¹⁴ Sin is no longer your master, for you no longer live under the requirements of the law. Instead, you live under the freedom of God’s grace.

¹⁸ But when you are directed by the Spirit, you are not under obligation to the law of Moses.

² And because you belong to him, the power^[a] of the life-giving Spirit has freed you^[b] from the power of sin that leads to death.

¹² Do not let sin control the way you live;^[a] do not give in to sinful desires.

⁴ But when the right time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, subject to the law. ⁵ God sent him to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that he could adopt us as his very own children.^[a]

⁴ So, my dear brothers and sisters, this is the point: You died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the one who was raised from the dead. As a result, we can produce a harvest of good deeds for God. ⁵ When we were controlled by our old nature,^[a] sinful desires were at work within us, and the law aroused these evil desires that produced a harvest of sinful deeds, resulting in death. ⁶ But now we have been released from the law, for we died to it and are no longer captive to its power. Now we can serve God, not in the old way of obeying the letter of the law, but in the new way of living in the Spirit.

God’s Law Reveals Our Sin

⁷ Well then, am I suggesting that the law of God is sinful? Of course not! In fact, it was the law that showed me my sin. I would never have known that coveting is wrong if the law had not said, “You must not covet.”^{[b] 8} But sin used this command to arouse all kinds of covetous desires within me! If there were no law, sin would not have that power. ⁹ At one time I lived without understanding the law. But when I learned the command not to covet, for instance, the power of sin came to life, ¹⁰ and I died. So I discovered that the law’s commands, which were supposed to bring life, brought spiritual death instead. ¹¹ Sin took advantage of those commands and deceived me; it used the commands to kill me.

¹⁷ For the law was given through Moses, but God’s unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ.

⁶ He has enabled us to be ministers of his new covenant. This is a covenant not of written laws, but of the Spirit. The old written covenant ends in death; but under the new covenant, the Spirit gives life.

The Glory of the New Covenant

⁷ The old way,^[a] with laws etched in stone, led to death, though it began with such glory that the people of Israel could not bear to look at Moses’ face. For his face shone with the glory of God, even though the brightness was already fading away. ⁸ Shouldn’t we expect far greater glory under the new way, now that the Holy Spirit is giving life? ⁹ If the old way, which brings condemnation, was glorious, how much more glorious is the new way, which makes us right with God!

¹² Therefore, dear brothers and sisters,^[a] you have no obligation to do what your sinful nature urges you to do.