Jesus Is The Answer For Our Struggles With Sin! Series

Jesus Is the Answer for Our Struggles with Sin!

The Book of Romans

Romans 7:1-25 (Read vs. 1-6)

Sermon by Rick Crandall

Grayson Baptist Church - July 3, 2016

(Revised December 23, 2020)

BACKGROUND:

*Please open your Bibles to Romans 7. In the first 6 chapters, Paul made the rock-solid case that all of us are guilty of sin, and we all deserve the righteous wrath of God. Thank God, Paul also explained the forgiveness, eternal life and freedom we can have through faith in Jesus Christ.

*Paul summed it up for Christians in Romans 5:6-10, and said:

6. For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.

7. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die.

8. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

9. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.

10. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.

*The Lord Jesus Christ has given Christians everlasting victory over sin and death. But it is also true that Christians still have struggles with sin. And here in Romans 7, we will see Paul's struggle. Thank God, we also get to see that Jesus is the answer for our struggles with sin! Let's begin by reading vs. 1-6.

MESSAGE:

*Christians: Do you ever struggle with sin in life? -- Yes, we surely do. None of us is perfect, so every Christian struggles with sin on some level. We are in good company, because even the greatest Christians who ever lived struggled with sin.

*Everyday Christians do too. English Pastor Geoff Thomas gave the example of wonderful deacon named Rex Pocock. At the age of 90, Bro. Pocock went home to Heaven in October 2002.

*Rex had kept a little diary, and after walking with the Lord for almost 70 years, he wrote these humble words about himself, "More like a devil than a saint." And Pastor Geoff wondered, "How often did Paul feel like that?" (1)

*We know that here in vs. 19 Paul said, "The good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice." And in vs. 21-24, Paul wrote:

21. I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good.

22. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man.

23. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

24. O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?

*Some Bible scholars think Paul was talking about the days before he got saved. Others assume Paul was talking about his early days as a believer. But Romans 15:25-28 shows us that this letter was written near the end of Paul's third missionary journey. That was many years after Paul had been saved. And if Paul had been talking about the past, common sense says he would have written, 'O wretched man that I was.' But instead, he said, 'O wretched man that I am.'"

*Speaking to Christians in 1 John 1:8-10, the Apostle John also used the present tense and wrote, "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us."

*The Apostle John never claimed to be perfect, and neither did Paul. Yes, in Matthew 5:48 Jesus told His followers to be perfect, just as our Father in heaven is perfect. And real salvation will always change the way we live. But we are all a work in progress, and Paul never claimed to be perfect.

*About 4 years after he wrote this letter, Paul was a prisoner in Rome. There he wrote a letter to the Christians in Philippi. And in Philippians 3:10 Paul indicated that he still wanted to get to know Jesus better. Then in vs. 12, Paul said that he wasn't already perfect.

*Real salvation always changes the way we live, but we will never be perfect in this world. That must be why the Holy Spirit inspired Paul to write about his personal struggle with sin. Thank God, we also get to see that Jesus is the answer for our struggles!