One of the joys I have is reading each month through the testimonies of those who are coming into our membership. That is part of our membership process, that is each one who is coming writes out a personal testimony as to how he or she trusted Christ. This last week it was a joy to read, 27 or 28.
I remember one in particular in which a wife commented about the fact that her husband came home and expressed to her that in the church they had been going to that point, they had heard a lot about the love of God, but now he said, I've heard about the holiness of God. As a result of that he became a Christian and she later became a Christian.
I wonder if in some circles our theology isn't a little off balance when we talk a lot about the love of God, but we seldom stop to consider God's holiness. That holiness is condensed and brought to our attention in the law of God. We've been talking about the law of God in Romans chapter 7. I invite you to take your Bible and turn there again with me as we complete the chapter this morning. We'll begin reading in verse 14 of Romans 7.
For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. For that which I am doing I do not understand. For I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. And if I do the very thing I do not wish to do, I agree with the law confessing that it is good. So now no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which indwells me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh.
For the wishing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. For the good that I wish I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not wish. But if I am doing the very thing I do not wish, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wishes to do good.
For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members, wretched man that I am, who will set me free from the body of this death. Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other with my flesh the law of sin.
This is probably one of the most controversial passages in the book of Romans. And it has been controversial and misunderstood by some probably for close to 2,000 years. It is too bad the Apostle Paul did not write a commentary on the book of Romans, isn't it? One of the first questions that comes to mind is who is this person that is in view here? Is this a saved person or is it an unsaved person?
Now there are those who say that it is an unsaved person, that it must be a regenerate person for in verse 24 he says wretched man that I am. And how could a Christian make a statement like that, call himself wretched? For he is the one who said in Romans 5, 1 that he has peace with God having been justified by faith through our Lord Jesus Christ. So how could a Christian say wretched man that I am?
Furthermore in verse 14 he says I am of flesh or literally I am fleshly, I am carnal, sold into bondage to sin. And people say well how could a Christian ever say he is sold into bondage to sin? After all back in chapter 6 in verse 2 he said how shall we who died to sin still live in it? Talking about Christians. And also in chapter 6 verse 6 he said knowing this that our old self was crucified with him that our body of sin might be done away with that we should no longer be slaves to sin.
Verse 14, for sin shall not be master over you. Verse 17, thanks to God that though you were slaves of sin you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed. And verse 18, having been freed from sin you became slaves of righteousness. And so it's argued how could a Christian who says what he does in chapter 6 then say what he does in chapter 7 therefore it must be an unsaved person in chapter 7.
And then they look at verse 18 where it says I know that nothing good dwells in me. They say the Holy Spirit dwells in the Christian. So no Christian would be able to say something like that.
Now personally I believe that there are answers to each of those arguments and we're going to talk about them as we go through our text this morning because I do not believe this is talking about an unsaved person in this part of chapter 7. I believe it's talking about a Christian and I believe that for several reasons. In the first place in verse 22 he says I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man. He says I delight, I rejoice in the law of God.
An unregenerate person would never have that attitude about the law of God. But this person says I delight in it. I concur with it. I agree with it. I rejoice in the law of God. Furthermore in verse 25 he says that he serves the law of God with his mind. So he not only rejoices in it and concurs with it but he says with his mind he serves the law of God. Not so the unsaved person. In verses 15, 18, 19, and 21 he essentially says this. I hate sin. I loathe it. Though I do it, it repulses me.
I hate it. No unsaved person would make a statement like that. He loves sin. He loves sin. But here's a person who hates it with the fiber of his inner being. And in verse 25 this person after saying who will set me free thanks God that Jesus Christ will set him free. And that again is no hope that an unsaved person can express. Only a Christian can say that. And so personally I'm convinced that this passage is talking about a Christian.
But then there's the question what kind of a Christian is this? And again there are at least two answers to that. There are those who say that this is a defeated Christian. We have here the testimony of a Christian who is seeking to be sanctified by the law. That is, he is seeking to please God by doing good things and keeping rules. He's under some legalistic system. My answer to that is that I have met legalists in my life. I even were one, I suppose, earlier to some degree.
And I've never heard a legalist who'd be willing to say something like this paragraph says. Because a legalist sees himself okay. He doesn't see himself in the predicament that this man sees himself in. A legalist has got the victory because he's keeping his little set of rules. But here's a man who cries out in anguish because of sin.
I believe that this passage was written by the Apostle Paul and that in it he is giving us his personal testimony as a spirit-filled, mature, growing, dynamic Christian. That's who writes this paragraph and that's who it refers to. He is one who knows the law of God and who therefore knows of God's holiness. And against that background he sees himself with his imperfections and he agonizes over his inability to live out completely the righteousness of the law of God written on his heart.
What is seen here is a hatred of sin and that in itself is evidence of the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. The closer one gets to God the more sensitive he is to sin. This person is very sensitive to the sin that's in him. And so I'm saying to you that this is the testimony of Paul himself and of every person who seeks to walk with God and know the filling of the Holy Spirit. Now you say, I can't believe Paul would say something like this.
I mean Paul saying he's a wretched man, saying that he has brought prisoner to the law of sin and the members of his body, how could Paul, the great apostle, ever say something like that? Well, the same way that he was able to say that he was the least of the saints, 1 Corinthians 15, or in Ephesians 3 he says he was less than the least of the saints. 1 Timothy 1, 12 he says, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom what? I am chief. Not I was chief, I am chief.
You see, Paul is giving to us a certain perspective about himself. Not everything that could be said, but he is revealing to us a certain perspective about himself. And what he is doing here in our text is to open his heart like most of us would be frightened to do. He allows himself to be very transparent as he tells us about his personal struggle with indwelling sin. That's what he's doing. Now the Christian lives in a tension between two truths.
One truth is that having trusted Christ, we are no longer in sin or in Adam, but we are in whom? In Christ, that's right. We are in Christ. And we have been set free from sin, we have been set free from the law with this condemnation. That's one side. That's one truth. But the other truth is that even though we are no longer in sin and in Adam, sin remains in us, in our humanness, or in our flesh as the apostle says.
Or he also calls it in the members of our body, that is the capacities of our bodies, to some degree our personalities. And so we live in a tension between these two truths. Our text reveals a three-fold explanation of the struggle that the apostle Paul personally had with indwelling sin. And my friend, if you today are seeking to follow the Lord and to grow in Christ and to mature in your faith, you're going to do a lot of identifying as we talk about it.
The apostle actually gives us three key thoughts. He talks about his condition, the confirmation of that condition, and his conclusion. Those are the three points, in fact, you'll find on the outline in your worship folder. But the apostle does something that I guess we all who teach have learned, that you need to repeat yourself. And so three times he goes through the process of talking about his condition, the confirmation of it, and his conclusion. Follow it with me as we begin in verse 14.
He talks here about his condition. He says, we know that the law is spiritual. In other words, the law reflects the character of God. God is spirit. The law reveals to us his holiness. His moral standard. And it speaks to the spirit of a man. It's energized by God. That's why he says the law is spiritual. Before he said it's holy, it's just, it's good. Remember that? Now he says in contrast to the law which is spiritual, I am carnal. I am fleshly, sold into bondage to sin.
Paul says the law is spiritual, I am unspiritual. Essentially what he says here. Now again I emphasize this is not the total truth about Paul, but this is one perspective of what Paul was and what you and I are as maturing, growing Christians. The apostle says I am fleshly. Notice he does not say I am in the flesh. Back in verse five of this same chapter he says, while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death.
And we said when we study that verse that that phrase is a key phrase the apostle uses to describe the unregenerate condition. An unsafe person is in the flesh. We see it used again in chapter eight. Look over there in verse eight where he says those who are in the flesh cannot please God, an unsafe person. So Paul is not saying in verse 14 of chapter seven I am in the flesh, but he's saying essentially the flesh is still in me. Can you identify with that? Do you ever get irritated?
I could say to you I never get irritated and then I would be guilty of lying. My wife can testify to the fact I get irritated and I am sometimes insensitive to people. And there are times when I become proud and there are times when I am irresponsible. And all of that is evidence of sin. It's fleshliness. That's what the apostle is saying to us. He's not perfect. He says I'm fleshly. But then he goes on to say I'm sold into bondage to sin. And that one really throws some people for a loop.
How could a Christian ever say that? Well, the apostle is simply giving us the truth about one aspect of him, one perspective. In his flesh there is still a proneness to want to sin. The power or the principle of sin lives in that part of him. And when he sins he is captivated by sin. That's what he says in verse 23. He has these two laws or principles waging war in him and he says this law of sin or sin rather makes him a prisoner of the law of sin which is in his members.
So when he sins he is taken captive by sin. There is still a certain bondage that is there. Even the redeemed of God are still victimized in their flesh, in their unredeemed mortality, their unregenerated humanness still victimized by sin. You say how does that relate to chapter 6? Well we just read the verses in chapter 6 that says we are freed from sin. You must remember in chapter 6 his main thought there is the new man. He says the old man was executed, it was put to death.
And you are in your innermost being a new man. A new person is Christ in you. You are a new man created in righteousness and true holiness. It is sinless, that new man in you. That is the perspective in chapter 6. And he says that new man is totally freed from sin under no obligation any longer to it. But I want you to notice in chapter 6 even in verse 12 he mentions the possibility of nonetheless sinning. Look there he says, do not let sin therefore reign in your mortal body.
Notice where he says it reigns. That you should obey its lust and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness. And so in the very chapter where he says that in our new man we are free from sin he nonetheless warns us of the capacity still to sin. That capacity is our flesh, that unredeemed humanness that we still have. Now let's go back to chapter 7 and look at verses 15 and 16.
Paul says here is the proof, here is the evidence, here is the confirmation that I am in this condition. He says for that which I am doing I do not understand. For I am not practicing what I would like to do but I am doing the very thing I hate. If I do the very thing I do not wish to do I agree with the law confessing it's good. Paul is using I here in a personal way of course and in a non-technical sense. He's saying I take responsibility for my actions. I accept the blame.
He said here is proof that I am fleshly. Here is my frustration he says. The law is spiritual. He says I long for the law. I delight in it. I serve God with my mind after the law. But he says there is about me still fleshliness and I am still captured by sin and he says the things I want to do I don't do. The things I don't want to do those I do. That is his frustration. Can you identify with that?
Actually only the immature Christian might see himself to have arrived spiritually and to be above what is said here. Even one so mature and so close to the Lord as the apostle Paul wrote in Philippians that he had not yet arrived. So when you hear a Christian who gives a testimony to the fact that he has arrived he's giving evidence of his immaturity. He's not quite where he thinks he is. For here is one apostle Paul who says I have an inner struggle in me. I have a struggle with sin.
His conclusion in verse 17 is this. So now no longer am I the one doing it but sin which indwells me. Now do you notice what he does here? Before he took responsibility. He said I'm guilty. I'm to blame. So in a non-technical general way that's true. But now he says more specifically he says it's not really I the new man who's doing it but it's sin which indwells me. And where does it dwell? It dwells in our bodies, in our flesh, that humanness about us. That power of sin is still within.
The apostle says it's no longer I the one who's really sinning. He says because I delight in the law of God. He says technically speaking it's sin within me that's doing this. We need to distinguish don't we between reigning sin and surviving sin. In the unsaved person sin reigns. But in the Christian sin only survives. It no longer is in there with no foe because now there is a new man and the Holy Spirit indwells us. And even though it's been displaced it still survives to do battle within us.
That's what the apostle is saying here. He says there's a conflict between the new I, the new me, that deepest innermost new person in Christ and the flesh where sin dwells in me. What does he do in verse 18? He starts all over again. He talks about his condition. He says I know that nothing good dwells in me. Now the apostle is not denying here that the Holy Spirit dwells in him. Notice he is specific again. He says I know that nothing good dwells in me. That is he says in my flesh.
Not in the innermost part of me because the Holy Spirit's there. But he says in my flesh that unredeemed humanness about me there's nothing good that's there. That's his condition. The Bible speaks about the corruption of sin in the believer. It's always and only in his flesh and the members of his body, not in the new man, the deepest self as he is in Christ. That's what Paul is saying. Then he begins again to give us the confirmation and the evidence.
In verse 18 he says, for the wishing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. For the good that I wish I do not do, but I practice the very evil I do not wish. So essentially he says the same thing as verses 15 and 16. He says there is something within me that wants to do good, but then there is a struggle with an opposite force. By the way, when Paul says what he does here, he is not saying he always fails. He is not saying I'm going around as a defeated Christian.
That is not what he's saying. Rather, he's saying he is frustrated because he just can't do all the good that he wants to do. He can't live out as fully as he really wants to the righteousness of God. All the time he's not doing the good. There are times when evil expresses itself, and he hates that. He hates sin, and he grows in his hatred of sin as his sensitivity to it increases.
Actually, I believe that a person who is moving in the direction the apostle is is decreasing in his frequency of sin. But as a person decreases in frequency of sin, his sensitivity to sin increases. It's just like smoking. Some people smoke and they think I'm picking on you because I've talked about that two weeks in a row now. That's not the case. But if you're around cigarettes, smoke all the time, you don't smell it anymore. Is that right?
You don't realize how it affects your sense of smell and of taste. But as you decrease in your use of cigarettes and stop altogether, what happens? You increase in your sensitivity to it, and you can pick it up that fast. And if you don't smoke at all, you know exactly what I'm talking about, don't you? Because when a person comes up to you, you can smell on their clothes or even on their breath. Gum or no gum, it's there. And so it is with sin.
As we decrease in frequency of disobedience, actually our sensitivity to sin increases. And so that's why the apostle writes this. You see, this is a very mature, spiritual man. He is very sensitive to sin indwelling him. And he is grieved by it. He is distressed by what he senses. In verse 20 he says, if I'm doing the very thing I do not wish, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. Again, he says what he did in verse 17. That's his conclusion.
He's taking responsibility for his actions, but he says, technically speaking, he says, I'm not the one who's doing it any longer. Now why does he say no longer in verse 20 and so now in verse 17? Well, it's because before he was saved, all he was was flesh. And sin dominated him. And so sin and he were synonymous. But now he says there's a distinction that's been made. So now it's different. No longer is it that way.
He says now it's not the real me that's doing this because I'm a new man in Christ. He says it's sin which dwells in me. So what does he do in verse 21? Starts all over again. Now you parents understand this, don't you? I mean you repeat and you repeat and you repeat and eventually the truth gets through, hopefully. Now the apostle is repeating so that we will understand what he's saying. Verse 21, he says, I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wishes to do good.
So that's his condition again. Evil is still present in him. There's the principle of sin. There's a battling of every good word or deed or act that he desires or attempts. Sin attacks him. It struggles with him. It is not eradicated. He says the principle of evil is present in me. Now there are people who teach that sin can be eradicated in a Christian.
I knew a man one time, I worked with him, and he said that he had had a second blessing and that he no longer had sin in dwelling him and he didn't sin any longer. The thing I found so curious was why he was so often angry if sin didn't dwell in him any longer. And so foolishly I asked him and he said it wasn't sin, it was just a failure on his part. So what happens when you have that kind of a theology? You begin to redefine your terms to be consistent.
But it's inconsistent with the Bible, that's the problem. Now here's one who is very spiritual and mature who says, evil is present in me. Then he says in verses 22 and 23 what we've said before, it's the struggle. He says I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in the members of my body. Do you see the contrast there? The inner man is his new person, that innermost part of him.
He says in that part of me, the real me, I joyfully agree with everything God says. I want it, I want to experience it, but he says in the members of my body, that is in the capacities I have physically, I see a different law, waging war against the law of my mind. That's the inner man again, the desire to do right. And making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members.
No one believer would ever say what Paul says in verse 22, nor would he be able to talk about being a prisoner of sin in his members, because he's always captivated by it. He wouldn't know the difference, he wouldn't know the struggle that's involved in verse 23. This is the characteristic of a Christian, verses 22 and 23, and it's something I identify with and I suppose you do too. If you're saved today, you understand the struggle Paul is talking about.
And the more he grows, the more he matures, the more sensitive he becomes to it, and the more agonized he is inside. And that's why he says in verse 24, wretched man that I am. Now this fellow still is rejoicing in the Lord always, and again rejoicing. That's one side of Paul, but here's another perspective. And it's something all of us who are Christians identify with. He says, I am a miserable man. It is a cry of transparency, it is a cry of anguish. He struggles and he fails at times.
As seems all the worse, the better he knows and loves the law of God. As Haldane said, men perceive themselves to be sinners in direct proportion as they have previously discerned the holiness of God and his law. The more one understands the holiness of God, the more one understands the word of God, his law, his moral standards, the more miserable he becomes whenever he fails. So the apostle cries out and says, who will set me free from the body of this death?
Notice again the emphasis on the body, on the flesh, that humanness about him still. He says, who's going to set me free from this? Then of course he answers his own question. He says, thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. In other words, he says, there is a day coming when I will be free. And he longs for that day of what we call theologically his glorification.
When sin will be entirely removed from him, the power of it will no longer be present, the principle will fall away from him, and he will be like Jesus Christ. It will be the removal of sin entirely from his personality, from the members of his body. There's a great parallel passage to this, and I want us to take time to read it. First Corinthians chapter 15. In this resurrection chapter, the apostle winds down his argument for the resurrection by saying, behold, I tell you a mystery.
Verse 51. Now a mystery, folks, is not a thriller. It's not something you've got to try to dig into and discern the meaning of. A mystery in the New Testament sense is something that was not revealed before this, but which God has graciously shown to us. So we don't have to dig into it and try to find it. It's already here clearly for us. It simply means something before that was not revealed, which is now revealed. And this is what Paul says is the mystery. We shall not all sleep.
Now he's not talking there about Christians in church because some of them do. He's talking here about death. He's talking about death. Sleep is a metaphor of death. Physically, what happens to the body, it's put to sleep, so to speak. He says, we shall not all die, but we shall all be changed or transformed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised and perishable and we shall be changed. What's he talking about?
The rapture. He's talking about that time when Christ is going to come back into the atmosphere of the world and shout for his people to join him and we will be changed and will rise to meet him in the air. That's what he's talking about. He says, but when, brother, verse 20, let's start at verse 54, but when this perishable will have put on the imperishable and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, death is swallowed up in victory.
Oh, death, where is your victory? Oh, death, where is your sting? Now he says in verse 56, the sting of death is sin. In other words, death does not have a sting unless there's sin. What about a Christian? He's been forgiven of his sin. So does death have a sting for him? Well, it's gone. He says the power of sin is the law. If you've been with us in Romans 7, you understand that.
When the law enters in, it arouses, it revives sin, it stirs it up, it agitates sin, it exposes it then so a person can be brought to Christ. But he says, thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. So that parallels perfectly with Romans 7 where he says, God gives me the victory. There's a day coming when I will be free entirely from the sin I struggle with now. And so he ends with a statement of his present reality in verse 25 of Romans 7.
He says, so then on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other with my flesh, notice with my flesh the law of sin. You say, well you know, I sure identify with Paul here because I'm struggling against sin in my life. And like Paul, I am looking forward to the rapture. Brother, I can hardly wait until that sin power is no longer even present in me. But what about right now? Do I have to be defeated by sin?
No. Bless the Lord, he has provided victory for us right now too. The struggle will still be there, but we can have victory. I close by turning with you to Galatians chapter 5 and here's the secret. Now when I say that it sounds like this is a little simple formula, one, two, three, I don't mean it that way. But here is the key to victory. In verse 17 of Galatians 5 he really condenses all that he said to us in Romans 7. For the flesh sets its desire against the spirit.
Now the spirit dwells in that new man. And he says the spirit against the flesh and these are in opposition to one another so that you may not do the things that you please. You see there is the struggle, there is the fight, there is the warfare. But verse 16 comes before verse 17 where he says, this I say, walk by the spirit and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. He doesn't say that there won't be fleshly desires. Sin is with us for life.
This struggle is universal, it's for all Christians, it's lifelong. You will have it till the day you die. But he says if you walk by the spirit you won't fulfill what the flesh wants to do. How do you walk in the spirit? It begins by confessing sin. Sin grieves the Holy Spirit. Today if you as a Christian are living with known sin in your life, that's where you start. You must reckon with sin with disobedience.
It may be a sin that you've committed, it may be something you are not doing that you should be doing. It may be insensitivity or anger or adultery or unfaithfulness. But you need to deal with sin. And after you've dealt with sin then you need to yield afresh to the Lordship of Christ. To give him your all anew afresh. And then you need to appropriate by faith the power of the Holy Spirit. To walk in the spirit.
I think it's interesting that Paul uses that metaphor because when we walk, you know what we're doing? We're throwing ourselves off balance and with coordination hopefully we catch ourselves. Now some of us trip over seams in the carpet. But normally when we walk we put our foot out and we just throw ourselves off balance and we catch ourselves and then we do it again and that's the way we make progress and so it is spiritually.
You cannot make spiritual progress unless you know what it is to walk by the Spirit. Now to walk by the Spirit means that you are depending on him. You're throwing yourself off balance onto him. You're trusting him to empower you to know consistent victory over temptation, etc., etc., etc. You know what it is today to walk by the Spirit? If you don't, then the flesh is having its way in your life, isn't it? I mean it's one or the other. It's one or the other.
To not walk by the Spirit is to live under the domination, the captivity of sin and that's not the will of God for his people. Will you today deal with the sin? Will you yield to Christ's lordship and begin learning to walk in the spirit?
My Father, I pray that you will take this message today, bring it personally to my heart, to the heart of every person in this auditorium and help us to respond to what you've said to us honestly, to confess sin that may be in our lives, to yield to your lordship and begin appropriating your power by faith. In Jesus' name I pray, amen.
We're going to talk next week more about what it is to walk in the Spirit, but I want to challenge you this morning that if you are under the domination of sin, confess that to the Lord and get right. You may need someone to pray with you and we have people who are trained to do that. I want to invite you to come as we sing our invitation hymn.