Isn’t it great that we are under grace and the New Covenant? A new and living way to relate to God in contrast to the old and dead arrangement God had with His people Israel. As born again believers, we do not have a legal relationship with God. We have a loving relationship with Him. God does a work in the heart of the Christian that is far different from any external behavioral modification. So what was the purpose of the law? Paul says, “I would not have known sin except through the law” (Romans 7:7). We don’t know sin without the law, therefore some would argue, wouldn’t we all be a lot better getting rid of the law? By way of illustration, a mirror might reveal a spot on your face, but it did not create that spot nor can it clean the smudge. And you will never be able to clean your face without the knowledge that mirror provides. t merely reveals the imperfection. In the same way, the law exposes the exceeding sinfulness of our hearts so that we might come to God to make it right. The law cannot transform our hearts any more than that mirror could clean your face. That is why it is our loving relationship with the risen Lord that is the key to true transformation. What Paul found out is that although he lived an outward moral life according to the law, he was “slain” when he realized that the tenth commandment lt with the heart. He could not measure up when God looks at the heart – and requires inward transformation. Be encouraged, dear reader. We who have been born again have been given a new heart – the old is gone, behold all things are new (2 Cor 5:17)!
(Romans 7:6-13 NKJV) – (6b) …we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter. (7) What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, “You shall not covet.” (8) But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead. (9) I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. (10) And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death. (11) For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me. (12) Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good. (13) Has then what is good become death to me? Certainly not! But sin, that it might appear sin, was producing death in me through what is good, so that sin through the commandment might become exceedingly sinful.