The Early Church · c. AD 57
Chapter 23
No Condemnation
For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from God’s love which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
For parents
Paul writes of a married woman who would be called an adulteress if she became another man’s wife while her husband lived (Romans 7:2–3); it is told plainly, and the word is explained. He speaks of being slaves of sin or slaves of righteousness (Romans 6:16–22), and of persecution, famine and the sword, quoting the words “for your sake we are killed all day long” (Romans 8:35–36).
’s letter to went on. “What should we say, then?” he wrote. “Should we stay in sin, that may overflow? Never! We died to sin. How could we live in it any longer?
“Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life.
“If we have been joined with him in the likeness of his death, we will also have a share in his . We know this: our old self was with him. This was so that the body of sin would be done away with, and we would no longer be slaves to sin. Someone who has died has been freed from sin.
“But if we died with , we believe that we will also live with him. And we know that Christ has been raised from the dead and doesn’t die anymore. Death is no longer his master! When he died, he died to sin one time; but the life he lives now, he lives to God. So think of yourselves, too, as dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
“So don’t let sin rule as king in your mortal body,” Paul wrote, “to make you obey its cravings. Don’t hand over the parts of your body to sin as tools for wrongdoing. Instead, hand yourselves over to God as people who are alive from the dead, and the parts of your body to God as tools of . Sin will not be master over you, because you are not under law, but under grace.
“What then? Since we are not under law but under grace, should we sin? Never! Don’t you know that when you give yourselves to someone as servants and obey him, you are the servants of the one you obey? That is true whether you serve sin, which ends in death, or obedience, which ends in righteousness.
“But thank God! You were once slaves of sin, but you became obedient from the heart to the form of teaching you were handed over to. Set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.
“I’m putting this in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. Just as you once handed over the parts of your body as servants to uncleanness, and to wickedness piled on wickedness, so now hand them over as servants to righteousness, for holiness. When you were servants of sin, you were free from righteousness.
“What fruit did you have back then from the things that make you ashamed now? Those things end in death. But now you have been freed from sin and made servants of God. Your fruit is holiness, and it leads to eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
“Or don’t you know, brothers and sisters,” Paul wrote, “that the law has power over a person for as long as he lives? I am speaking to people who know the law.
“A woman who has a husband is bound to him by law while he is alive. But if he dies, she is freed from the law that tied her to her husband. So then, if she becomes another man’s wife while her husband lives, she would be called an . But once her husband has died, she is free from the law. Then she is not an adulteress, even if she becomes another man’s wife.
“And so, my brothers and sisters, you too were made dead to the law through the body of Christ. This was so that you would be joined to another, to him who was raised from the dead, and so that we would bear fruit for God. When we were in the flesh, the sinful passions that came through the law were at work in the parts of our bodies, bearing fruit for death. But now we have been freed from the law. We died to what held us, so we serve in newness of the spirit, and not in oldness of the letter.
“What should we say, then? Is the law sin? Never! But I wouldn’t have known sin except through the law. I wouldn’t have known about unless the law had said, ‘You shall not covet.’
“But sin found an opening through the commandment and produced in me all kinds of coveting. Without the law, sin is dead. Once I was alive without the law, but when the commandment came, sin came back to life, and I died. The commandment was for life, but I found it to be for death. Sin found an opening through the commandment, deceived me, and through it killed me.
“So the law is holy indeed, and the commandment holy, righteous, and good. Did what is good, then, become death to me? Never! But sin was causing death in me through something good. That was so it would be shown to be sin, and so that through the commandment sin would become extremely sinful.”
“We know that the law is spiritual,” Paul wrote, “but I am made of flesh, sold under sin. I don’t understand what I am doing. For I don’t do what I desire to do; but what I hate, that I do. But if what I don’t desire is what I do, I am agreeing with the law that it is good.
“So now it is not I who do it anymore, but sin, which lives in me. For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, no good thing lives. Desire is there with me, but I don’t find it doing what is good. For the good that I desire, I don’t do; but the evil that I don’t desire, that I do. And if what I don’t desire is what I do, it is not I who do it anymore, but sin, which lives in me.
“So this is the law I find: while I desire to do good, evil is present. For I delight in God’s law in my inward self, but I see in the parts of my body a different law, fighting against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity under the law of sin that is in the parts of my body.
“What a wretched man I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! So then with the mind, I myself serve God’s law, but with the flesh, sin’s law.”
“There is therefore now no to those who are in Christ Jesus,” Paul wrote, “who don’t walk according to the flesh, but according to the . The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus made me free from the law of sin and of death.
“God did what the law couldn’t do, because the law was weak through the flesh. He sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, and he condemned sin in the flesh. He did this so that what the law requires would be fulfilled in us, who don’t walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
“People who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but people who live according to the Spirit set theirs on the things of the Spirit. The mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace. That is because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God: it isn’t subject to God’s law, and it can’t be. Those who are in the flesh can’t please God.
“But you aren’t in the flesh. You are in the Spirit, if it’s true that the Spirit of God lives in you. If anyone doesn’t have the Spirit of Christ, that person doesn’t belong to him. If Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is alive because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of the one who raised up Jesus from the dead lives in you, then the one who raised up Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.”
“So then, brothers and sisters,” Paul wrote, “we owe something, but we don’t owe it to the flesh to live by the flesh. If you live by the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. Those led by the Spirit of God are God’s children.
“You didn’t receive the spirit of slavery, to be afraid again, but you received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry, ‘! Father!’
“The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God. And if we are children, we are also : heirs of God, and heirs together with Christ, if indeed we suffer with him, so we may also be glorified with him.”
“I consider,” Paul wrote, “that the sufferings of this present time aren’t worthy to be compared with the glory that will be revealed toward us. The creation waits, eagerly watching for the children of God to be revealed. The creation was made subject to emptiness. It wasn’t its own choice. It was because of the one who made it subject, and it was in hope that the creation itself will also be freed from slavery to decay, into the liberty of the glory of the children of God.
“We know that the whole creation groans and suffers birth pains together until now. And it isn’t only the creation. We ourselves have the of the Spirit, and even we groan inside ourselves as we wait for adoption, the of our body. We were saved in hope. But hope that is seen isn’t hope. Who hopes for what he can see? But if we hope for something we don’t see, we wait for it with patience.
“In the same way, the Spirit also helps us when we are weak, because we don’t know how to pray as we should. But the Spirit himself pleads for us with groanings that can’t be put into words. The one who searches the hearts knows what is on the Spirit’s mind, because the Spirit pleads for the the way God wants.
“We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, for those who are called according to his purpose. For whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. Whom he predestined, those he also called. Whom he called, those he also justified. Whom he justified, those he also glorified.”
“What then should we say about these things?” Paul wrote. “If God is for us, who can be against us? He didn’t spare his own Son, but handed him over for us all. How would he not also freely give us all things along with him?
“Who could bring a charge against God’s chosen ones? It is God who . Who is the one who condemns? It is Christ who died. More than that, he was raised from the dead. He is at the right hand of God, and he also pleads for us.
“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Could trouble, or anguish, or persecution, or famine, or having no clothes, or danger, or the sword? Just as it is written, ‘For your sake we are killed all day long. We were counted as sheep for the slaughter.’
“No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor , nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from God’s love which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”