Romans 7

1. At death they are freed from a body of sin. There are in the best reliquiae peccati, some remainders and relics of corruption (Romans 7:24). O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from this body of death!

The moral law is to keep us within the bounds of our duty; sin is a going beyond our bounds. 2. The Law of God; it is not the law of an inferior prince that is broken, but of Jehovah, who gives laws as well to angels as men; it is a law that is just, and holy, and good (Romans 7…

Quest. But who can obey God in all things? Ans. An adopted heir of heaven, though he cannot obey every precept perfectly, yet he does evangelically: 1. He approves of every command (Romans 7:16). I consent to the law that it [reconstructed: is] good.

No man can feel sin but by grace. A wicked man is insensible; lay a 100 weight upon a dead man, he does not complain, but the being sensible of corruption, argues a gracious principle (Romans 7:21). Again, from where is it that there is a combat with sin, but from the life of gr…

The Law of God is a hedge to keep us within the bounds of sobriety and piety. Use 2. If God spoke all these words of the Moral Law, then it condemns, first, the Marcionites and Manichees, who spoke slightly, indeed, blasphemously of the Moral Law; they say it is below a Christia…

I was held before conversion (says Austin) not with an iron [reconstructed: chain], but with the obstinacy of my own will. Sin is the enslaver; sin is called, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, a law (Romans 7:23), because it has such a binding power over a man: And it is said, 〈 in non…

2. The threats and prohibitions of the moral law reach the heart: the law of God forbids not only the act of sin, but the desire and inclination: not only does it forbid adultery, but lusting (Matthew 5:28). Not only stealing but coveting (Romans 7:7). Lex humana ligat manum, le…

Third, we grieve that we can do no better. When we fail, we weep: we prefer bills of complaint against ourselves, and judge ourselves for our failings (Romans 7:24). Fourth, we do elicere conatum, we endeavor to obey every Commandment (Philippians 3:14): I press toward the mark.

In old age the fair blossoms of beauty fall; so original sin is the Old Man, because it has withered our beauty, and made us deformed in God's eye. 2. Original concupiscence is called the law of sin (Romans 7:25). Original sin has vim coactivam, the power of a law.

What would a Christian give to have his chains taken off, to be rid of vain thoughts. How did Paul (that bird of paradise) bemoan himself for his sins (Romans 7:24). We cannot act either our duties or graces without sin.

It is not said, You shall not take away his house: but, You shall not covet it. These lustings and desires after the forbidden fruit are sinful (Romans 7:7). The law has said, You shall not covet.

A man sweats at his recreation, tires himself with hunting, but there is a delight he takes in it which sweetens it: (Romans 7:22) I delight in the Law of God, in the inner man, Gr. [illegible], I take pleasure. Not only is the kingdom of Heaven delightful, but the way there:

Answ. Though we cannot do all God's will legally, yet we may evangelically; which is, 1. When we mourn that we can do God's will no better, when we fail we weep (Romans 7:24). 2. When it is the desire of our soul to do God's whole will (Psalm 119:5): O that my ways were directed…

Quest. If sin in the regenerate is not quite done away, then how far must one put off the old man that he may be a new creature? Answ. 1. There must be a grieving for the remains of corruption (Romans 7:24). O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from this body of death?

2. The command expects perfect obedience; that is, that every act of obedience do fully come up to the height of what the Law requires, that there be no flaw or defect in it, whereas the people of God are perfect in no one act. Believers indeed are sincere, and that sincerity is…

But still it is also woefully true on the other hand, that they are overtaken with sin, drawn forcibly into it; yes, they are miserably hampered with it, the oppression which they suffer from it sets them [〈◊〉] groaning, and fills their souls with distress. Holy Paul makes bitte…

The most of men have entertained carnal conceptions about the Law, and that occasions their taking up of confiding thoughts in themselves: they have not made a discovery of the exceeding great latitude of it, and that makes them to think it an easie matter to pay all observance…

Q. What proceeds from this imperfection of Sanctification? A. A continual combat between corruption and grace in the sanctified soul (Galatians 5:17; Romans 7). Q. And what else?

Q. What rules are to be observed for our better understanding the commandments of the Law? A. Every commandment of the Law is spiritual, reaching not only to the outward man, but also to the heart, soul, and conscience (Romans 7:14; Matthew 5:22, 28). Q. What is another rule?

And because such examples of men cast off are presented to them to show them what advantage God might take against them — they, mistaking, think they read their own destiny laid before them in them, and conclude that God will deal so with them. And thus, as the apostle says of s…

1. That he knows what ends and intentions and thoughts and lusts such corrupt hearts as ours usually produce and bring forth in all men, and therefore can imagine what selfish motives, etc., may be stirring in such and such actions, and so lay them to our charge, and so often hi…

Admit a house be weakly timbered, which being almost now already fallen will ere long fall; and that I do not with any engines or instruments throw or beat down the same, but only take away the outward hindrances, and on every side as it were open a way for the downfall, to the…

Fourthly, hence also we learn, what a regenerate man does most feel in himself; namely, original sin, the corruption of his nature: for, that hangs on fast, and hinders him in the practice of all good duties. This, Paul knew well; and therefore confesses, that he saw another Law…

Answer. By means of faith, which does revive and refresh the dead heart of man, by bringing to his remembrance the merciful promises of God. Saint Paul pressed with corruption, cried out: O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Romans 7:24. Ye…

While Satan, the strong man, keeps the house, Christ the stronger comes upon him, and bereaves him of his armor, and divides the spoil (Luke 11:21, 22). We are dead to our first husband, the Law, by the body of Christ (Romans 7:4), and therefore it is by the virtue of Christ's d…

For God himself was the immediate Author of it, whose Authority is Sovereign and over all; and from there also it follows, that the matter of it was Good. For the Commandment, as our Apostle speaks, was Holy, Just, and Good (Romans 7:12). And however there be a difference betwee…

The first includes all positive holiness; the other an abnegation of all unholiness. As he was [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉] he had not [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉], sin present, as we have with us (Romans 7:18, 21), or [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉], sin easily besetting (Hebrews 12:…

1. The introduction of the assertion is by the particles [⟨ in non-Latin alphabet ⟩], But now; [⟨ in non-Latin alphabet ⟩], now, is a note of time, of the present time. But there are instances where these adverbial particles thus conjoined, do not seem to denote any time or seas…

This force it borrows from its relation to the law of God and the curse thereof. (2.) Its impelling ruling power, subjectively in the minds of men, leading them captive into all enmity and disobedience to God (Romans 7:23). Christ appeared to abrogate this law of sin, to deprive…

No otherwise is it with them who are thoroughly convinced of sin. They were alive, as the Apostle speaks (Romans 7), and at peace, fearing no more evil than they felt; perhaps persuading themselves that all things were well between God and their souls, or not much solicitous whe…

I shall endeavour to make some discovery of it. 1. It is not only notional, or doctrinal, but it is experimental also: a man does not only hear it, or read it in some good book, but he does also feel, and find it, as he said (Romans 7:21), I find then a law, &c. How did he know…

Oh! consider it, you say you trust in Christ, but it may be you never saw your selves yet, nor the plague of your own hearts. The commandment never came, and sin never revived, as he speaks (Romans 7:9). It may be you never saw the evil of sin.

If you close with, and love the Lord Christ himself. You will abhor your selves; and there will be a continual contest with, and opposition against your own righteousness: you will still endeavour to be beating down that: as he (Philippians 3:8, 9), and you will never wholly get…

We are here admonished to be displeased with ourselves, for our slack and imperfect obedience to God, and for our hypocrisy, private pride, presumption, deadness of spirit, and many other wants which break out when we are in doing God's will. There is no servant of God, but has…

Lastly, if all mankind be shut up under unbelief, the duty of every man is, to labor in using all good means whereby we may be delivered from this bondage, and to pray to God with David, Create in me a [reconstructed: clean] heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me (Psal…

The righteous man says, What a pleasure is it! I delight in the law of God in the inner man (Romans 7:22). As the bee delights to suck the flower, so does a holy person to obey God; it is amor elicitus, he does duty out of love to duty; he prays out of love to prayer: when he si…

The sin of the Pharisees was vain-glory and ambition: some morsel there is reserved under the tongue, some sin kept with the greater allowance from conscience, and the less shame from abroad, because otherwise the life is fair and honest. 4. There is a greater care about actions…

Again, the philosophers knew that lust with consent was evil even by the light of nature. But Paul — a learned Pharisee and therefore more than a philosopher — knew not lust to be sin, that is forbidden in this commandment, Romans 7. Therefore the lust forbidden here is without…

Reason 1. (Romans 7:17) Paul says directly: It is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me: that is, original sin. The Papists answer again, that it is so called improperly: because it comes of sin and also is an occasion of sin to be done.

Their hearts are under the power of their lusts, and therefore it is no wonder they go after their lusts even when they are about holy things (Ezekiel 33:31). (2) Involuntary and lamented distractions (Romans 7:21-24): 'I find then a law, that when I would do good, evil is prese…

So did David (Psalm 119:128): I esteem all your precepts concerning all things to be right. And so did Saint Paul when he was under the same temptation as other men, when his corrupt inclination led him one way, and the law and Spirit of God pulled him another way, and he was li…

Oh! Was your heart ever wounded for sin and made sick of it? Did the Lord ever awaken you by his Word, not only to dream of a natural estate; but to see it; to see yourself a dead man, under the power and guilt of sin, under the strength of the curse (Romans 7:9)? Has the Spirit…

So Paul had, and so the saints in Scripture had. If you have but Paul's faith, that is, a sin-lamenting faith, as (Romans 7:24), a groaning faith (Romans 8:23, 26), a laboring faith (Colossians 1:29), a sanctifying faith (Romans 6), a growing faith (Philippians 3:10–13), and if…

But there is a taint come upon the souls of all men by sin, so as this alliance is thereby worn out, indeed forfeited, until it be restored. Now therefore these souls (the only subject of our discourse) being such as God has wrought, and so are become his workmanship by a new an…

It is supposed that sin does still abide in and dwell with believers. For so is the meaning of the words: that sin which is in you shall not have dominion over you; that is, none of them who are not sensible of it, who groan not to be delivered from it, as the Apostle does (Roma…

Such imaginations are no evidence of the dominion of sin, in what degree soever they are, where they are afflictive; where they are a burden to the soul, which it groans under and would be delivered from. There is a full account given by the Apostle, of the conflict between indw…

As, When the Law presseth on their consciences, perplexing and disquieting of them, the Commandment comes home to them, Sin reviveth and they die (Romans 7:9, 10). That is, it gives power to Sin to slay the hopes of the sinner, and to distress him with the apprehension of guilt…

It is a matter of eternal thankfulness to God, that we are delivered from being the servants of sin. Yes, it is an evidence of grace, of a good frame of spirit, when a soul is made really sensible of the excellency of this freedom; when it so finds the power and interest of sin…

Secondly, if you have been dead, whether you are made alive. First I say, consider whether you have been dead or no; I mean, whether sin has been made alive in you, that you might die (Romans 7:9, 10). I was alive without the law once, but when the commandment came, sin revived,…

We are here admonished to be displeased with ourselves, for our imperfect obedience to God, and for our hypocrisy, privy pride, presumption, deadness of spirit, and many other wants which break out, when we are in doing God's will. There is no servant of God, but has wants in hi…