![\"\"](\"\/Banner-MOG-60.gif\" "\\"Ministry")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Romans 7:5<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death.<\/span><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n Truth to Learn<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Trying to live by a set of laws or rules produces spiritual death, not life.<\/p>\n Behind the Words<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n The word translated \u201cflesh<\/span>\u201d in this verse is sarx<\/span><\/em>, which means \u201cthe flesh, or muscle, of a living animal.\u201d This is a contrasting word to kreas<\/span><\/em>, which refers to \u201cthe flesh of a dead animal,\u201d also sometimes translated as \u201cmeat.\u201d Paul is using the word \u201cflesh\u201d here as a metonym, that is, a word used to represent something else. An example of a metonym is the use of the word \u201cWashington\u201d to refer to the U.S. Government.<\/p>\n \u201cPassions<\/span>\u201d is from path\u0113ma<\/span><\/em>, which is a form of pasch\u014d<\/span><\/em>, meaning \u201cto experience strong feelings.\u201d It is often translated \u201csuffer,\u201d although it can refer to strong feelings no matter whether they are good or bad (or somewhere in between). The ending \u201cma<\/span><\/em>\u201d gives it the meaning \u201cthat which is felt strongly.\u201d<\/p>\n The word \u201caroused<\/span>\u201d is energe\u014d<\/span><\/em>, from which we get our English word \u201cenergy.\u201d It refers to \u201cthat which is active, effectual, or mighty.\u201d We could easily translate the opening phrase of this verse as, \u201cFor when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were energized by the law \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n Meaning Explained<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n What does the Apostle Paul mean by the opening part of this verse, \u201cFor when we were in the flesh<\/span>\u201d? Aren\u2019t we always in our flesh, at least until we die? Yes, but that\u2019s not the kind of flesh Paul is talking about. In order to understand what he\u2019s talking about we need to look at a verse in the next chapter of this letter where Paul says,<\/p>\n And those being in the flesh are not able to please God. But you are not in flesh, but in Spirit, since <\/span>the<\/span><\/em> Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone has not<\/span> the<\/span><\/em> Spirit of Christ, this one is not His.<\/span> (Romans 8:8-9<\/span><\/strong>)<\/p>\n In these verses Paul is contrasting being \u201cin the flesh\u201d and \u201cin the Spirit.\u2019 What he means is being controlled by the flesh, the sin nature, versus being controlled by the Spirit of God. Paul has already told us that before we were saved, we were in bondage to sin, or controlled by our sin nature. Now, in the current verse he is telling us that when we were controlled by our sin nature the passions, or overwhelming desires, of sin were not subdued but energized through the Law to bring forth fruit that resulted in death. I think Paul is talking about spiritual death or separation from fellowship with God, not physical death. And in the previous verse Paul told us that we should bring forth fruit to God by being married to Christ.<\/p>\n So, when we were controlled by our sin nature we produced fruit that resulted in spiritual death, but now that we have been saved and freed from the Law, we have become the bride of Christ, and the fruit that we produce should be fruit that is worthy of being brought to God.<\/p>\n Application<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Now, the question is, what kind of fruit are you bringing to God? Are you allowing the desires of your flesh to control your actions? Or are you so tuned-in to God and walking so close to Him that your fleshly desires are easily resisted? The type of fruit that you produce will answer these questions for you.<\/p>\n In God\u2019s service, for His glory,<\/strong><\/p>\n Copyright \u00a9 2010 Will Krause. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –<\/p>\n <\/span>If this message or this link was forwarded to you by a friend and you wish to receive future verses directly to your inbox, you can call the church phone \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Romans 7:5 For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death. Truth to Learn Trying to live by a set of laws or rules produces spiritual death, not life. Behind the Words The word translated \u201cflesh\u201d in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[796,240,797,104,424,798,799,800,801],"class_list":["post-1640","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-aroused","tag-death","tag-energeo","tag-flesh","tag-fruit","tag-pascho","tag-passions","tag-pathema","tag-sarx"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd5geA-qs","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1640\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"signature\"](\"\/signature.gif\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"chrome:\/\/skype_ff_toolbar_win\/content\/space.gif\")
(618) 614-3070<\/span><\/span><\/span> and leave a message telling us your name and e-mail address or you can send an e-mail to:![\"e-mail](\"\/Will_e-mail.gif\")
<\/p>\n