Romans, 7

1. As people who are familiar with the Law, brothers, you cannot have forgotten that the law can control a person only during that person's lifetime.

1. Do you not know, brethren -- for I am speaking to those who know the law -- that the law is binding on a person only during his life?

2. A married woman, for instance, is bound to her husband by law, as long as he lives, but when her husband dies all her legal obligation to him as husband is ended.

2. Thus a married woman is bound by law to her husband as long as he lives; but if her husband dies she is discharged from the law concerning the husband.

3. So if she were to have relations with another man while her husband was still alive, she would be termed an adulteress; but if her husband dies, her legal obligation comes to an end and if she then has relations with another man, that does not make her an adulteress.

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. In the same way you, my brothers, through the body of Christ have become dead to the Law and so you are able to belong to someone else, that is, to him who was raised from the dead to make us live fruitfully for God.

4. Likewise, my brethren, you 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. While we were still living by our natural inclinations, the sinful passions aroused by the Law were working in all parts of our bodies to make us live lives which were fruitful only for death.

5. 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 what was binding us, and so we are in a new service, that of the spirit, and not in the old service of a written code.

6. But now we are discharged from the law, dead to that which held us captive, so that we serve not under the old written code but in the new life of the Spirit.

7. What should we say, then? That the Law itself is sin? Out of the question! All the same, if it had not been for the Law, I should not have known what sin was; for instance, I should not have known what it meant to covet if the Law had not said: You are not to covet.

7. What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet, if it had not been for the law, I should not have known sin. I should not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, "You shall not covet."

8. But, once it found the opportunity through that commandment, sin produced in me all kinds of covetousness; as long as there is no Law, sin is dead.

8. But sin, finding opportunity in the commandment, wrought in me all kinds of covetousness. Apart from the law sin lies dead.

9. Once, when there was no Law, I used to be alive; but when the commandment came, sin came to life

9. I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died;

10. and I died. The commandment was meant to bring life but I found it brought death,

10. the very commandment which promised life proved to be death to me.

11. because sin, finding its opportunity by means of the commandment, beguiled me and, by means of it, killed me.

11. For sin, finding opportunity in the commandment, deceived me and by it killed me.

12. So then, the Law is holy, and what it commands is holy and upright and good.

12. So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and just and good.

13. Does that mean that something good resulted in my dying? Out of the question! But sin, in order to be identified as sin, caused my death through that good thing, and so it is by means of the commandment that sin shows its unbounded sinful power.

13. Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, working death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure.

14. We are well aware that the Law is spiritual: but I am a creature of flesh and blood sold as a slave to sin.

14. We know that the law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin.

15. I do not understand my own behaviour; I do not act as I mean to, but I do things that I hate.

15. I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.

16. While I am acting as I do not want to, I still acknowledge the Law as good,

16. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good.

17. so it is not myself acting, but the sin which lives in me.

17. So then it is no longer I that do it, but sin which dwells within me.

18. And really, I know of nothing good living in me -- in my natural self, that is -- for though the will to do what is good is in me, the power to do it is not:

18. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it.

19. the good thing I want to do, I never do; the evil thing which I do not want -- that is what I do.

19. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.

20. But every time I do what I do not want to, then it is not myself acting, but the sin that lives in me.

20. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin which dwells within me.

21. So I find this rule: that for me, where I want to do nothing but good, evil is close at my side.

21. So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.

22. In my inmost self I dearly love God's law,

22. For I delight in the law of God, in my inmost self,

23. but I see that acting on my body there is a different law which battles against the law in my mind. So I am brought to be a prisoner of that law of sin which lives inside my body.

23. but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin which dwells in my members.

24. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body doomed to death?

24. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?

25. God -- thanks be to him -- through Jesus Christ our Lord. So it is that I myself with my mind obey the law of God, but in my disordered nature I obey the law of sin.

25. Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I of myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.