Paul likens a person being legally bound to the law under the law’s jurisdiction to a wife being legally bound to her husband. In this case in Romans 7:1-4, the law would be the husband, we’d be the wife. Paul said according to the law a woman is bound to her husband as long as her husband is alive. This is the very phraseology contained in marriage vows today. “Till death do us part or as long as we both shall live.” It’s interesting that Paul likens the wife being bound to her husband to an individual being bound to the law. With the law as your husband, you would of necessity be living under the legal constraints of that law relationship. You’d be living under the law’s jurisdiction. The law says, “If you do this, you’ll be blessed. But, if you do that, you’ll be cursed or punished” because the law was a conditional system for righteousness. It was a merit system based on performance.
There are many people today who are doing that very thing. On the one hand, they claim to be joined to the Savior but on the other hand, who do they believe to be their husband? They continue to operate with God as those they were joined to the law rather than joined to the Savior while claiming to belong to the Savior on one hand and claiming to be operating under the dictates of the law on the other hand. To what husband do they belong is the question? That’s what Paul is illustrating for us here at the outset of Chapter 7. One has to be dead in order to be married to the other. You cannot be legally bound, legally married to both at the same time. It’s totally impossible. God absolutely refuses to share those who are joined to his son with the law, with the law husband.
There are many people today who are doing that very thing. On the one hand, they claim to be joined to the Savior but on the other hand, who do they believe to be their husband? They continue to operate with God as those they were joined to the law rather than joined to the Savior while claiming to belong to the Savior on one hand and claiming to be operating under the dictates of the law on the other hand. To what husband do they belong is the question? That’s what Paul is illustrating for us here at the outset of Chapter 7. One has to be dead in order to be married to the other. You cannot be legally bound, legally married to both at the same time. It’s totally impossible. God absolutely refuses to share those who are joined to his son with the law, with the law husband.