in us to produce actual sin unto death. But now we are delivered from the law, having died in that in which we were held. The life in which we were connected with it is ended; the bond which attached to that life exists no more, ending with the life it subsisted in. The law addressed itself to the child of Adam, and required from him what was according to God's will. Man was in sin, not subject to the law of God; nor could his sinful flesh be so, or it would not have been sinful flesh. The law only stirred up that flesh in its will and lusts, but now with Christ we have died; the bond with the law is broken in our death with Christ, and we are connected with Christ risen, serving in the newness of the spirit, not in the oldness of the letter; bound to a husband - not however the law, but Christ. We could not have both together.

158 That is the great point here. Romans 6 laid the groundwork of doctrine and truth, namely, that our old man is crucified with Christ. We are for faith dead. Romans 7 takes up the effect of this on the connection of the child of Adam with law. Death has dissolved the bond,* and we are to another - to Christ risen, now to bring forth fruit to God, for we are alive unto Him. The whole point of the passage is, that we cannot have the law and Christ together - the two husbands at once. It is impossible. But our deliverance from the law is by having died to sin. Christ risen is now our life and husband, where there is power to bring forth fruit to God, which the sinful flesh never could do. The contrast of Christianity with law is not only for justifying, but for life, obedience, and fruitbearing. Under law we are under the dominion (not guilt merely) of sin; in Christ made free, and able to bring forth fruit to God.

{*It is not, "that being dead in which"; as if the law had died. The text has been (in error) changed in one letter in Greek to keep the apparent comparison perfect, to the destruction of the whole doctrine of the passage.}

But this is not all. The law has its use, namely, in bringing out the consciousness of what we are - of our state. Was it the fault of the law, this dominion of sin, while we were under it? Nay, it was the fault of the sin, and lust which the law condemned. "But that," says the apostle, "I had not known, unless the law had said, Thou shalt not lust." If he had murdered, he would have known the fact; his natural conscience would have taken cognisance of it. But we are not treating of sins now (as before observed), but of sin. I had not known that, unless the law had dealt with its first movements as evil. Many have committed no crimes - have neither murdered, stolen, nor committed adultery; but who has never lusted? It would be to say, I am not a child of Adam at all. And note here, we are not speaking of guilt by acts, but of state; not of judgment, nor of forgiveness, but of deliverance, of setting free. And note further here, how great the error is of those who hold lust not to be sin if not consented to. The object here is to detect the evil nature by its first motion - lust. Not, indeed, what we have done, but what we are; and the sinfulness of flesh is detected by that first movement, which is lust - will in evil. It proves, by its sinfulness, the sinful source in me. I know that in me dwells no good. Important though humbling discovery! Not, I repeat, what I have done, but what I am; but how important that! What simple folly the thought to make the child of Adam good, unless he be born again!

159 God's way is, not to improve the wilding, but to cut it down and graft it. Then, when we are grafted with Christ, the fruit of that life is to be brought forth. Law does not condemn the nature nor consequently treat man as lost. Law supposes it is yet to be proved and trusted, but forbids what is its only first movement - lust. Law thus gives the knowledge of what it is. The true force of the word translated "nay," in verse 7, is "but." And note, it is sin, not sins; for he would not, as natural men do not, have judged and taken cognisance of lust in himself as evil and sin, unless the law had said, Thou shalt not lust. The law was thus a means, not of righteousness, but of the knowledge of sin. By it, moreover, sin deceived and killed us. It took its occasion, or point of attack, from the law. Thus did Satan come when Adam was innocent. Now sin takes the prohibition to provoke the will and suggest the lust; for, till the law came in and forbade it, the conscience took no cognisance of lust.

We must remember he is not treating of sins, but of sin. This was provoked and stimulated by the commandment; without it, sin was dead. But when the commandment came, sin revived, and guilt and death came upon my conscience. Otherwise there was no sentence of death in the conscience by sin. Sins would be judged in the day of judgment, bringing condemnation; but a sinful nature, as such, does not give a bad conscience. We remain alive, untested, unawakened. I was a living child of Adam, unconscious of sin, as we see hundreds; but when the law of God forbade lust, the conscience was affected, and I died under its judgment. What had said, Do this and live, and was thus ordained for life, I experimentally found to be to death. I took up the law, thinking I had power to be good and righteous by it: sin profited by it thus to deceive me and bring me into death by the commandment. Still it was to profit. Sin became by the commandment exceeding sinful. It was there, and I unconscious of it as a fatal evil in my flesh (we are not speaking of committed sins); but it appeared as sin when the law came, and became exceeding sinful. It appeared in its true nature of sin, and took the characteristic, moreover, of opposition to, and transgression of, the holy, just, and good will of God.

160 But another element comes in here: the spiritual judgment which can thus estimate all this - "We know." This is a technical expression for knowledge belonging to the Christian as such. See 1 Cor. 8:4; 2 Cor. 5:1; 1 John 3:2; 1 John 5:13; and other places. We know the spirituality of the law; not applying it to crimes merely, but to the inward man. But if I look at myself as a child of Adam, I am carried a captive to sin, sold under it. I say, a child of Adam; for the apostle says, "in me, that is, in my flesh." He is looking at the man as standing on that ground with Christian knowledge as to it, but as married to the first husband - the law: "When we were in the flesh." It is Christian intelligence applied to the judgment of the state of (not an unrenewed person in mind and desire, but) one under the law. Hence the law only is mentioned, not Christ or the Spirit, till the cry for deliverance from that state come. It is not a question whether the flesh is in us; but "when we were in the flesh," the motions of sin there, we being met in that state by the requirements of law in our conscience, not as redeemed and dead with Christ, delivered and having the power of life in Him, consciously in that state.

161 Three immensely important lessons are learned, under divine teaching, in the conflict connected with this state. First, in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. This is not the guilt of having sinned, but the knowledge of what we are, that is, as flesh. Next, I learn that it is not I; for, being renewed, I hate it - would it not at any time: the true I hates this. It is then sin in me, not I - a very important lesson to learn. Thirdly, if it is not I, it is too strong for me. To will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I know not. But it is well to enter into this a little more in detail. It is not really any individual person, but the judgment of a nature; but a nature which (till I know redemption, and that I have died to sin with Christ, and am in Him) constitutes myself, for the conscience. It is to be remarked that the will is supposed always right, and good never to be done. This is not the Christian state. We can do all things through Him that strengthens us.

Further, the man here is a slave; in Romans 8:2 he is set free. In Romans 7:5 we are supposed to be in the flesh; in Romans 8:9, we are not in the flesh, if the Spirit of God dwell in us. If a man be not dead with Christ, he is fully in the flesh. If he do not know it, the conscience and mind are on that ground with God. What he is, not what Christ is, is the ground on which he judges of his state before God. As to his conscious standing, he is in the flesh; and it is the process of deliverance from this by the thorough humiliation of self-knowledge that is here described. The operation of the law is what is contemplated; grace working in the man, but he, as to his mind and conscience, under law undelivered. By the law is the knowledge of sin. Grace has given him to see that the law is spiritual. It is not sins, but sin, which is in question. Conscience has by grace recognised that the law is good, yea, the spirit consents to it; more than that, he delights in it, after the inner man. He is a renewed man.

We have first, then, the state of the man. Light from God has come in. The law is spiritual for him; but he is carnal, a slave to (sold under) sin; for he sees himself in flesh still alive - in that life of a child of Adam in which the law asserts its claim. "I am (that is consciousness, individually) carnal," "sold under sin." That is, you have a man looking at himself as in flesh, and knowing that the law is spiritual, perceiving it by divine teaching.

162 We have then, further (this being the state of the person's soul), two points in respect of the law - nothing, mark, in respect of Christ and the Spirit. He is not there yet, but on the way, getting, while taught of God, knowledge of sin (that is, of himself under law). In the first case he is doing evil, but would not; he does what he hates. He does wrong, but would not. He consents to the law that it is good. His conscience and mind accept it as right - coincide with it, but he does the contrary; but thus under grace, by this very word, he is taught that it is not he does it, but sin that dwells in him. He has a new man, a new life, in which, thus taught, he can treat sin as a stranger, though dwelling in him - as not himself. And now he has experimentally learnt, not mere doctrine, even though taught of God, as to something outside himself - "we know" - but something about himself, and a great lesson too: "I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing." The flesh is a judged nature, a great point of progress. And now the second point in the renewed man comes out - the positive will to do good. He delights in the law of God in the inner man - not merely consents, having it as his own approved rule in conscience, but he would do good; but evil is there - he cannot perform good. Power is wholly wanting: the law gives none. There is a law in his members, a constantly operating power of evil which brings him into captivity, though now against his will.

Poor wretched man! But (immense advantage) he knows it; he knows himself. Desires and efforts to do right have resulted in this - in the knowledge of himself and his real state: in him, that is, in his flesh, there is no good thing. But it is not (now he is quickened of God) himself at all. But that makes out no righteousness for him, no deliverance from the power of sin; he is still under it, being under law. It is an immense lesson to learn, that we have no power. (Like the poor man at the pool of Bethesda, the disease of which he had to be healed had taken away, even if he willed, the strength through which he could get healed; John 5.) Thus taught, the man ceases to look to being better, or to doing; he has learned what he is, and looks for a Deliverer. The moment God has brought him there, all is clear. He thanks God through Jesus Christ our Lord. But though the subject treated be the experience of the soul under the law when its spirituality is known through grace, the thing learned is not what the law is, but what sin is - what we are. By the law is the knowledge of sin. Hence, though the process be carried on under law, by which through the secret working of grace that knowledge is acquired, yet the thing we have learnt to know - what sin in the flesh is - is always true.

163 Hence, although as we have said it is the description of a soul under law, yet it is in a way in which the lesson remains for the Christian at all times. Not that he is ever under law, or in the flesh - he never is: he has died as connected with that first husband, and for faith the flesh is dead, and he is delivered; but the lesson he has learned remains always true. In him, that is, in his flesh, dwells no good thing. And it is experimentally known. The flesh may deceive him if he is careless, and he forget to bear about in his body the dying of the Lord Jesus, but it can no longer deceive him as to what it is itself. He may have left a door open in his house to an unfaithful servant, but he does not now take him for a trustworthy or unsuspected one. And the difference is immense. The power of flesh is broken. And, further, he has no thought of being in the flesh before God. The Galatians shew his position. "The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, that ye may not do the things that ye would." "But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law." You are not in Romans 7, though the evil flesh be there. You are free with the liberty wherewith Christ has set you free. Be not entangled again in the yoke of bondage. Hence, too, after the deliverance is spoken of here, the abiding fact of the two natures is affirmed, though going on further than the law, the subject before us. "So, then, I myself with the mind serve the law of God; with the flesh, the law of sin."

In result, then, the state described is that of a soul under the law, but sin comes to be known, and conflict with this remains - flesh remains flesh. But it is a very different thing to have to say to it, when we have no strength, when we are sold under it, and it has us down, in the combat, under the law of sin, and to be able to say, "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." The natures are the same; but it is one thing, having them, to be under the law, which is the strength of sin, and having died with Christ to have the life and Spirit of Christ, which is the strength of godliness; to be led captive as a rule or law by sin though hating it, or to rejoice in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. This freedom, and the state of the believer in it, we shall find developed in Romans 8. The two points before us are, deliverance, and the abiding of the law of sin in the flesh; only that it is not I. That is the mind which serves the law of God. That is experimental and learned.

164 But there are two things the apostle now assumes of the Christian. What constitutes him such - being in Christ, and the Spirit of God dwelling in him? What belongs to such is another thing. That is being a Christian. But we must remark that the measure of walk and practical effect is limited, as all here is, to human responsibility. One passage alone connects us with the counsels of God, and then only as a great general truth. But the result in practice takes the measure of human responsibility, whatever the deliverance needed to enable us to meet it.

For the man in Christ, then, there can be no condemnation. Such is the first statement in this chapter. It will be remembered that it was said there were two passages descriptive of the Christian's blessing, Romans 5:1-11, and Romans 8, the former already treated of, and what now occupies us: that, the blessing flowing from what God was towards us in grace; this, the believer's status before God. Hence here it is "there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" - not for those for whose sins Christ has died. These last are forgiven, the man justified and fully blest; but it is not his new standing as one who has died as in the flesh, and is alive to God in Christ; who is married to Him that is risen from the dead. How could there be condemnation for those who are in Christ? It would be, so to speak, like condemning Christ.

But the reason is given in connection with what precedes; and that on the side of good in the power of life in Christ on the one side, and as to the evil, the condemnation of sin in the flesh, on the other. The being in Christ is the great and sure ground; but the conditions and ground of it are added when this is the case. The law of sin and death has lost its power. I have another principle of life in power in me, which has its own constant nature and rule; for such is the force of "law" here - "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus." This alludes to the breath, or spirit of life, breathed into Adam. Now it was spiritual or divine life in the power of the Spirit of Christ in us; and this had its constant law and character, and was power which had made the Christian free from the law of sin and death - the deadly principle which ruled in him before, as alive in the flesh. It is there, no doubt; but he is set free from it. It has no dominion. There is another operative life and power, which has its own determined and unvarying characters, and which works in power; so that I am not under the dominion of sin. That is the side of God - what I am before God in life.

165 Then comes the evil nature, and why I am not condemned for it. The law could not work good nor righteousness in me because of it; it could not bring the question of flesh to an end before God; it could neither justify nor deliver me; could not clear me of the evil that is in it before God. Where sin in the flesh was, law could not hinder its acting, nor justify me while it was there; it could not operate the good it required. It only required the good, and provoked the sin. But "God, sending his own Son," sinless surely, but in form and fashion of one of these sinners in flesh, "in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin" (that is, as a sacrifice for sin) "condemned sin in the flesh." The evil thing, so hateful, condemnable for God and for the new man, has been condemned when Christ was a sacrifice for sin. Death and condemnation of sin in the flesh went together, and I am dead to it; and its condemnation is past and settled when Christ was a sacrifice for sin. There is no allowance of it, which the new man even could not bear. A nature is not to be forgiven. But its condemnation was in that which removed all condemnation from me, and was at the same time death to it.

Thus there can be no condemnation for one in Christ. Not only are the sins blotted out, but the nature which produced them has been condemned, that is, sin in the flesh; and, as to my actual state, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of it. Thus the old man is condemned and dead, and the new man lives and walks, so that the claim of the law (its righteousness, the sum of what it requires) is fulfilled in us, because we are not under it, but under grace. The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set me free, and I walk not according to the flesh, which the law forbids, but according to the Spirit, against whose fruits there is no law; yea, through the power of the Spirit of God I walk after that which it leads me into - the life of Christ in this world. And this walking after the Spirit gives its true character to the walk of the Christian in this world.

166 As I have said, as Christ is contrasted with law for righteousness, the Spirit (Christ as life in the power of the Spirit) of God in us is contrasted with the righteous but powerless law for our walk and rule; deadness to sin, and life in the power of the Spirit of God. This the apostle develops. In fact, commencing with the "no condemnation" to the end of verse 11 is the unfolding of the answer to "Who shall deliver?" On the words "who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit," hangs a full description of both; of the Christian life as flowing from the Holy Ghost, and of the flesh. Each has its own objects according to its nature. There are things of the flesh and things of the Spirit - not merely right and wrong, but objects which belong to each.

Thus there are two natures, with their respective objects, and with the new one the power of the Spirit of God, instead of one, the old one, and a law which fruitlessly forbade its desires as well as its acts. They that are after the flesh are governed by its principles: mind, will, have their object in the things which that nature craves after. They that follow the leadings of the Spirit are under His power in the things the Spirit brings to us, and sets the mind upon. Now the mind of the flesh is death; the mind of the Spirit is life and peace. That is, they are characterised respectively by these things as immediately and necessarily flowing from them, or accompanying them. For the mind of the flesh is enmity against God, resists His authority, rejects His will, rises up against Him and His authority, does not like it should exist, and consequently hates Him. It is not hence subject to the law, nor can be. Its lusts will not have what it claims, nor its self-will bow to the claim itself. God comes in by law, asserts authority, and forbids lust; but the flesh knows no obedience, loves its will and its lust, and hates God. Self-will cannot like subjection because it is self-will, nor lust what forbids lust. But God must come in thus with law to flesh. What is essential to flesh, it is essential to God to contradict, and it is enmity against Him. They that are in the flesh cannot then please Him. Those whose life is in the first Adam cannot please God. There the flesh leads and governs. Their place of standing is in Adam life. But this is not so if the Spirit of God dwell in us. This characterises, leads, forms the life of him in whom it dwells. God's Spirit, in living power, forms and characterises the state of the soul.

167 This, then, characterises the Christian, and distinguishes him: the Spirit of God dwells in him. Such an one is not in the flesh (that is not his standing), but in the Spirit. This is clearly and in terms the contrary of the state, "when we were in the flesh"; that is, of Romans 7 experience. Then the motions of sin, which were by the law wrought in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. And, note, it is not here being born again. It is the Spirit of God dwelling in us. True, if we are born again, there are new desires, the evil of the flesh is felt. But this is not liberty and power. But where the Spirit of God is, there is liberty, with God and from sin. It is the fruit of redemption by Christ - of the ministry of righteousness and the Spirit. Christ has redeemed, justified, and cleansed us. The blood of sprinkling having made us perfectly clean* in God's sight, the Holy Ghost comes to dwell in us, the seal of the value of that blood, and consequently, so coming to dwell in us, gives us the consciousness that we are in a new place before God - not in the flesh, not in our natural Adam state, but in the condition in which the Spirit sets us in God's presence. This position belongs only to those who have the Spirit. It is the Spirit of Christ. If any man have not this, he has not the proper Christian place, is not of Christ, does not belong to Him according to the power of redemption, which brings us before God according to its own efficacy, of which the Spirit's presence and indwelling is the characteristic seal and living power - that by which those who have entered into this place are distinguished.

{*Compare the case of the leper, washed, sprinkled with blood, and then anointed.}

Being born again does not give this. It may (and by itself, does) lead to the cry - "Who shall deliver me?" It does not tell us we are redeemed. It gives desires and hopes, but may equally increase fears, because it strengthens the sense of responsibility, giving spiritual apprehension of the measure of it; but it gives no power of deliverance from the evil it makes us sensible of. But the redemption which is in Christ delivers. There is no condemnation for those who are in Him. And if we are in Him, He is in us, the power, as the source, of a new life; yea, that life itself. And this is the Christian; such an one is actually His;* Romans 8:9. Those born of God may be under the law as to their state of mind, dwelling on their own responsibility as alive in flesh, this side of redemption - married to the first husband, and the bond not broken by death, as to their state. They are not united to the second husband in their faith - to Him who is raised from the dead - passed into a new sphere (which is indeed the fruit of redemption for us), where there can be no condemnation; for we are accepted in Christ, and the presence of the Holy Ghost characterises our position.

{*It is of Him, not for Him. Note in verse 1 we are in Christ; here verse 10 He is in us - two things inseparable. One is in a place before God; the other, power of life before the world. It is the practical development of John 14:20.}

168 We now find in verse 10, the power which produces the effect, doctrinally stated in Romans 46 as our position. "If Christ be in you, the body is dead, because of sin." Sin is its only fruit if it live; but if Christ be in one the power of life, the body, as to all will, has its place in death. What then is practically life? The Spirit that is to produce righteousness. This is the full answer to its being liberty to sin, or leading to it, because we are not under law. But this deliverance goes farther. If the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in us, He who raised up Christ from the dead shall quicken our mortal bodies by reason of His Spirit which dwelleth in us. This is full and final deliverance, even as to the body. We may remark that the Spirit is spoken of in three ways here: as the Spirit of God, contrasted with flesh - with man as he is; as the Spirit of Christ, or Christ in us, formative of our practical state; thirdly, as the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus, and the assurance of our mortal bodies being quickened, and thus our possessing full liberty in the highest sense. For all this is not forgiveness sought, nor justification, but deliverance from a state we are made conscious of being in.

A further remark (which leads us to the structure of the whole chapter) has here to be made. In the verses we have been considering, the Spirit, though spoken of as indwelling, is viewed as the source and power of life characterising the man: "The Spirit is life because of righteousness." After this He is spoken of as a distinct and separate Person, acting on and in us - "with our spirit." This is the second part of the chapter. The third and last part is, not what God is in us by His Spirit, but for us, securing us in the blessing which it is His purpose to give.

169 We may now come to the second part of the chapter. It is preceded by two verses of practical consequence; verses 12, 13. "We are not debtors to the flesh." It has no claim or title over us. It has done us all the evil it can, and only evil; and it has been condemned on the cross of Christ, and we are dead to it, having been crucified with Him. Living after it ends in death, but, mortifying the deeds of the body (the things which flow from its will if left to work), we shall live. But now the instruction goes farther, and shews us the relationship the Spirit brings us consciously into, and not merely the state as hitherto; "As many as are led by the Spirit of God these are the sons of God." This flows directly from the whole position we are brought into, in contrast with that we were in under the law - a position God has brought us into by grace, through redemption - not the bondage and fear in which we were toward Him under the law; the fruit of divine grace in Christ - not the effect of failure in responsibility in presence of a divine claim upon us. We are sons of God, and cry, "Abba, Father," having the consciousness of being sons by having the Spirit, which is in us a Spirit of adoption.

It is well to remark, as so frequently occurring in this chapter, that "for" expresses in very many passages no direct inference on the part of the apostle, but introduces some statement confirmatory of the general principle which is in the apostle's mind. Thus, in verses 13, 14, there is no direct inference, though the connection be more immediate in verse 13. Verse 14 goes on to give the whole condition of him who has the Spirit, suggested by the mention of the Spirit exercised in moral power over the walk in verse 13. Such a mortifying of the deeds of the body is natural in the Christian, for such is their real state and character as having the Spirit. But it is in no way "Ye shall live, for," etc. But he has in all the chapter the man in Christ before his eye, shewing what is his character, and what qualities and privileges belong to him as such.

We have now to consider what is said concerning the Spirit as dwelling in us. We are sons, and by the Spirit cry, "Abba, Father," in the consciousness of being so. The Holy Ghost Himself (here we have Him definitely as a distinct Person) "beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God." It is a distinct definite testimony of the Spirit who dwells in us that we are such; not a proving by the word on examination of ourselves (a false and unscriptural and evil procedure), but the testimony of the Holy Ghost Himself dwelling in us, which He bears to us as so dwelling in us. We have the consciousness and estate of the mind of the Spirit in us; but He Himself, as dwelling in us, bears consciously also to us the witness that we are sons. We are in the conscious relationship, but He who is in us gives the confidence-producing testimony.

170 But if we are children, we are heirs. We are heirs of God naturally as His children, and (as Christ is the great heir and firstborn) joint-heirs with Christ. But then the whole path and character of Christ as Man characterises us. His life and Spirit being in us, the spring of what we are, our mind must be in character and nature His. But He suffered here, and now is glorified as Man, ready to inherit all things. We too, then, must suffer with Him; not exactly for Him - this is a special privilege - but with Him. He could not (walking in holy love and grace, holy in all His ways, and heavenly) but suffer in the midst of a sinful world rejecting His love. His Spirit must have been ever grieved by sin, and the sorrow that was all around Him. So the saint in the measure in which he walks in the power of His Spirit, as he says in Timothy, "If we suffer with him, we shall reign with him." It is a whole Christ: the same life has its natural consequences here and in heaven in the place of sons; a heavenly Man in this world, and in the heaven of God in holy glory. We are co-glorified, and co-sufferers. But the sufferings are not worthy to be compared with the glory. I apprehend "in us" is our whole state as well as our persons.

We have, then, a beautiful connection of the suffering and glory, through the dwelling of the Spirit in us. He gives us to know we are sons, and is an earnest and revealer of the glory while we are in this world of sorrow. The creature is in the state which results from the fall, but grace causes it on the other hand to wait for our being in glory for its deliverance. It must be so; the unintelligent creature cannot be brought to the rest of God's glory when the heirs for whom it is ordered are not there. It waits for the manifestation of the sons. The liberty of grace it cannot enter into (which is intelligent and spiritual - "soul-salvation"); but the liberty of glory will be its deliverance also. It was subjected to vanity, not by its will, but by reason of another, Adam - but not ever to be left there. It also will have its deliverance in the liberty of glory; for this applies to the whole state of things, not merely to the relationship of souls with God.

171 Such is the general statement. And in this we get the first and fullest glimpse in Romans of the counsels of God. We shall find something of them as to the Jews in chapter 11, but in this the general result in the sphere of glory of the Son of man, though only briefly stated in connection with the subject of deliverance, which here applies to the whole creation. But this is the general statement of this truth.

What follows is our personal connection with it as Christians. We know (we Christians, having the mind of Christ, know) that the world which flesh is trying to improve as its home is groaning and travailing in pain through the fall (though grace and deliverance and reconciliation are received by us). And this is not simply true of the creature around us: our body is part of this. We being creatures have to wait for the redemption of this - the actual adoption and salvation. The redemption of the body and of the purchased possession, in a general sense, go together. The redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, we have; but the Spirit we have received in consequence is only the earnest of the other. It is in this sense we are saved in hope. What was in God's purpose to give us in salvation we have not yet (that is in glory with Christ); but the work is wrought which saves us, and we have it by the Holy Ghost. We stand (having received the Holy Ghost) between the accomplished work which saves us and entitles to the inheritance (and know it is accomplished, having, withal, been sealed for the day of redemption), and the exercise of power which shall bring the full redemption in when Jesus comes again. We, by the Spirit, look back to the accomplishment of the work, and understand its value; and by the same Spirit look forward to Christ's second coming to accomplish all and bring in the glory. Meanwhile we have these earthen vessels, our unredeemed bodies - unredeemed as to power and deliverance; for the body also is the Lord's, bought with a price; and though we have the firstfruits of the Spirit (for the Spirit will again be poured out as the latter rain for millennial blessing), we suffer with Him who suffered here, connected with the glorious inheritance by the Spirit, and with the creation fallen in the first Adam by the body; and we groan (saved in hope) for the redemption of the body, and wait for that and the inheritance with patience - for that which is not yet seen.

172 We have seen that the Spirit bears witness with our spirit, that we are sons, and so heirs - heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ. For the inheritance we wait. But He takes part also in the infirmities in which we find ourselves, through our connection with the fallen inheritance through the body. But the part we take through the body in the sufferings of the fallen creation is not in the selfishness of a sufferer, but we become, by the Holy Ghost, the voice of all this sorrow according to God. There are cases, no doubt, where we know the will of God, and can (praying in the Holy Ghost) expect an answer according to our demand of God. But there is a mass of sorrow which we feel according to God by the Holy Ghost, for which we know not what to demand as we ought; but the sense of the evil pressing on the heart is wrought by the Holy Ghost, and, in our weakness through this poor body, the mind of the Spirit is there through the Spirit's working.

Thus He who searches the hearts, and scrutinises what is found there, finds, not our poor selfish feelings or complaints, but the mind of the Spirit - what the Holy Ghost has produced in them; for the Holy Ghost Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. He makes intercession for the saints according to God. Wonderful privilege in our sorrows and sufferings, that, when God searches the heart, He finds the mind formed by the Spirit there, the Spirit itself, as in us, making intercession for us according to God! It is a privilege to be in suffering thus, God by His Spirit taking part in it. As Christ personally felt all the sorrow perfectly through which He passed, so we through grace by the Spirit take our part in it (not according to selfishness, but) according to God, with the increased sense of our infirmity and weakness of our dependence and connection with a fallen creation from which we cannot escape down here, and feeling it so much the more as we see the glory, but given by the power of the Spirit to take part in it according to God - to be its voice, so to speak, in grace felt by ourselves, though having part in it. It is the mind of the Spirit in it which God finds in us when He searches the hearts, and the Holy Ghost Himself is there making intercession for the saints according to God. It is wonderful grace: the heart of man is searched; the mind of the Spirit is there, because the Holy Ghost Himself is there interceding, but, though Himself, in groans which are in our hearts. But (for such is the force of it), though we do not know "what to pray for as we ought," we do "know that all things work together for good to them that love God." God works of and from Himself in our favour - and makes everything work together for our good. We know not what to look for. Perhaps in the present state of things there is no remedy, no direct setting aside or remedy for what makes us groan; but this is certain - God makes all things work together for good to those who love Him. The sorrow may not be remedied, but the sorrow is blessed. We are called according to God's purpose, and God orders everything for our good.

173 This evidently brings in God working for us (without us - not in us); and this is the third part of the chapter. The work in us we have seen, in life by the Spirit, and the presence of the Spirit giving us the consciousness of being sons, heirs of God, joint-heirs with Christ, and helping us - taking part in the scene of the infirmities and sorrow - being come down from heaven to dwell in us while we are in the midst of and, as to our bodies, connected with, the fallen creation, subject to corruption through the first Adam. The will is right; power is there by the Spirit for the inner man, and hope of the glory to come; and that just makes us feel the infirmity and sorrow, but felt through the Holy Ghost according to God. It is a blessed place, and shews how true and complete is the deliverance from the power and evil of the flesh; for in that, in which by the body we are connected with the fallen creation, the will is not - "not willingly," though we be still subject to the effect as sorrow. As for the will of the flesh, it is dead and condemned; but, on the contrary, He who searches the hearts finds the mind of the Spirit - a divine sense of the evil, and sorrow through it; the Holy Ghost interceding for us, in that which is beyond the measure of human thought, but God entering, as in our hearts, into the sorrow. It is a wonderful deliverance in, though not yet out of, the sorrow.

We have now brought to us the counsel and favour of God - His own purpose. If through grace any have loved God, they were called according to His purpose. The purpose is not here, nor indeed anywhere, simply sovereignty in election. It includes that to which they were called. They were foreknown; but whom he foreknew He predestinated to a glory which was in His mind and counsels before the world began, namely, to "be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren."

174 Here we may remark the epistle goes wholly beyond and out of its general subject - the responsibility of man and his failure, and the way that it is met by the death of Christ. But the delight of divine wisdom was in the sons of men before the world was. Hence the Son became a man that His redeemed ones might be conformed to Him in glory. Meanwhile the first Adam was set in responsibility, and this had to be met, and was met in the cross, but therein a righteous ground laid also for the accomplishing the counsels of God, which consequently was then revealed. See Titus 1:2, 3; 2 Tim. 1:9; Rom. 16:25, 26. Compare Eph. 3 and Col. 1. In the Romans, however, the instruction does not go beyond the individual, even in speaking of the purpose of God. We are predestinated to be conformed to the image of God's Son, that He may be the firstborn among many brethren. This surely is clearly sovereign grace. To set poor worms, and dying worms, in the same glory as the Son of the Father has nothing to do with responsibility, or meeting it; although the act by which our failure in it was met did lay the ground for it, in that Man perfectly glorified God; and hence Man is set in God's glory. Our sins and our sin were met on the cross, as we have seen. But besides that God was glorified; and man, exalted to His right hand, entered into the glory as our forerunner. For, besides His personal and eternal title, it is because of what He did for us that Christ is entered into the glory. Here then we pass beyond responsibility and get on purpose: only that in this epistle we do not go farther than the individual place. We are to be conformed to the image of God's Son. And so scripture constantly testifies. "We have borne the image of the earthy," says 1 Corinthians 15, and "we shall bear the image of the heavenly Adam." "When he shall appear, we shall be like him," says the apostle John; 1 John 3. "He will change our body of humiliation, and fashion it like his glorious body," says our apostle; Phil. 3. Such as to this point is the wondrous counsel of God. For how, as to state, could we conceive anything more glorious, more blessed, than to be conformed to the image of God's Son; to see Him as He is, and be like Him?

175 The Spirit then blessedly states the security of those whom God has predestinated to be so conformed, stating the steps by which they are brought to the great result, only omitting wholly the work in us, which had been fully stated previously, because He is speaking of that which God is for us in His own purpose as its source (and securing that purpose in grace up to its accomplishment), and not of man's responsibility and the necessary requirement of God's nature and righteousness. These have been discussed in the previous part, both as to guilt and righteousness, and as to nature and state, so as to render it possible to have to say to the holy God. Grace has wrought that, but has wrought what was needed that we might be reconciled to God. Here (as already stated), alone in Romans, he touches on purpose and counsels. So in Ephesians 1:4. There it is so according to the purpose of His own will. Men must be holy and in love to be before Him; but making us sons is according to the purpose of His own will. He might have made us something lower - could not, indeed, if we think of Him. It was part of His perfection to think and purpose thus. But we can think as a fact of a lower place. But His counsel was to make us sons, "that in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us by Christ Jesus." Part of His glory - of what angels learn - would have been lost else; part of the glorious offering of the atonement. This could not be. Well, He called them, justified them, and brought all to perfection in His plan - He glorified them. It is not as yet in historical accomplishment, but all one unbroken chain with God.

We have then the great and blessed truth derived from it all - God is "for us": if so, "who shall be against us?" It is the great central truth of grace: God is for us. He is for us, in giving, in justifying, and in securing that in all difficulties nothing shall separate us from His love. And first, in giving, "He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us": with Him given, we can reckon on receiving everything else. No gift like this: how should He then not give everything else? Again, it is God Himself who justifies. It is not here justified before Him, but He justifies us Himself - little matter who condemns us then. God is for us in this also. Compare Zechariah 3.

176 Further, there are difficulties, trials, dangers in the way, death, the high and holy place so far removed, Satan's power against us. First, as to difficulties and trials, we more than conquer. It is the very path of blessing and honour: there Christ trod; there His power and mind are with us. Take all on high moreover, or in the depth: angels and powers, all are creatures - creature power or creature weakness. They cannot separate us from the love of God: this is more, more sure, more strong than any creature; yet it is in Him who, as Man, has met for us all of hostile power and death in the way, and is on high for us. It is the love of God, the sureness of divine love, and that in Christ Jesus our Lord, who has been through all, and is now on high for us. This secures us against all and through all for glory.

Here alone in this epistle, to bring in His intercession, the ascension is spoken of: "It is Christ that died, yea, rather that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us." He has gone down to the depth for us in sorrow and the ruin of man, and risen in power and victory over it now as the exalted Man; He is interested in us, intercedes for us, finding needed help and mercy: what then shall separate us from His love? Here it is the love of Christ, that we may know Him and His love, as Man gone down to depth, and gone up on high as Man, still interested in and caring for us. In verse 39 it is the love of God in Christ, that we may know the love to be divine, supreme, and immutable, above everything that might separate in us - stronger than everything which, without us, might seek to separate us from this love.

This closes the doctrine of the epistle, carrying us on personally to glory, according to God's counsels, but not beyond our personal place according to those counsels; and surely it is high and blessed enough. Otherwise the epistle goes no farther than the responsibility of man, of which the law is the perfect rule, and where even redemption and the Spirit (our being dead to sin, and alive through Christ to God) have set us free; it is still "the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in us who walk after the Spirit." It is being thus dead and alive in Christ which is the way of deliverance. But no one can read Romans 6:14, and Romans 7, without seeing that the great object of the apostle is to shew that being taken wholly from under the law and put under Christ - being delivered from the law - is the way of godliness as well as of peace; that the law, which gave no new life and left sin its power - left us therefore under its power, is contrasted with our having died, for faith, to sin, and with being alive through Christ and the power of the Spirit. That is, obligation, sin, and no new life, which is our state under law, is contrasted with life and the Spirit (having died to sin), giving us power and liberty, though the flesh remains just the same when the mind is renewed, and man is viewed as living still in this earth, only in the life of Christ, and dead to sin.

177 But in one case we, even if renewed, are still under the power of, and slaves to, sin; in the other, we are set free to live to God. Law is bondage to sin; our new place is life and liberty, sin in the flesh being condemned in the cross. The natures are the same; but to be bound by the evil one and unable to deliver ourselves is a different thing from being set free by power and able to keep it under. But this we have through the very fact that this epistle confines itself to the responsibility of man and the way God has met it in grace, man's justification and deliverance, with only just a slight mention of counsels at the end to bring in his security.

Thus the whole ground of his personal standing as so justified (God's salvation), is with wonderful fulness completely set forth, searched into, and grounded on God's work of grace, from the utter sinfulness of man alienated from God to the perfect security of the called one, so that nothing can separate him from God's love. This is of unspeakable value. Sin is fully stated, searched out; the law, as condemning and convicting of sin, forgiveness, justification, deliverance from the power of sin, all gone into; every question examined relating to how a man can be just with God; divine judgment, and human experience, fully ventilated; and divine righteousness, through grace, effectually established as the ground on which the believer stands, and which he will never be off. It does not go far on into counsels and privileges connected with the establishment of Christ's glory as Head; but our standing is most completely revealed and gone into, in the Holy Ghost's reasoning, by the word of God.

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With the prayerful desire that the Lord Jesus Christ will use this God-given ministry in this form for His glory and the blessing of many in these last days before His coming. © Les Hodgett .