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Paul's Argument on Law, Flesh and Sin (Claims God Blundered in Creating Flesh) Paul's argument in Romans and Galatians is that before there can be sin there must be law; and before there can be law, there must be flesh. Spirit is the answer, because spirit is not flesh; and there can be no sin without flesh, because there is no law without flesh. He's trying to say that God blundered in creating human life; then God blamed humans for defying him; but someone straightened out his thinking by killing Christ. 1. (Rom 4:15) Indeed, the law worketh to bring down wrath, for where there is no law there is no transgression. (The purpose of Congress is to bring down wrath upon the public.) 2. (Rom 7:1) Are you not aware, my brothers... that the law has power over a man only so long as he lives? 3. (Rom 6:7) For he that is dead is freed from sin. 4. (Rom 7:5,6) When we were in the flesh, the sinful passions roused by the law worked in our members and we bore fruit for death. Now we have been released from the law - for we have died to what bound us - and we serve in the new spirit, not the antiquated letter. 5. (Rom 7:7-9) I should never have known what evil desire was unless the law had said, "You shall not covet." Sin seized that opportunity; it used the commandment to rouse in me every kind of evil desire. Without law sin is dead... (7:15-18) I do not do what I want to do but what I hate...it is not I who do it but the sin which resides in me...no good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh... 6. (Rom 8:2) The law of the spirit, the spirit of life in Christ Jesus, has freed you from the law of sin and death. 7. (Rom 8:3) Then God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh as a sin offering, thereby condemning sin in the flesh... 8. (Rom 5:9,10) Now that we have been justified by his blood, it is all the more certain that we shall be saved by him from God's wrath. For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him by death of his Son... (Notice that what people need to be saved from is not their own corruptions but God's wrath.) 9. (Rom 8:6) The tendency of the flesh is toward death but that of the spirit toward life and peace. 10. (Gal 2:16) Nevertheless, knowing that a man is not justified by legal observance but by faith in Jesus Christ, we too have believed in him in order to be justified by faith in Christ, not by observance of the law; for by works of the law no one will be justified. 11. (Gal 2:21) If justice is available through the law, then Christ died to no purpose! 12. (Gal 5:16,17) My point is that you should live in accord with the spirit and you will not yield to the cravings of the flesh. The flesh lusts against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh; the two are directly opposed. 13. (Gal 5:18) If you are guided by the spirit, you are not under the law. 14. (Gal 5:22) ...the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patient endurance...Interpretation of tongues. Paul indicated that flesh causes sin, as if he were speaking of biological flesh, then he drifted into metaphor, then drifted into spiritual flesh, and then indicated that the death of spiritual flesh ends sin. There is no such thing as death of spiritual flesh, and it wouldn't end sin if it occurred, because sin permeates all realities, attitudes and values in the mind. Christ said that not the smallest letter of the law is to be done away with (Mat 5:18). Paul said that God created two contradictory sets of laws. First he created biological laws through flesh, which created passions and resulted in bad conduct. Then God created commandments which say it is sin to succumb to the laws of flesh through passions. Of course, God got angry when the sin occurred. Crucifying Christ supposedly had the purpose of alleviating God's anger. Note that by spirit, Paul is not referring to the Holy Spirit but the person's own spirit. He is saying that the spirit is a moral influence (14), while flesh is a corrupting influence (5). Paul does not say how to get from point A to point B except as faith in Christ (10). How does faith go from flesh to spirit, and why are Paul's admonishments and moralizing necessary? Is there a path involved? Paul claims the only purpose of Christ's death is to justify someone, and law does not produce justice (10). So much for government. Paul is saying there was no sin before human life was created, because flesh creates law (2, 4, 5, 12), and law creates sin (1, 5). He tries to indicate that sin is not possible in the spirit world (2). Of course, it is, as satan and evil spirits indicate. Spirit powers supposedly perfect people, so persons with spirit powers are more worthy. There is plenty of evidence that the opposite is true. Power corrupts, and spirit powers are the primary source of power. Most evil and sin come from the spirit world. Another implication of Paul's is that God created the problem of sin by creating human life (4). Besides being patently absurd, the fix would not be killing Christ. Paul isn't quoting Scriptures or delivering a message from God. He is describing what is supposed to be the self-evident logic of the subject. He is saying that flesh has a problem with it, because it creates passions. So God forbid certain behaviors. Instead of God's commands fixing everything, it forced people to defy him, which became the essence of sin. God supposedly got angry because of the defiance, but killing Christ dampened his anger and fixed the problem (8). That aint no way, shape or form what happened - not by the Scriptures, not by logic and not by the evidence of objective reality. Sin goes far beyond flesh and began long before human life began. The serpent knew all about sin when tempting Adam and Eve. Why would killing Christ dampen God's anger? Paul's logic indicates that sinners made a believer of God by showing him that they could not live by his laws, and crucifying Christ was the result. So God relinquished his demands. One reason why Paul's claims about the crucifixion are false is because God designed the crucifixion, not sinners, and his purpose was not to influence himself (Mark 8:31-33). After the resurrection, Christ said penance is to be preached for the remission of sins (Luke 24:47). Therefore, the crucifixion did not end the problem of sin or change its significance or the means of overcoming it. The obvious purpose of Christ's crucifixion was to create truth about sin, its characteristics, who perpetrates it and why. It showed that religious authorities and corrupted persons would crucify God for healing the sick, feeding the hungry, raising the dead and producing moral truth.
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