Romans 7: Now vs Before

[Ghada]

With every doctrinal dispute in the Bible, there is always one or two verses that end the argument. In Romans 7, the simple fact is, that Romans 7 is about now after and was before.

Paul is first speaking of now after becoming a repented and newborn son of God, and then speaks of how he was before conversion to Christ Jesus.

Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God.

For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.

But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.

As Paul and all sons are now after deliverance.

What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay,

Eternal principle of God's law, yesterday, today, and forever.

I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.

For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.

O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

As Paul and all sinners were before deliverance.

 

[Ghada]

We also see that Paul begins to speak specifically of how it was for him after hearing the word of truth, yet not now doing the truth from the heart by unrepentance from lusting and sinning.

As with all confusion brought into the doctrine of God in the Bible, the grammatical obvious is overlooked in the name of 'theological' and 'spiritual' teaching.

The complexity of double mindedness revealed in sincere hearers but not doers of the word, has nothing to do with the straightforward fact of Paul first speaking of Himself now as a son of God doing the word, vs before as an unrepented hearer of the word only.

And only the unrepented hearers, that seek to justify their continued sinning, will openly lie against simple words and grammatical context. Trying to shape-shift the past tense into the present tense, is grammatical malfeasance.

But to make present deliverance of Jesus Christ the same as past non-deliverance before Jesus Christ, is rejecting the entire NT of God, and making the blood of His Lamb no more powerful nor better than of a bull and goat.

The only thing true about such false accusation against Jesus' deliverance, is that for themselves, the present indeed is still the same old past of lusting and sinning. The delusion is to make Romans 7 all now and present, in order to claim a change of deliverance in spirit only, and not in deeds and in life.

My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.

 

[Wynona]

Well put. Can we stop using Romans 7 to justify sin now?