In traditional wedding vows, a husband and wife pledge themselves to one another “till death do us part.” As long as they are both alive, the marriage contract will be intact. In his letter to the Romans, the apostle Paul explains that, just as the legal obligations of marriage cease when one’s spouse dies, Christ’s death freed the believer from being bound to the Law. In chapter 7, Paul helps us understand how the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ forever changed our relationship to the Law.

Does this mean we no longer have any obligation to God? Not at all. Paul explains that we have been released from the Law so that we can serve God in a new and more powerful way. As verse 6 puts it, “we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.” Paul’s message is not a gospel of subtraction but of addition. Something new has been added to our nature to provide life where there once was none. It is the resurrection power of the Spirit.

It is clear that verse 4 has both Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection in view. Those who are united by faith to Christ in His death have “died to the law through the body of Christ” so that they “might belong to another.” Because they belong “to him who was raised from the dead” they are now able to “bear fruit for God.” This contrast reveals an important limitation in the Law that enables us to understand why nobody could be made righteous by it. The Law set a standard of holiness, but because “we were in the realm of the flesh,” it could not empower anyone to comply with its demands (v. 5).