Romans - Lesson 33

Romans 7:13-25

A. Deliverance in Christ is the Only Solution: Let’s go on to the second part of Romans 7:13-25 where we have the famous debate about what level, what time, what kind of experience Paul is talking about here. I take the Pre-Conversion interpretation as the most likely reading of the passage. It is a place where good interpreters have differed through history. This continues today and the differences are not going to go away. It is one of these classic texts where the evidence points in different directions. 

I do think myself what Paul is doing here is describing in much more personal terms I think, Paul’s own experience is much more to the fore here. Here is something Paul is much more personally identified with. Here is a situation of being a Jew under the Law; knowing the Law of God, loving the Law of God, delighting in the Law of God, and yet ultimately finding that sin keeps me from doing the Law. Therefore, I find that the Law hasn’t rescued me, rather I find myself frustrated as a Jew under that Law recognizing that deliverance in Christ is the only solution.

Student:  
I don’t see the big deal about this because Paul throughout the New Testament when he was writing, used this kind of language. When he wrote to Timothy, when he said he was the chief of sinners. Paul used this as part of his communication, part of his forte. I don’t see how they could say Paul was an immature Christian here, when from the get-go he matured in the faith to write most of the New Testament.  I think he is writing from a mature Christian standpoint because he is using illustrations of his own life experience, just like he did when he wrote to Timothy in 1 Tim 1:15 when he described himself as the chief of sinners. I don’t see the big debate.

B. The Mature Christian Interpretation: 

Dr. Moo:  
I’m trying to understand the view you’re arguing – you think that Paul is writing as a mature Christian and looking back at his experience before he was a Christian? 

Student:  
Or do you think he was using the “Everyman” type; I’m putting myself in the framework of the “Everyman” to say this is what the struggle is. 

I think there is truth to that. To go back to what we said earlier about the broader significance of the Torah. If, as I think, Paul is describing his struggle as a Jew under that Law outside of Christ, I am happy on the basis of some of the scriptural points we made earlier, to apply that in general to the struggle of humans, people in general, with whatever law they are struggling with. I think that is true. 

But I don’t think that this text is one we should use to talk about the nature of the Christian life. Those who take what I’m calling the Mature Christian interpretation, that is to say that Paul is writing about his current experience as a, by definition, mature believer, so that the struggle we have in this passage is the struggle of the Christian confronted with the Law and the demand of God. That is what I would think to be not the correct application of the passage. In my view, the passage is talking about Paul’s experience before he came to Christ rather than his experience as a Christian.

Student:   
Help me with it being Israel rather than Paul here – are we saying that this is pre-conversion Israel, or are we saying this is a pre-conversion Paul? 

C. The Focus is More on the Law: 

Dr. Moo:  
Clearly the focus is on Paul here. The way I see the progression in the text in verses 7-12 Paul is certainly describing himself, not just Israel. It is himself in solidarity with Israel. As I look at my past, here is who I am in terms of the history of my people. Here is then where I found myself as a Jew, as an Israelite under the Law where there is much more of a personal connection Paul is making now with the experience of verses 14-25.  He wasn’t personally there when Israel was given the Law, but in his solidarity with Israel, he has experienced the effects of that. However, he has personally lived as a Jew under the Law. So, there is much more of an identification that he is making personally with what he has described in the last part of the chapter. 

In a sense, Paul is using himself as an illustration saying, here is what the coming of the Law meant and here is what life under the Law is. It is the sequence of what happened when the Law came and now the effects of that coming of the Law on Israel, and by extension I would say, all people with respect to any law we might want to talk about. 

The ways we think about these views: the Pre-Christian view says that here is where the Christian used to be; the Mature Christian view says here is where Christians in general are now located in the struggle; the Immature Christian view basically says to get out of this situation, don’t be an immature Christian; learn again to use the Spirit to move you out of the struggle that Paul is depicting here.  

Student:   
I wonder if Paul is saying, here is the way it is as an unbeliever, here is our experience under the Law. By implication he is arguing if this principle is what I found as an unbeliever, so also as a believer. If this principle is what I found as an unbeliever and what all right-thinking Torah loyalists have found, why would I want to return to that?  I think he is making a case; you don’t want to live under the Law. Here is the circumstance. He is not necessarily saying this is what I am now experiencing as a believer. He is saying if this is true when you were in unbelief, why would you want to return to that?

Dr. Moo:  
I think there is some truth in that. Although, we don’t have much evidence that there were Christians in Rome who were saying like the Galatian Judaizers were – let’s go back under the Law again. Even when Paul addresses the two groups in Romans 14 and 15, he doesn’t really critique either of the groups. He says both had beliefs that were within bounds, that are Christian beliefs, don’t criticize each other. He doesn’t say that you Jewish Christians are wrong, you need to change; instead, he gives tolerance to them. So, I don’t think that rhetorically in terms of what Paul is doing here, he is directly saying to people don’t go back under the Law. What he is doing is saying here is the problem of the Law. He is trying to tell them the issue of the Law and to understand why salvation history has moved on why you are now in Christ and the Spirit, and what that means.

Student:   
Going back to Romans 6:14 and that thesis statement, “under the Law,” and it indicates “sin shall not be your master” but if you go back under the Law, it will be your master.

D. Sin Isn’t Our Master Under the Spirit: In terms of the argument of the letter, Paul really never puts it that way. It is always indicative; you are not under the Law, you have died to the Law. It is not “make sure you die to the Law,” or “don’t go back under the Law.” You never have him saying that. I think what you are saying is true, and in Galatians Paul says that very clearly again and again. But in writing to the Romans, Paul is looking more dispassionately at the situation and how the history of salvation has unfolded.  He is not in a polemical mode.

Student:  
From a psychological point of view this passage has always given me as a believer such comfort to recognize in a sense that sin lives within me.  I stopped smoking years ago, but there is data that says the brain releases chemicals that tell you to light up, and people light up before thinking about the fact that they are lighting up.  I’ve always seen that to be kind of what Paul is talking about the history and reality of our sin has a place within us, that calls us back to it. When I read your interpretation, I thought to myself, are you excluding that possibility in your interpretation? 

Dr. Moo:  
While I don’t think this passage describes the Christian struggle with sin, there are certainly other texts that do. I am not denying the fact that Christians struggle with sin; my point in this text is that while we struggle with sin, we are not people who are sold as slaves under sin or imprisoned by the law of sin. Those are the statements that Paul makes here. Balance is so important here again because I hear a lot of Christians who take what I’m calling the Mature Christian view of the passage who use this text as an excuse for their sin. They say yeah, I’m really struggling with this sin; I get defeated by it all the time; but that’s okay, Paul had the same experience. I think this is a misuse of the passage. My friends that argue for the Mature Christian view would agree that it’s a misuse of the passage too. Again, it’s where the balance is needed; clearly Christians do continue to struggle with sin.

But Paul makes it clear that Christians are not people who should be consistently defeated by sin. We talked about that upward movement; the trajectory is moving toward conformity to Christ and holiness before God. Paul says this needs to be the state that we find ourselves in as Christians.

Student:  
Is this where Paul singles out coveting as a challenge for himself? Is there any indication why he indicates this for himself?

Dr. Moo:  
He does that in 7:7 where he is talking about the history, the background. Why Paul singles out that commandment is not clear. Those who think Paul is writing more autobiographically think that is the one Paul struggled with. You could even interpret that as you shall not desire in a sexual sense. Some interpret it that way. Robert Gundry has argued that this is what Paul is reflecting upon here; his coming of age as an adolescent Jew, when the sexual urge awakened in him. That experience of sin springing to life. All of a sudden, we’re full of all these devils, and that is what Paul is reflecting on here.

Dr. Moo:  
That is exactly right. This could be, as Gundry argues, the point where Paul realized that he really was a sinner and that he wasn’t doing the Law. I’m in trouble in a way I didn’t realize.