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:
All Commentaries on Romans 8:3 Go To Romans 8
Ambrosiaster
AD 400
For whom was this impossible? For us of course, because we could not fulfill the commandment of the law, since we were subject to sin. For this reason God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh. It is the likeness of our flesh because, although it is the same as ours is, it was sanctified in the womb and born without sin, neither did he sin in it. Therefore the womb of a virgin was chosen for the divine birth so that the divine flesh might differ from ours in its holiness. It is like ours in origin but not in sinfulness. For this reason Paul says that it is similar to our flesh, since it is of the same substance, but it did not have the same birth, because the body of the Lord was not subject to sin. The Lord’s flesh was sanctified by the Holy Spirit in order that he might be born in the same kind of body as Adam had before he sinned. By sending Christ God used sin to condemn sin…. For Christ was crucified by sin, which is Satan; hence sin sinned in the flesh of the Savior’s body. In this way, God condemned sin in the flesh, in the very place where it sinned. Commentary on Paul’s Epistles.
