Or do you not know, brethren (for I am speaking to those who know the Law),
Paul is clarifying here that he's addressing primarily Jewish believers.
that the Law has jurisdiction over a person as long as he lives?
Only a living person can obey a law, when he dies he can't do anything.
For the married woman is bound by Law to her husband while he is living; but if her husband dies, she is released from the Law concerning the husband.
Marriage is a contract that the two people agree to, until death. So if her husband dies, she's no longer married to him, the marriage contract has been nullified by his death.
So then, if while her husband is living she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress;
Sleeping with another man while still married to her husband is going against the contract she agreed to follow.
but if her husband dies, she is free from the Law, so that she is not an adulteress though she is joined to another man.
But if the contract has been nullified by the death of the husband, it's not in effect any more, so she is free to agree to another contract in marriage to someone else.
(Paul is not giving marital advice here, he's using the marriage agreement as an example of how God's Covenants operate.)
Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead,
The same way, the Law is a contract we made with the Lord God, and we are bound to it "until death." So by the Lord's death, and our dying with Him, the contract was nullified in its authority over us, and we are free to "marry" another, the same Lord with a new Life, under another contract.
in order that we might bear fruit for God.
Physical marriage produces children, which are the fruit of a marriage. Our spiritual marriage to our Lord Jesus is to produce the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5: 22-23), which also produces spiritual children, in this spiritual marriage.
For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law, were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death.
While we live in the flesh, we are bound to the contract of the Law which binds us to having to obey every letter. But when we can't do it all perfectly, we're going against the contract. That's why God calls idolatry spiritual adultery.
So, because we all have failed to obey perfectly, we've all sinned, and deserve to die.
But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter.
When Jesus becomes our Savior, we die with Him on the Cross, and He causes us to become alive spiritually by putting His Holy Spirit inside us, making our dead human spirits alive. So the old contract has been rendered null and void to us, and we're under a New Covenant now.
What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? May it never be! On the contrary, I would not have come to know sin except through the Law; for I would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said,
You shall not covet (Exodus 20: 17; Deuteronomy 5: 21).But sin, taking opportunity through the commandment, produced in me coveting of every kind; for apart from the Law sin is dead.
When my kids were teens, they told me that all the "just say no" commercials only reminded them of the drugs and cigarettes, and made them want to do drugs and cigarettes.
Just the mention of them raised a desire for them, even when showing all the detrimental results of imbibing in them. That's our sin-nature working.
I was once alive apart from the Law; but when the commandment came, sin became alive and I died;
and this commandment, which was to result in life, proved to result in death for me;
for sin taking an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me.
Just as the commercials' intent was to protect the kids from drugs and cigarettes, the effect was that sin lied to them, and caused them to want to do them. If they had succumbed to that deceit, then they would have damaged their own health, physically, mentally, and emotionally, and their relationships in their family. What was intended for good resulted in death.
So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
It's good to know how to do good, and God's commandments reveal how holy and righteous He is, and how He wants us to be holy and righteous, too.
Therefore did that which is good become a cause of death for me? May it never be! Rather, it was sin, in order that it might be shown to be sin by effecting my death through that which is good, so that through the commandment sin would become utterly sinful.
One reason why God gave the Ten Commandments, and all the sacrificial laws, and all the other rules and precepts and ordinances, was to show how perfect God is, and how evil and harmful it is to go against the order and symmetry God put into our World so that everything would go well for us.
And when we go against what He showed us, it shows that we don't trust Him to know what is best, that we think we know better. As though we're smarter than He is!
But that lie is what draws us astray, and brings decay and depredation and death to our lives. And shows how horrible it is to sin against God.
The perfect Law shows how utterly sinful every sin is, even the little, tiny ones. Because we're putting something else before God in importance in our lives.
O my Father, please help us to see how evil sin is, how much it hurts us, and breaks Your heart. You Love us so much, and it pains you to see how we are doing so much to disrespect You and what You have made, even knowing how perfect and just You are.
It breaks Your heart so much that You have done everything possible and impossible to draw us to Yourself, to take care of our unpayable debt that would take us forever to pay, and never be done.
You sent Your own Son, our Lord God Himself, to take that eternal debt upon Himself for each of us, so that His precious Blood could wash us completely clean, to be fit for You to live in each of us by Your Holy Spirit.
And that's how You planned for us to be able to live with You where You are, without being destroyed by Your Presence. This is why You created. This is why You made the Universe to place our Earth there, as a perfect paradise for humanity to live. To the end that Mankind would be Your own children, members of Your Divine family, to be Your kings and queens to rule Your extensive Kingdom that will never cease to continue to grow and expand forever.
Father, let Your church know that it is our job to let the rest of the World know who You are. To share with them how much You Love them. Send us out as Your workers, into every fertile field You have prepared, into every field ripe for harvest, to reap all Your crops into Your great barn.
Lead us to find every wandering sheep, every lost lamb caught in a pit or entangled in a thicket, to carry them all, by the hand or even kicking and screaming, into the serenity and peace and joy of Your One Fold with One Shepherd.
And Your great House will be filled with all Your uncountable number of children, every place at Your grand Banquet Table will be occupied, to enjoy the feasting and rejoicing forever with our dear Father God.
And every eye shall see, every knee will bow, and every tongue will confess in every language, that Jesus Christ is our Lord God Almighty, the King of the Universe, to the glory of Almighty God the Father, for ever and ever. Amen.
Even so, come quickly, Lord Jesus!
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