This One Is Not For You (3)

For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law, were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death. But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter. Romans 7:5-6 NASB

Have been released – So you’ve discovered that what happens to you, either as a result of choices or circumstances, affects everything about you, and over time alters the direction of your life. Torah attempts to provide guidance so that you stay on track, but our own proclivities, desires and personal agendas, coupled with the cultural leanings of our environment, often push us away from this guiding light. We end up wandering in the dark without even realizing it.

What’s the solution? It looks as if Paul tells us that the solution is “no more Torah,” but that doesn’t make any sense. How can removing the flashlight help us navigate in the dark? Oh, it might convince us that everything is fine (because we can no longer see the danger) but it won’t be much consolation when we walk off a cliff. Paul cannot mean that putting away the Torah (the guidance we need) is the work of the spirit. That solution is suicide.

The critical word is katargéō, translated here as “have been released.” The translation is a bit dubious. First, the verb is aorist, passive. It’s a completed act done for us or to us, not something we did ourselves. Second, the native verb means “to render inoperative,” “to remove from activity.” The translation “released” makes us think of prisoners and cells, not shutting off a machine. “Released” is personal, strong and emotional. “Turning off the machine” is not.   But if I wanted to communicate the end of Torah, “released” is a great term to use. It makes me think that the “Law” no longer applies to me. Once the “Law” held me captive (remember the pink elephant) but now I am free from those rules. Now I can walk in the dark with confidence. I don’t need flashlights any more.

What?

That’s just plain stupid. If you want to walk along the edge of the Grand Canyon on a moonless night without a flashlight, be my guest. Don’t complain about the wind in your hair on the way to the bottom, please.

No, this isn’t Paul. Paul loves the Law. It is the guidance he needs to live life as God designed it, to experience freedom from error, to know what it means to be truly human. Paul would never suggest that we need to dispose of the Law in order to live in the spirit. In fact, just the opposite is true. The Spirit of the Lord guides us through Torah in order that we might satisfactorily answer the question, “What does God demand of me?” Whatever Paul means by katargéō, he doesn’t mean Luther’s idea of “get out of jail.”[1] The Torah isn’t prison and we aren’t its captives. We’ve put ourselves in prison by ignoring or disobeying Torah.

So what does Paul mean by katargéō. The word is constructed from two other Greek terms basically adding emphasis to the idea of making something idle. What Paul means, it seems to me, is that the Spirit turns off the “Enticement Switch.” In other words, now we can think of pink elephants without having to go look for one. Before the sensation of wine on the tongue would have led us to drink the whole bottle. Now we know our limit. Wine is no longer the master. Before we were consumed with wealth. We worked tirelessly toward the financial goals of accumulation (remember all those exercises you were taught about visualizing the vacation, the dream home, the fast car?). Now money doesn’t drive us. Is it important? Sure. We have to live. But we don’t serve it and it doesn’t rule us. Katargéō turns off the enticement. We are free to be at God’s calling because we don’t have a competing agenda. We’ve “died” to the temptation. Now we are released to serve without enslavement.

Oh, and by the way, Torah never was a slave master. It might have seemed that way when it illuminated our missteps. But with the Enticement Switch in the OFF position, Torah does what it was intended to do—show us the way in the dark.

Ah, maybe these few investigations were really for you after all.

Topical Index: katargéō, released, make idle, Torah, Romans 7:5-6

[1] Delling is mistaken when he writes, “A transvaluation of values is effected in 1 Cor. 1:28: God ‘brings to nothing’ things that are. In Eph. 2:15 he ‘destroys’ the law of commandments; Christ’s work frees us from the legalistic requirements of the law (while not invalidating its ethical demands; cf. Rom. 3:31) . . . The body of sin, i.e., our form in subjection to sin, is thus ‘negated,’ although our new life has not yet taken on its definitive form, and thus includes things which will be ended, e.g., prophecy and our present knowledge (1 Cor. 13:8). For with the coming of the perfect, the imperfect ‘loses its point’ (v. 10).” TDNT, Vol. 1, pp. 451-454.