Romans 7:7-13 (Wednesday Evening Bible Study)

Romans 7:7-13

• Is God’s law bad for pointing out sin?  Consider why someone might think there is something wrong with the law.
• Is There Something Wrong With The Law?
  • What has Paul told us about the law?
  • The Spirit is more favorable 
  • It is unable to justify sinners
  • It is associated with sin
  • Believers die to it
• So after reading what Paul has written in this letter to Rome some might think that the law is no good for anything.
• Context:
  • Last week we saw that since we have died to the law we are no longer live under it. Does that mean that there’s nothing good with the law or that it’s all bad? What purpose do God’s precepts have? In our passage tonight Paul tells us why the law isn’t bad and helps us see what the results of God’s law are.
• Romans 7:7
• 7 What should we say then? Is the law sin? Absolutely not! But I would not have known sin if it were not for the law. For example, I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, Do not covet.
  • Does Paul see the law as sinful?
    • No Way!
    • Paul begins this section with a familiar phrase: “what then shall we say?” He used it in chapters 3, 4, and 6. Paul is again anticipating a question from his readers and quickly answers it. He verbalizes what some may be thinking.
  • Who is the “I” here?
    • The best way to see it is Paul speaking of himself…If that is the case then are the spiritual events describes here just true for Paul or representative of what most of will experience.
  • According to what Paul says here, what does the law do?
    • The law makes sin known…the law illuminates sin or gives  us a knowledge of sin.
  • What stage of life do you think Paul is describing here?
    • As childhood innocence to the age of accountability, becoming aware of God’s law and the demand on him to keep it.
  • Did Paul covet before the law told him not to covet?
    • Yes, but he didn’t know there was anything wrong with coveting. However, after the law his coveting became apparent. So is the problem with the law? Some would think so. There’s nothing wrong with the law; the law is from God. The problem is with us and that problem becomes all the more apparent when we compare ourselves to the law.
  • Out all the commandments why did Paul pick, you shall not covet?
    • This is the 10th commandment…Here is the entire command  Exodus 20:17
      • You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
    • How would you define coveting?
      • “an intense desire to possess something (or someone) that belongs to another person.” It also means “to desire greatly, to lust after that which cannot be legitimately ours.”
  • Covet, then, is to want what belongs to someone else.
    • Maybe Paul chose coveting because is often the cause of most other sins. What we see is the sin, but if we could see the motives behind the sin it would often be a spirit of coveting. Some have argued that coveting was the root sin of Eve’s decision to disobey God in the Garden of Eden.
• Romans 7:8-9
• 8 And sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me coveting of every kind. For apart from the law sin is dead. 9 Once I was alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life again
  • What is the next result of the law?
    • Paul says it produced in him every kind of coveting. So the law is pictured here as in some sense provoking sin.
    • Because the law is good, it shows that we are bad. The law illuminates the evil lurking in our lives and at the same time, it also stimulates sin.
  • There a hotel Galveston, Texas that sits right on the beach. They posted a sign in each room: “No Fishing from the Balcony.” Yet, every day, hotel guests threw in their lines to the water below. The management decided to try a different approach and they removed all the signs. I’m sure you can guess what happened. The fishing stopped immediately. The sign had ignited sin.
  • The Greek word translated “opportunity” is a military word,  it means a base or bridgehead  for military operations  for an attack. So sin is pictured as an enemy who is using the law itself to launch an attack upon us.
  • How can the commandment be an opportunity for sin?  Especially since the law was designed to prevent it?
    • Prohibitions awaken the desire to break them…we may think God is trying to, limit our freedom so we rebel.
  • How is sin dead apart from the law?
    • In the absence of law sin is not identified. Romans 4:15… And where there is no law there is no transgression.
  • When was Paul alive apart from the law?
    • Reference to his days of innocence childhood…once Paul became accountable and understood the law, sin sprang to life in  him…he violated the commandment and died  spiritually.
• Romans 7:10-11
• 10 and I died. The commandment that was meant for life resulted in death for me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me, and through it killed me.
  • What is the result of the law here?
    • The law brings death…In other words, the law tells us how to live and then condemns us for not living up to it.
  • Who deceived Paul?
    • He says sin here but he is personalizing it…Satan stands behind it.  Who was   doing the deceiving at the  very 1st sin…How was Eve deceived?  The serpent lied…you will be  like God…it  made Eve resent God for holding this back from her.
  • What are some ways that sin deceives us?
    • You’re not as sinful as the Bible says you are. In fact, you are really a good person.
    • Everyone else doing it, so why don’t you.
    • This will satisfy, fulfill and make you happy.
    • This isn’t really sin, anyway
    • Don’t underestimate the deceitfulness of sin. The author of Hebrews warns us about the deceitfulness of sin. Hebrews 3:13
      • But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness. 
  • After being deceived Sins brings what?
    • Death
• Romans 7:12
• 12 So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and just and good.
  • Why is the law and the commandment holy, righteous and good?
    • Because God is holy, righteous and good and the law is a reflection of His character; the law came from Him. 
• Romans 7:13
• 13 Therefore, did what is good become death to me? Absolutely not! But sin, in order to be recognized as sin, was producing death in me through what is good, so that through the commandment, sin might become sinful beyond measure.
  • How can Paul say ‘By no means’ concerning the law bringing death to him?
    • Because the real culprit is not the law but rather sin…sin is the source of death.
  • What happens if we think our sin is no big deal?
    • Will we see we need a Savior?
  • In a sermon on sin, Andy Stanley made the point that most of us would rather use the word “mistake” instead of “sin” when we do wrong. He says,
  • If everything I do wrong can be dumbed down to where it’s just a mistake, that makes me a mistaker, which means I don’t have sin. If I don’t have sin, I’m not a sinner. If I’m not a sinner, I don’t have any need for a Savior. If you’re just a mistaker, then all you have to do is do better…[However] until you embrace the fact that you’re a sinner, you’re not open to embracing the fact that God sent you a Savior.
• SLIDE-TAKE AWAY
  • The law is there to make sin known
  • The law is  righteous, holy and good
  • Sin uses the law to bring death to the law breaker
  • Unless we are aware of our sin we cannot be aware of our need for a Savior.