Romans 7:13

Here Paul is expounding the person of Adam. For although he had the image of God dwelling in him, he turned away from true life and chose death instead. Moreover, this death was not just the common death of our bodily members but the spiritual …

That is, that it might be shown what great evil sin is, namely, a listless will, an inclinableness to the worse side, the actual doing, and the perverted judgment. For this is the cause of all the evils; but he amplifies it by pointing out the exceeding grace of Christ, and teaching them what an evil He freed the human race from, which, by the medicines used to cure it, had become worse, and was increased by the preventives. Wherefore he goes on to say: "That sin, by the commandment, might become exceeding sinful." Do you see how these things are woven together everywhere? By the very means he uses to accuse sin, he again shows the excellency of the Law. Neither is it a small point which he has gained by showing what an evil sin is, and unfolding the whole of its poison, and bringing it to view. For this is what he shows, by saying, "that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful." That is, that it may be made clear what an evil sin is, what a ruinous thing. And this is what was shown by the commandment. Hereby he also shows the preeminence of grace above the Law, the preeminence above, not the conflict with, the Law. For do not look to this fact, that those who received it were the worse for it, but consider the other, that the Law had not only no design of drawing wickedness out to greater lengths, but even seriously aimed at hewing down what already existed. But if it had no strength, give to it indeed a crown for its intention, but adore more highly the power of Christ, which abolished, cut away: and plucked up the very roots an evil so manifold and so hard to be overthrown. But when you hear me speak of sin, do not think of it as a substantial power, but evil doing, as it comes upon men and goes from them continually, and which, before it takes place, has no being, and when it has taken place, vanishes again.

"That, then, which is good," he says, "is it death to me? God forbid!" He refutes an objection that necessarily arises, and says: It is not that the good of the law and of the commandment brought death upon me; "but sin," he says, "that it might appear" how wicked it is, "through what is good wrought death in me." For the commandment is good when it is kept: but if it is not kept, it will necessarily be an evil to him who has lost the good. Therefore "sin itself becomes a sinner beyond measure" by occasion of the commandment. We said above too that he fashioned, as it were, a personification of sin, and says of it that sin itself — of whose person he speaks — was made a sinner beyond measure by occasion of the commandment. For it is less of a sin if you commit what is not forbidden. But if you commit things vetoed and prohibited, you are, so to speak, a sinner beyond measure: because you have not only done what you ought not, but you have also transgressed a precept. But as for our saying "sin is a sinner," we preferred to admit a fault of language rather than not express the Apostle's meaning in its entirety: because in the Latin tongue the noun for sin (peccatum) has confined us, since it is declined in the neuter gender, whereas in Greek it is feminine; and therefore we have called it a sinner in the masculine (peccator): for there it can be called a sinner in the feminine (peccatrix).

Then, when he says, did that then which is good, he raises a question in regard to the effect of the law. First, the question, saying, did that then which is good, namely, in itself, bring death unto me, i.e., act as a per se …

The Law, he says, did not become death for me, but sin put me to death, so that it would become clear what an evil sin is, and that despite the healing provided by the Law, it became worse. And by sin, as we said …

But it was sin, which was made death to me, inasmuch as it wrought death in me even by that which is good - By the good law. So that sin by the commandment became exceeding sinful - The consequence of which was, that inbred sin, thus driving furiously in spite of the commandment, became exceeding sinful; the guilt thereof being greatly aggravated.

Thus by the commandment it becomes exceedingly sinful; that is, it appears to be so. We never see the desperate venom or malignity there is in sin, till we come to compare it with the law, and the spiritual nature of the law, and then we see it to be an evil and a bitter thing.

Was then that which is good, made death unto me?.... An objection is started upon the last epithet in commendation of the law; and it is as if the objector should say, if the law is good, as you say, how comes it to pass that it is made death, or is the cause of death to you? can that be good, which is deadly, or the cause of death? or can that be the cause of death which is good?

Now in this sin appears sin. The worst thing that sin does, and most like itself, is the perverting of the law, and taking occasion from it to be so much the more malignant. Thus the commandment, which was ordained to life, was intended as a guide in the way to comfort and happiness, proved unto death, through the corruption of nature,

Was then that which is good made--"Hath then that which is good become" death unto me? God forbid--that is, "Does the blame of my death lie with the good law?

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — odd-straight-quotes

So sang George Herbert, that sweet and saintly poet, and of one of those "two vast spacious things" we are about to speak on this morning—namely, sin. May the Holy Spirit direct us in thought and speech while into the very center of our subject we plunge at once, keeping to the words of our text. I. Our first point to consider this morning shall be that TO MANY MEN SIN DOES NOT APPEAR SIN. Yes, and in all men in their natural blindness there is an ignorance of what sin is.

So sang George Herbert, that sweet and saintly poet, and of one of those "two vast spacious things" we are about to speak on this morning—namely, sin. May the Holy Spirit direct us in thought and speech while into the very center of our subject we plunge at once, keeping to the words of our text. I. Our first point to consider this morning shall be that TO MANY MEN SIN DOES NOT APPEAR SIN. Yes, and in all men in their natural blindness there is an ignorance of what sin is. It needs the power of the Divine Omnipotence, the voice of that same Majesty, which said, "Let there be light," and there was light to illuminate the human mind, or else it will remain in darkness as to much of its own actual sin and the deep and deadly evil which belongs to it. Man, with wretched perverseness of misconception, abides content in a wrong idea of it. His deeds are evil and he will not come to the light lest he should know more concerning that evil than he wishes to know. Moreover, such is the power of self-esteem that though sin abounds in the sinner he will not readily be brought to feel or confess its existence. There are men in this world, steeped up to the throat in iniquity, who never dream that they have committed anything worse than little faults. There are those whose souls are saturated with it till they are like the wool that has been lying in the scarlet dye—and yet they conceive themselves as white as snow. This is due in part to that dullness of conscience which is the result of the Fall. Though I have heard 10,000 times that conscience is the deputy of God in the soul of man, I have never been able to subscribe to that dogma. It is no such thing! In many persons conscience is perverted. In others only a fragment of it remains and in all it is fallible and subject to aberrations.

INTO the connection of these words our time, which is very short this evening, will not permit us to enter. It was something like this—Paul was showing that the Law could not make a man holy and he observes that he had, himself, found that when the Law came into his heart, it excited in him a desire to act contrary to its precepts. There were some actions which he would not have thought of performing until he found that they were forbidden—and then immediately he felt a desire to do them at once!

INTO the connection of these words our time, which is very short this evening, will not permit us to enter. It was something like this—Paul was showing that the Law could not make a man holy and he observes that he had, himself, found that when the Law came into his heart, it excited in him a desire to act contrary to its precepts. There were some actions which he would not have thought of performing until he found that they were forbidden—and then immediately he felt a desire to do them at once! To this a grave objection was raised. This were to make the Law aid and abet sin! Not so, replies the Apostle—it was not the Law that made him sin, for the Law is good—but it was the sinfulness of his heart that could thus turn that which was good into an occasion of evil. He further showed that this was the very design of the Law as given by Moses—to make clear how sinful sin was. The purpose for which it was sent was not to make men holy, but to make men see how unholy they were! It was not the cure of the disease, much less the creator of it, but it was the revealerof the disease that lurked in the constitution of man! Now, what I want to call your attention to is that Paul here calls sin, "exceedingly sinful." Why didn't he say, "exceedingly black," or, "exceedingly horrible," or, "exceedingly deadly"? Why, because there is nothing in the world so bad as sin! When he wanted to use the very worst word he could find to call sin by, he called it by its own name and reiterated it—"sin," "exceedingly sinful." For if you call sin, black, there is no moral excellency or deformity in black or white. Black is as good as white and white is as good as black. And so you have expressed nothing. If you call sin, "deadly, "yet death in itself has no evil in it compared with sin.

Was then that which is good made death unto me? - This is the question of the Jew, with whom the apostle appears to be disputing. “Do you allow the law to be good, and yet say it is the cause of our death?” The apostle answers: - God forbid! μη γενοιτο, by no means: it is not the law that is the cause of your death, but sin; it was sin which subjected us to death by the law, justly threatening sin with death: which law was given that sin might appear - might be set forth in its own colors; when we saw it subjected us to death by a law perfectly holy, just, and good; that sin, by the law, might be represented what it really is: - καθ’ ὑπερβολην ἁμαρτωλος, an Exceeding Great and deadly evil. Thus it appears that man cannot have a true notion of sin but by means of the law of God. For this I have already given sufficient reasons in the preceding notes. And it was one design of the law to show the abominable and destructive nature of sin, as well as to be a rule of life. It would be almost impossible for a man to have that just notion of the demerit of sin so as to produce repentance, or to see the nature and necessity of the death of Christ, if the law were not applied to his conscience by the light of the Holy Spirit; it is then alone that he sees himself to be carnal, and sold under sin; and that the law and the commandment are holy, just, and good. And let it be observed, that the law did not answer this end merely among the Jews in the days of the apostle; it is just as necessary to the Gentiles to the present hour. Nor do we find that true repentance takes place where the moral law is not preached and enforced. Those who preach only the Gospel to sinners, at best only heal the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly. […]