In the context of the larger book of Romans, Paul has worked diligently to get us to this point of this complex chapter:

• Chapter 5: Free from the wrath of God.
• Chapter 6: Free from the dominion of sin.
• Chapter 7: Free from a law keeping system.
• Chapter 8: In Christ, there is no condemnation.

He also revealed his own struggle (and ours): Romans 7:15b–20 (ESV) For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. ¹⁶ Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. ¹⁷ So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. ¹⁸ For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. ¹⁹ For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. ²⁰ Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

God Frees Us from Sin’s Penalty and Power (8:1–4)

Paul’s heart-cry in 7:24, “Who will rescue me from this body of death?”, was immediately answered in brief: “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord” (7:25a).

While the main concern of this question and its answer is freedom from the power of indwelling sin, we need to be reminded again of the main point already established in 3:21–5:21, that the penalty for our sin has been paid in full by Jesus.

In the midst of our intense spiritual struggle against sin, in which we are sometimes on the losing end, we need not fear that our forgiveness is in jeopardy. Christ has already secured this for us on the cross

The Law cannot claim you (8:2). You have been made free from the law of sin and death. You now have life in the Spirit. You have moved into a whole new sphere of life in Christ. The Law no longer has any jurisdiction over you: you are dead to the Law (Rom. 7:4) and free from the Law (Rom. 8:2).

The Law cannot condemn you (8:3). Christ has already suffered that  condemnation for you on the cross. The Law could not save; it can only condemn. But God sent His Son to save us and do what the Law could not do.

8:3  What the law was powerless to do.  Freedom over sin never can be obtained by obedience to the law. The law cannot help us because it was weakened by the flesh.

But what the law can’t do, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man. Jesus Christ was a “likeness” of us. This likeness (homoious) was not merely an appearance; he was completely human (John 1:14), with the same desires that yield to sin, yet he never sinned (see 2 Corinthians 5:21; Hebrews 2:17–18; 4:14–16).

Christ took on humanity in order to be our sin offering. Because Christ was sinless, his death passed the “death sentence” on sin for all of us, setting us free from sin’s power over us: he condemned sin in the flesh.  Jesus gave himself as a sacrifice (“sin offering”) for our sins.

In Old Testament times, animal sacrifices were continually offered at the temple. These animals brought to the altar had two important characteristics: they were alive, and they were “without flaw.” The sacrifices showed the Israelites the seriousness of sin: innocent blood had to be shed before sins could be pardoned (see Leviticus 17:11). But animal blood could not really remove sin (Hebrews 10:4); and the forgiveness provided by those sacrifices, in legal terms, was more like a stay of execution than a pardon.

Those animal sacrifices could only point to Jesus’ sacrifice that paid the penalty for all sin. Jesus’ life was identical with ours, yet unstained by sin. So he could serve as the flawless sacrifice for our sins.

In him, our pardon is complete. The tables are turned so that not only is there “no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,” but also the very sin that guaranteed our condemnation is itself condemned by Christ’s sacrifice.

Grace was given that the law might be fulfilled. —Augustine

The Law cannot control you (8:4). The believer lives a righteous life, not in the power of the Law, but in the power of the Holy Spirit. The Law does not have the power to produce holiness; it can only reveal and condemn sin.

The law of Moses did exactly what it was designed to do, but it did a lousy job doing what it was never designed to do.

• It was designed to show man his sin and it did a tremendous job of it.
• The law of Moses condemned every person who ever tried to keep it in its entire 1500+ year history! (Excluding Jesus, of course.
• The law wasn’t designed to set us free. For that purpose it was impotent, weak, sick. Paul spent the first half of his life living under the law of Moses and we just read in chapter 7 how ineffective it was for him. It only showed him how bad he really was!

The sacrifice of Jesus takes away the sin that frustrates us so much in the struggle and would certainly condemn us in the end!

Look again at verse 4: “in order that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled…” In the original language, that word “fulfilled” was used to describe the leveling up of a hole in the ground.

The law of Moses showed us that it was impossible. But God has come and filled up the hole! We can walk again on level ground! Praise God!

The indwelling Holy Spirit enables us to walk in obedience to God’s will. The righteousness that God demands in His Law is fulfilled in you through the Spirit’s power.

In the Holy Spirit, you have life and liberty (Rom. 8:2) and “the pursuit of happiness” (Rom. 8:4).

     8:4 The righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us. The requirement of the law is holiness (see Leviticus 11:44–45; 19:2; 20:7); but the law is powerless to make us holy because of our innate sinfulness.

Only through Christ’s death and the resulting freedom from sin can we no longer live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit and thus fulfill the righteous requirements of the law.

The Holy Spirit is the one who helps us become holy. The Holy Spirit provides the power internally to help us do what the law required of us externally.

It is the Spirit who produces “fruit” in us; only in this way can we fulfill the requirements of the law. But Paul has already made it clear that the law is powerless to save. So why do its requirements still need to be met?

The law is God’s law and was never meant to be cast aside. Paul makes a distinction between two kinds of obedience to the law. He speaks against the obedience to the law that stays merely at the level of the flesh (such as being circumcised because the law required it) and the obedience that depends on God’s Holy Spirit.

Only the latter fulfills the law. When we live according to the Spirit, we actually do meet the requirements of the law. Or, as Paul puts it, the requirements of the law are met in us.

The Spirit-led Christian, as he yields to the Lord, experiences the sanctifying work of the Spirit in his life. “For it is God that worketh in you, both to will and to do of His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13).

When an opportunity to do something that might be momentarily enjoyable presents itself, but you know it would be wrong to do it, is there any kind of struggle that goes on in your life? You know there is. A part of you wants to do it and a part of you doesn’t. An inner struggle ensues.

Question: Are you the only Christian who struggles that way? Answer: Every Christian struggles that way. Even the great Apostle Paul struggled that way!

If we had lived in the first century, we would have looked at Paul and said, “Wow! What a spiritual man! What an overcomer!” But I suspect Paul would have corrected us in that. He would have said, “What a wretched man! You don’t know the half of it.”

Within the universe there is a law so important that it has become the law of the Holy Spirit. It is called “the law of the Spirit of life.” What is meant by this law? Very simply, life is in Jesus Christ and in Him alone.

Whatever life is—energy, being, spirit, love, joy, peace—it is all in Jesus Christ and nowhere else.

Within Christ, within His very being is the Spirit of life, the very energy and being of life. This fact is important, so important that God has written it into the laws of the universe.

The “law of sin and death” simply means the rule and reign of death. Every man dies: death rules and reigns over every man. But the Spirit of God frees a man from the rule and reign of death.

The Spirit of life frees the believer from both sin and death. The Holy Spirit frees the believer to live as Christ lived, to actually live out the life which Christ lived. The active energy of life, the dynamic force and being of life—all that is in Christ Jesus—is given to the believer.

He lives now and shall live forever. He senses this and knows this. Life to him is a spirit, a breath, a consciousness of being set free through Christ. Even when he sins and guilt sets in, there is a tug, a power (Holy Spirit) that draws him back to God.

He asks forgiveness and removal of the guilt (1 John 1:9), and immediately upon asking, the same power (the Holy Spirit) instills an instantaneous assurance of cleansing.

The spirit of life, the consciousness of living instantaneously takes up its abode within him once again. He feels free again, and he feels full of life in all its liberating power and freedom.

He bubbles over with all the depth of the richness and fulness of life itself. He is full of the “Spirit of life.” Life itself becomes once again a spirit, a consciousness of living. He lives now and forever.

The Spirit gives life by doing what the law could not do. The law could not make man righteous because man’s flesh is too weak to keep the law. No man has ever been able to keep the law of God, not to perfection or even close to perfection.

All flesh has miserably failed—come far short of God’s glory and law. Consequently, all flesh dies physically and spiritually.

Therefore, righteousness and life just cannot come by the law. But what the law could not do, the Spirit is able to do. He can provide righteousness and life.

The Spirit gives life by Christ condemning sin in the flesh.

Whatever the man sows in Christ, he reaps: God matches it. Whatever a man measures out to Christ, the same is measured back to the man: God matches it. In fact, Scripture says that God will even go beyond and do much more than we ask or think (cp. Ephes. 3:20).

Therefore, the man who walks after the “Spirit of life” which is in Christ Jesus is given the Spirit of life. The Holy Spirit fulfills and credits him with the righteousness of the law, with the right to live eternally.

The Christian who is dedicated to his or her heavenly Father through Christ, will someday hear those words, “Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of your Master.” And he/she will do this in spite of the weaknesses of the flesh. Halleluia! Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! That is good news! That is a real benefit!