It is commonly, though wrongly thought, that freedom from the Law means freedom from obligation to obey it, or freedom from worry about disobedience to it. But the Scriptures teach a freedom from condemnation, through victory over sin’s dominion. And Jesus taught how this could be achieved through following His words.
Paul teaches that before salvation you were married to the law, but that through the cross: ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead. (Romans 7:4)
Before men are saved they are: servants of sin. (Romans 6:20) There is therefore a battle between their desires and their conscience enhanced by the law of God: I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind (God's law) and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. (Romans 7:23) This was the condition of all as: we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind. (Ephesians 2:3)
Because men broke the commandments, those who heard the law of God were condemned by it: that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. (Romans 7:13) But the law gave no power to gain victory over sin. So Paul says: O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? (Romans 7:24)
But when a person is saved their sinful passions lose their hold over a man: our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. (Romans 6:6) A person then, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, becomes empowered to live righteously by the power (or law) of the Holy Spirit: the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. (Romans 8:2)
Your new life as a Christian should have been that: being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness. (Romans 6:18) That this refers to our actual deeds, rather than to imputed righteousness is clear from Galatians 5:19-24 where the resultant deeds of one with the Holy Spirit are contrasted with the works of the flesh: Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, sexual immorality, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. That the fruit of the Spirit in terms of righteous deeds is not just some ideal, but should be the reality, is made clear by Paul when he says that those whose normal works are those of the flesh: shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
The commandments condemn those who break them. Because a Christian has the ability to keep the commandments, he should no longer be condemned by the commandments he cannot keep. Thus the two states of man are evident: the unsaved state of compulsion to sin followed by the condemnation of the law's commandments; and the saved state of freedom from sin and therefore freedom from the law's condemnation. The cross saves us from condemnation from past sins. A life of righteousness saves us from condemnation from present sins, although it is not as though we never ever sin. But if we do, we may be condemned by the law, until the sin is cleansed.
To those for whom love of sin, has been replaced by love of God and love for one's neighbour by the power of the Holy Ghost, John writes: Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgement: because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. (1 John 4:17,18) But this freedom from the law's condemnation is only for those who have been transformed to Christlike purity, or as John says, are as Christ in the world.
This transformation is the work of God's Spirit: a new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgements, and do them. (Ezekiel 36:26,27) The new heart, which God gives us, is no longer averse to keeping God's commandments.
God gives us a new will: it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. (Philippians 2:13) This new will results in our doing God's will or in other words keeping His commandments.
It is as though new life begins within us, our old life having been deadened by sin. Paul writes that we undergo: the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost. (Titus 3:5) This new life is so different from our old nature that Paul says: if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. (2 Corinthians 5:17)
When one is born again, God gives them new life and a new heart. However it is possible for this new life to be quenched, as happened to the Galatians unto whom Paul wrote: Christ is become of no effect unto you . . . you have fallen from grace. (Galatians 5:4) In their case it was through adherence to Jewish ceremonial law. In other words they were no longer placing their whole trust in Christ's finished work on the cross. Other types of faithlessness or disobedience can also cause one to fall from grace, so now I will look at how to maintain the life described by Paul, when he said: Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. (Galatians 5:16)
Jesus explained that sin's dominion could be overcome by keeping His word. He said: to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. They answered him, We be Abraham's seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free? Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin. And a servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth ever. If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed. (John 8:31-36) Jesus describes as a slave of sin, not one who is condemned by sin, but rather one who commits sin. So when He promises freedom, this is not just from the condemnation of sin, but also from its power over one's life. But He says that this victory, the power to lead a righteous life, is only for those who obey Him.
Obedience to Christ goes beyond merely not stealing, not committing adultery, not blaspheming etc. It means that we love God with all our heart, and our neighbour as ourself. This is the goal toward which we strive, and although we shall never fully attain it, yet as we strive for this higher goal we shall at least have power over sins such as anger, adultery and blasphemy which overcome the unsaved.
Generally speaking we walk in the Spirit by doing good: he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. . . And let us not be weary in well doing. (Galatians 6:8,9) Although the way to walk in the Spirit is to cooperate with the Spirit by being good, where God's definition of goodness goes beyond that of our own, we must trust and obey Him. Therefore when the words of Christ show us a higher standard than we would naturally attempt then we should obey. This is the way of the Holy Spirit according to Jesus: It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life. (John 6:63)
To walk in the Spirit we should strive to obey Jesus' words: Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. (Matthew 5:48) To show what this means for a Christian He taught: Love your enemies (Matthew 5:44); Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth (as a preoccupation) (Matthew 6:19); That thine alms may be in secret (Matthew 6:4); when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret. (Matthew 6:6)
Jesus also taught: if any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow me. (Matthew 16:24) To explain this, He said: What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in the light: and what you hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops. And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul. (Matthew 10:27,28)
Of such an obedience Paul writes: that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter. (Romans 7:6) An example of someone serving in the oldness of the letter is one who is struggling not to take the Lord’s name in vain. Serving in the newness of the Spirit in this respect applies to one who is praising the name of the Lord. But this serving in the newness of Spirit is not without direction from the scriptures, as it is written in Psalm 107:8: Oh that men would praise the Lord for His goodness.
Another example of serving in the oldness of the letter is one who is struggling not to hate his brethren. Serving in the newness of Spirit in this respect applies to one who keeps Galatians 5:13: by love serve one another. All of the Ten Commandments have a fuller Spiritual expression and the rest of the bible and the words of Christ in particular teach us to follow this way.
When one takes heed to obey the full word of God, not just the narrowest letter of the law of the ten commandments then 1 John 2:5 is fulfilled: whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected. Also Jeremiah 15:16 is fulfilled: Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart. This love and this joy and faith in the word of God, which is granted by the Spirit, helps provide an armour against the temptations of the flesh.
It is also important that we keep the whole law. If we break one commandment, the Holy Spirit will not fill us, and we will find it more difficult to keep the other nine. James 2:10,11 says: whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law.
The fact that we have power to resist the devil does not necessarily mean that we will always resist the devil's temptations. We still have free will. Our part in resisting the sins of the flesh such as adultery, murder etc is spoken of in Romans 6:12 where Paul says: Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. We must not yield to the flesh for Paul says: Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption. (Galatians 6:7,8)
Also Romans 8:13: if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die. This speaks of those whose repentance at salvation was not complete. By permanently discontinuing righteousness, they show that they were never saved.
Thus in summary there are two aspects to the life of righteousness: The first is to obey God; and the second is not to yield to temptations of the flesh and spirit from the devil. As James 4:7 says: submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil. There are two promises for those who do this: Firstly, of God, James 4:6 says: he giveth more grace; and secondly, of the devil, James 4:7 says: he will flee from you. The grace of God giving help by the Holy Spirit enables us to conquer the temptations of the flesh given by the devil. These two steps are how we obey Romans 8:13: if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.
The resultant state of one who takes heed to God's word is not: the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba Father. (Romans 8:15)
When Paul, in Romans 7, describes the condemnation of God's moral law and the dominion of sin which held him, he is describing how he still would be without Christ and how he once was without Christ, not how he normally was as a Christian.
As a Christian obeys God and abstains from sin, he feels less and less the desire to sin, and he comes under the dominion of righteousness. But if a Christian starts disobeying God, then the evil nature starts to re-emerge within him, causing him to feel stronger temptation. Paul, because he was human, knew that if he disobeyed God, the presence of God would leave him, and because of his flesh he would be subject to temptation which could overcome him. This is the state of the dominion of sin and the condemnation of the law which is described in Romans 7.
Before Paul was saved, because he was a murderer and a persecutor of God, this was his state. But when he was saved he was delivered from this state. The reason Paul uses the present tense in Romans 7 to describe the state of sin's dominion is that it was the state of his flesh both before and after conversion. However after conversion, because he was obedient to God, that state of the flesh would have been suppressed by the power of God.
We should not believe that Paul never experienced victory over the dominion of sin and the resulting condemnation because this interpretation would be contrary to his words: sin shall not have dominion over you, (Romans 6:14) and would also be contrary to the rest of the bible.
Sometimes in the letters of Galatians and Colossians freedom from the law means freedom from laws regarding Jewish ceremonial feasts and such like. But this freedom should not be misinterpreted as freedom from moral responsibility as outlined in the Ten Commandments. The mechanism of freedom from the Law’s condemnation is by the power of the cross of Christ.