Charles Spurgeon Commentary Romans 8:3-4

"For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the ordinance of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." — Romans 8:3-4 (ASV)

For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

If there are any people in the world who do keep the law of God, they are the very persons who do not hope to be saved by the keeping of it, for they have by faith found righteousness in Christ, and now by love and gratitude are put under the power of the law of the spiritual life in Christ, and they live in such a way, by God's grace, that they do manifest the holiness of the law in their lives.

For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

The law of God was a good law, a just and holy law. It was weak, not in itself, for, truly, if righteousness could have been by any law, it would have been by the law of God. But it was weak through our flesh.

We could not keep it. We could not fulfill the conditions of life laid down under it.

Therefore, what the law could not do, God has now done for us. He has found a way of making us righteous through the righteousness of his own dear Son, whom he has sent in the likeness of sinful flesh.

He has found out a way of condemning sin, without condemning us. He condemned sin in the flesh, but we escaped.

And he has found out a way of making us practically righteous, too, through the abundance of his grace, enabling us to walk no longer after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

Blessed be God for this, for when we had broken his law, he might justly have left us to take the consequences; but he has stepped aside: he has gone beyond all that might have been expected of him, and brought in a law by which a remedy is applied to all our ills.

Glory be to his name!

For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

The law never made anybody holy, and it never will do so. The law says to a man, "This is what you ought to do, and you will be condemned if you do not do it." That is quite true, but the law supplies no power to enable us to do this. It says to the lame man, "You must walk," and to the blind man, "You must see," but it does not enable them either to walk or to see.

On the contrary, our nature is such that, when the law issues its commands, there is a tendency in us at once to disobey them. There are some sins, which we never should have thought of committing if we had not been commanded not to do them, so that the law — not because of its own nature, but because of the wickedness of our nature — is weak and ineffectual for the producing of righteousness.

But the Lord Jesus Christ has come, has lived, and has died, — died for us who are his people, and has put away our sins. Now we love him; now, being delivered from all condemnation, we love him who has delivered us, and this becomes the forge by which we are inclined to holiness and are led further and further in a course, not merely of morality, but of holiness before God. What a blessed system this is, which saves the sinner from the love of sin, delivers a man from sinning, gives him a new nature, and puts a right spirit within him!

For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

This is our victory, that though the flesh may lust, we do not walk after it; we are kept by God's grace; we are preserved, so that the bent and tenor of our life is according to the rule of the Spirit of God.