Dead to the law
Day 560, Sunday, Feb. 22
Romans 7:1-6
Nobody likes to feel trapped. Sadly, though, most of us feel that way at one time or another. For some people at some times it can be overwhelming.
Yesterday we talked about some of the bad things that can enslave us and leave us feeling—and being—trapped. Paul recognized that even the law itself that he once so zealously defended can become a prison. Whatever entraps us, though, the problem is real and the solution is extreme. “Do you not know, brothers and sisters—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law has authority over someone only as long as that person lives?”
Christ brings freedom from being trapped not through our death, but by our sharing in the release gained through his death. “You also died to the law through the body of Christ.” Jesus, through his death and resurrection, has broken the bondage of law and sin. “But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.”
All of this can sound philosophical and theoretical, but it has application to a very real-world problem. Paul acknowledges that sometimes the only real freedom comes through death. In his thought that death is death to the old self and rebirth as a new creation.
Far too many people in our day come to the same conclusion—that death is the path to freedom from bondage—but don’t understand the spiritual death and rebirth that Christianity offers. As a consequence, the United States suffers from a surging suicide rate. With a declining murder rate and an increasing suicide rate, we now lose twice as many people each year to suicide than to murder.
While they might not use the same terminology, the bondage and slavery Paul writes about are a real problem for real people all around us. Freedom from sin and death isn’t just a nice Sunday school lesson. It’s an urgent need in today’s world.

Sunday meditation

Psalms 82:1-8
God presides in the great assembly; he renders judgment among the “gods”:
“How long will you defend the unjust and show partiality to the wicked? Defend the weak and the fatherless; uphold the cause of the poor and the oppressed. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.
“The ‘gods’ know nothing, they understand nothing. They walk about in darkness; all the foundations of the earth are shaken.
“I said, ‘You are “gods”; you are all sons of the Most High.’ But you will die like mere mortals; you will fall like every other ruler.”
Rise up, O God, judge the earth, for all the nations are your inheritance.

Prayer focus
Rescue the weak and needy, God. We need you.

-Rev. Mark Fleming