- Jul 22, 2014
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What I understand Paul to be teaching is that the law strengthens sin because it gives a fuller and clearer accounting of wrongdoing. Even apart from a written command, a person still has conscience, which bears witness and can accuse or excuse them (Romans 2:14–15). So man is not morally neutral without the written law. However, when the law comes, it does something more specific and forceful: it explicitly defines transgression, removes ambiguity, and establishes a clearer standard of accountability. In this way, the law does not create sin but intensifies its exposure and judicial weight.
This is exactly what Paul means when he says in Romans 5:20 that the law entered so that the offense might abound. The Greek shows the law “entered alongside,” meaning sin already existed, yet the law magnified trespass by making it explicit and undeniable. Conscience may convict internally, but the law provides an external divine standard that clarifies the violation and renders guilt more formally accountable. Because sin is lawlessness (1 John 3:4), the presence of law sharpens the definition of sin and increases its imputability. Thus sin gains greater operative potency, not by being created, but by being more clearly revealed and condemned.
This helps explain Paul’s statement that the strength of sin is the law (1 Corinthians 15:56). The law gives sin its condemning leverage because it transforms wrongdoing into explicit transgression, intensifies awareness of guilt, and establishes the basis for judgment that leads to death. In that sense, the law adds a second layer of moral accounting: conscience already witnesses internally, but the law provides an objective divine declaration that makes the violation unmistakable. Consequently, sin’s reign is reinforced through condemnation, yet Paul’s larger argument shows that Christ’s righteousness removes that condemnation if we accept His grace by faith and walk after the Spirit. This breaks sin’s dominion, and secures resurrection victory so that grace may reign through righteousness (both imputed righteousness by faith and by living righteously) unto eternal life.
Sin reigns unto death. But grace reigns through righteousness (Which is both the belief version and the obedience version) (Romans 5:21 KJV). This includes the grace of God that gives a person the ability to do the work of faith (1 Corinthians 15:10 KJV). For God's grace teaches us to deny ungodliness, and that we should live righteously and godly in this present world (Titus 2:11-12 KJV).
God gives grace to the humble (James 4:6 KJV).
James continues to say, "Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded." (James 4:7-8 KJV).
"But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law" (Galatians 5:18 KJV).
"Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh." (Galatians 5:16 KJV).
"And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts." (Galatians 5:24 KJV).
"Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin; That he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God." (1 Peter 4:1-2 KJV).
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