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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Romans 8:1 - 8:1
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1–11. The power is the indwelling spirit.
(1) It follows from this examination of man’s state under law, that in our present state, as effected by GOD, those who are made one with Christ Jesus are not under penalties. (2) For the new condition brought by the Spirit, which animates the new life we received on being united with Christ Jesus, liberated us once for all from the former tyranny. (3) GOD‘s law, barely declaring His will, could not do this because it was undermined by means of the flesh. But GOD Himself did the work of liberation, first, through His Son incarnate triumphing over sin even in the flesh, (4) and secondly and consequently through His Son in us, fulfilling the claim of law by conduct on the lines of spirit not of flesh. (5) It was in fact just this reinforcement of man’s spirit which was needed, in the antagonism of spirit and flesh, to overcome the limitations of the latter and to bring it under the power of the spirit. (9) That work has now been done in Christians: GOD’S Spirit dwells in them, because if they are Christ’s they possess Christ’s Spirit, which implies that their bodies are dead for all purposes of sin, their spirits a living power in the body for all purposes of righteousness, (11) for all purposes, because they are thus strengthened by the same Power which raised Christ Jesus from death, and will put life into their bodies, in themselves doomed to death, because it is GOD’S Spirit dwelling in them.
This section then brings out the nature of the power of the Gospel in contrast with the description of the powerlessness of law. That power in fact is the power of the life of the Risen Lord in the Christian, bringing to bear upon the human spirit the whole moral and spiritual force of the Spirit of GOD Himself.