Romans 7
An extract from The Normal Christian Life by Watchman Nee

Grace means that God does something for me; law means that I do something for God. God has certain holy and righteous demands which He places upon me: that is law. Now if law means that God requires something of me for their fulfilment, then deliverance from law means that He no longer requires that from me, but Himself provides it. Law implies that God requires me to do something for Him; deliverance from law implies that He exempts me from doing it, and that in grace He does it Himself I (where 'I' is the 'carnal' man of chapter 7. 14) need do nothing for God: that is deliverance from law. The trouble in Romans 7 is that man in the flesh tried to do something for God. As soon as you try to please God in that way, then you place yourself under law, and the experience of Romans 7 begins to be yours.

As we seek to understand this, let it be settled at the outset that the fault does not lie with the
Law. Paul says, 'the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and righteous, and good' (Rom.
7.12). No, there is nothing wrong with the Law, but there is something decidedly wrong with me. The demands of the Law are righteous, but the person upon whom the demands are made is unrighteous. The trouble is not that the Law's demands are unjust, but that I am unable to meet them. It may be all right for the Government to require payment of £100, but it will be all wrong if I have only ten shillings with which to meet that payment!

I am a man 'sold under sin' (Rom. 7. 14). Sin has dominion over me. True, as long as you leave me alone I seem to be rather a fine type of man. It is when you ask me to do something that my
sinfulness comes to light.

If you have a very clumsy servant and he just sits still and does nothing, then his clumsiness
does not appear. If he does nothing all day he will be of little use to you, it is true, but at least he will do no damage that way. But if you say to him: 'Now come along, don't idle away your time; get up and do something', then immediately the trouble begins. He knocks the chair over as he gets up, stumbles over a footstool a few paces further on, then smashes some precious dish as soon as he handles it. If you make no demands upon him his clumsiness is never noticed, but as soon as you ask him to do anything his awkwardness is apparent at once. The demands were all right, but the man was all wrong. He was as clumsy a man when he was sitting still as when he was working, but it was your demands that made manifest the clumsiness which, whether he was active or inactive, was all the time in his make-up.

We are all sinners by nature. If God asks nothing of us, all seems to go well, but as soon as He
demands something of us, the occasion is provided for a grand display of our sinfulness. The Law makes our weakness manifest. While you let me sit still I appear to be all right, but when you ask me to do anything I am sure to spoil it, and if you trust me with a second thing I will as surely spoil that also. When a holy law is applied to a sinful man, then it is that his sinfulness comes out in full display.

God knows who I am; He knows that from head to foot I am full of sin; He knows that I am
weakness incarnate; that I can do nothing. The trouble is that I do not know it. I admit that all men are sinners, and that therefore I am a sinner; but I imagine that I am not such a hopeless sinner as some. God must bring us all to the place where we see that we are utterly weak and helpless. While we say so, we do not wholly believe it, and God has to do something to convince us of the fact. Had it not been for the Law, we should never have known how weak we are. Paul had reached that point. He makes this clear when he says in Romans 7.7: 'I had not known sin, except through the law: for I had not known coveting, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.' Whatever might be his experience with the rest of the Law, it was the tenth commandment, which literally translated is, 'Thou shalt not desire....', that found him out. There his total incapacity stared him in the face!

The more we try to keep the Law the more our weakness is manifest and the deeper we get into Romans 7, until it is clearly demonstrated to us that we are hopelessly weak. God knew it all along, but we did not, and so God had to bring us through painful experiences to a recognition of the fact. We need to have our weakness proved to ourselves beyond dispute. That is why God gave us the Law.

So we can say, reverently, that God never gave us the Law to keep; He gave us the Law to break! He well knew that we could not keep it. We are so bad that He asks no favour and makes no demands. Never has any man succeeded in making himself acceptable to God by means of the Law. Nowhere in the New Testament are men of faith told that they are to keep the Law; but it does say that the Law was given so that there should be transgression. 'The law came in ...that the trespass might abound' (Rom. 5. 20). The Law was given to make us law-breakers! No doubt I am a sinner in Adam; 'Howbeit, I had not known sin, except through the law: ...for apart from the law sin is dead. ..but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died' (Rom. 7. 7-9). The Law is that which exposes our true nature. Alas, we are so conceited, and think ourselves so strong, that God has to give us something to test us and prove how weak we are. At last we see it, and confess, 'I am a sinner through and through, and of myself I can do nothing whatever to please a holy God.'

No, the Law was not given in the expectation that we would keep it. It was given in the full
knowledge that we would break it; and when we have broken it so completely as to be convinced of our utter need, then the Law has served its purpose. It has been our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, that in us He may Himself fulfil it (Gal. 3.24).