Day 17 – Created for Love – Not Law – Julie Earl
Romans 7:4-6
Have you ever noticed that as soon as you tell yourself you’re going on a strict diet, all you think about is food and how much you want to eat? Or when you tell yourself you’re going to start a strict Bible reading plan, how the joy of reading quickly gets lost? Why is it when we set up laws for ourselves that our sin nature rebels and rises up worse than ever?
It’s because God didn’t create us to live under law. He created us to live under love. When Adam and Eve walked with God in the Garden of Eden, God didn’t have a list of rules posted on the nearest tree. He didn’t have to because everything Adam and Eve did was in response to God’s love for them. Their behaviors were the fruit of their intimate relationship with God. How can you not be kind, loving and honoring when you are focused on and enjoying God’s kindness, love and honor for you? Adam and Eve didn’t have any problems until they switched their focus from trusting God’s love to trusting Satan’s lies.
We, too, were created to operate out of that love relationship with God. That’s why Paul, in his letter to the believers in Rome, mentioned again and again the importance of dying to the law and living life through the love and power of the Holy Spirit within us.
“So, my brothers, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit to God” (Romans 7:4). We can’t bear good fruit if we are still operating our lives by laws and rules. Why?
“For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death” (Romans 7:5). Since we were created to live in response to God’s love, living under law only arouses our sinful passions and causes us to rebel.
“But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code” (Romans 7:6). This is what the good news – the gospel – is all about. When we believe in Jesus and receive His forgiveness, we are released from the law and are empowered to operate out of love because God’s Spirit – Love Himself – now lives within us!
Much love to you and please share your thoughts!
Julie Earl with Crazy About You Ministries (CAYM)