Romans 7

Released From the Law, Bound to Christ

7Do you not know, brothers and sisters^q—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law has authority over someone only as long as that person lives? ²For example, by law a married woman is bound to her husband as long as he is alive, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law that binds her to him.^{r 3}So then, if she has sexual relations with another man while her husband is still alive, she is called an adulteress.^s But if her husband dies, she is released from that law and is not an adulteress if she marries another man.

⁴So, my brothers and sisters, you also died to the law^t through the body of Christ,^u that you might belong to another,^v to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. ⁵For when we were in the realm of the flesh,^aw the sinful passions aroused by the law^x were at work in us,^y so that we bore fruit for death.^{z 6}But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law^a so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.^b

The Law and Sin

⁷What shall we say, then?^c Is the law sinful? Certainly not!^d Nevertheless, I would not have known what sin was had it not been for the law.^e For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.”^{bf 8}But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment,^g produced in me every kind of coveting. For apart from the law, sin was dead.^{h 9}Once I was alive apart from the law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. ¹⁰I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring lifeⁱ actually brought death. ¹¹For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment,^j deceived me,^k and through the commandment put me to death. ¹²So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good.^l

¹³Did that which is good, then, become death to me? By no means! Nevertheless, in order that sin might be recognized as sin, it used what is good^m to bring about my death,ⁿ so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.

¹⁴We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual,^o sold^p as a slave to sin.^{q 15}I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.^{r 16}And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good.^{s 17}As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.^{t 18}For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature.^cu For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. ¹⁹For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.^{v 20}Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.^w

²¹So I find this law at work:^x Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. ²²For in my inner being^y I delight in God’s law;^{z 23}but I see another law at work in me, waging war^a against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin^b at work within me. ²⁴What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?^{c 25}Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!^d

So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law,^e but in my sinful nature^d a slave to the law of sin.^f