Romans 7:1-12
1 Or do you not know, brothers [brothers and sisters] —for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? 2 For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage [law concerning the husband]. 3 Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.
4 Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. 5 For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. 6 But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code [of the letter] .
7 What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. 9 I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. 10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
This week I am reading a book that came very highly recommended, so highly recommended, I had to read it. Coping with Your Difficult Older Parents, A Guide for Stressed-Out Children, by Grace LeBow, Barbara Kane and Irwin LeBow. Because I am thrifty, I bought it on the internet through Abe Books. This book is golden. Literally. And it is yellow.
What's fascinated me about this book - the personalities & stories, divided into 9 types. A brief summation, almost exactly what you'd want to know and move on, what makes them tick and why. Without the 'balance' people swing into very destructive communication habits and thoughts. And how to listen and deal with them. It explains the behavior we run into - why people go into blind rages for very little reason. Why people push each other away. I particularly enjoyed the chapters having phone calls that were successful and not. A new way at communicating.
How effective is the new way to communicate - limited - it explains not trying to change the individual and not really conveying thoughts leading to conflict. But it isn't the learning and up-building in knowing one another. Successful because there simply are people you cannot please. This explains why. Often it is because the person has deep emotional scars demanding their way or the highway.
How complex we have made life. So many of these scars go back to life pressing in on people and their children. When Paul was writing to the Romans, he was living in Corinth. Both cities had many types of marriage (just live together marriage) and divorce was very high, with few being the Roman type of marriage Confarreatio - marriage until death. For a lot of the world this was a new concept. Why would a marriage-less man like Paul, press for marriage like this? It wouldn't add to his popularity. (Can't you see this live and let live generation, 1st century, being told for the first time that Jesus Christ wants them to stay married for life? "What? What did you say?")
Jesus Christ himself upset the rule makers. He didn't ask for rules to clean up, He asks for understanding. He doesn't tell us if people are hard to get along with, cut and run - like a spouse. He asks for peace in a world not really wanting the calm of peace or the work to get there. People were and are offended by Him. How brave to tell this eat, drink and be merry crowd to do the hard work. How Amazing the World Believed Him. The world works better when we commit to love our spouse and to love our children.
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Other Scripture for Today Blogspot readings on Romans 7:
Friday, April 29, 2011, July 10, 2008 , April 5, 2011
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