Bible Strands
Romans 8:13
For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Paul addresses the Roman believers in the middle of a contrast between flesh-driven and Spirit-led existence (8:12–14), framing the choice as an obligation already settled by their position in Christ.
The words — μέλλετε (mellete, "you are about to") is a present tense of μέλλω, marking the death in the first clause not as a distant threat but as an imminent, in-progress reality for anyone living κατὰ σάρκα.
The thread — The same binary (flesh → destruction, Spirit → life) recurs in Galatians 6:8, and the active command to "put to death" the body's deeds is echoed in Colossians 3:5 and 1 Peter 2:11.
Why it lands — It removes the option of neutrality: the reader is either actively killing the body's deeds or actively dying, and the verb "put to death" demands a deliberate, repeated act rather than a one-time decision.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Greek words
King James Version
For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.
Cross-references
- Galatians 6:8 The one who sows to please his flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; but the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life.
- 1 Peter 2:11 Beloved, I urge you, as foreigners and exiles, to abstain from the desires of the flesh, which war against your soul.
- Colossians 3:5 Put to death, therefore, the components of your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, and greed, which is idolatry.
- 1 Corinthians 9:27 No, I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified.
- Titus 2:12 It instructs us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live sensible, upright, and godly lives in the present age,
- Galatians 5:24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
- Ephesians 4:22 to put off your former way of life, your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires;
- Romans 8:4 so that the righteous standard of the law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
- 1 Peter 1:22 Since you have purified your souls by obedience to the truth so that you have a genuine love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from a pure heart.
- Romans 7:5 For when we lived according to the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, bearing fruit for death.