Do you ever feel like a hopeless mess? The Apostle Paul sure did. In Romans 7 he berates himself for his shortcomings: “What a wretched man I am!” Paul's problem was a serious condition. Sin enslaves; it takes over. Jeremiah writes that the human heart is “desperately wicked” (17:9). It's been said that “There is more sin in our hearts than there has ever been in our actions” (Bo Giertz).
We turn on the news and we're appalled by the latest inhumanities and atrocities. The pundits try (and fail) to make sense of the senselessness. They figure people who do bad things are misguided or crazy, but such explanations don't satisfy our need to understand why do people do terrible things. For example, we blame guns. I only wish it were that simple a matter. Cain killed Abel with a rock. Murder is a sin problem, not a gun problem. No matter how we stand on gun control, we need to delve deeper. Let's not fail to recognize the root cause. It is our nature to sin, to reject God's way and go our own way. And every time we choose to do wrong, we are rejecting God.
Paul describes in gut-wrenching detail the human predicament. People may not like to hear it, but we're not getting better; we're not evolving morally. This isn't a popular message. People push-back when sin is mentioned. A sense of sin is lacking in today's world, along with a sense of right and wrong. We've replaced moral absolutes with arbitrary preferences. When you have no standard of right and wrong, it doesn't take long for wrong to wave its standard. People make their own truth. We tend to excuse sin as merely “mistakes.” It is much more. Sin is rebellion under the guise of freedom. Think of the worst sin you can...those doing it have justified their actions. The world is a mess, but do we recognize what a mess we're in? In Romans 3:23, Paul says we've “missed the mark.” Our inability to do right stems back to our fallen nature. We are sinners, polluted by sin, which is written into our DNA by the Fall, Genesis 3.
Adam and Eve made a grave of a garden, and the effects of their rebellion are passed on to us. Our first parents left behind a heritage of dishonor, and that dishonor is still with us. It's been said that “Adam and Eve’s sin was a small thing, but it was enough to undo God’s whole harmony, as we’re now learning to our sorrow…the unfix-able fix is in” (Robert Farrar Capon). In Romans 5:12, we read that “just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, in this way death came to all people, because all sinned.” This cause of moral weakness and spiritual death should make us alarmed--not only about what wedo, but about what we are.
Some scholars argue over whether Paul is describing himself before or after his conversion. Yet it is clear that Paul is talking in the present tense. He speaks of himself as only a Christian could. He's burdened by his behavior. Elsewhere he describes his pre-Christian attitude as self-satisfied and self-righteous, under the Law. As a Pharisee, Paul was confident that he was living a “faultless” life (Phil 3:6). Now, as a Christian, Paul agonizes over his sin and laments his ongoing struggle with sin, a struggle we all face. Paul confesses what he’s learned about himself, and we share his frustration. In I Timothy 1:5 Paul calls himself the “chief of sinners.” He wasn't saying that he was the worst person alive, but describing just how in touch he was with his imperfections. Are we complacent about our sin, or does it bother us? It should.
Paul admits he is “unspiritual,” verse 14, which elsewhere is translated “carnal,” or “human.” It literally means the “flesh.” This is our fallen, sinful nature, frail and weak, in need of God’s strength. In conversion, God transforms our nature from spiritual death to spiritual life, but we are still influenced by sin. We still struggle to be holy in an unholy world.
Paul says in verse 17 that sin is “living in me”. In the original Greek he says that sin “sets up house in me.” Indwelling sin is like a stranger who bursts into a home and tries to be the Master of the house. Sin takes over; it corrupts and imprisons us. Sins are not merely isolated events; all of our actions reflect who we are. The principle of sin is embedded in our inner being, and only the blood of Christ can remedy our plight. This means we're engaged in a constant battle within.
Listen to verse 18 from The Message: “I realize that I don't have what it takes. I can will it, but I can't do it.” Paul finds it impossible to do what he wants to do. Here's a sober reality: We can't do it. Only God can, in us. We are most vulnerable when we think we can conquer sin on our own. Paul admits that in his struggle with sin, he often loses. We share Paul's frustration when we fail. We know better; we know right-from-wrong...yet we still somehow manage to do what we hate, and we end up hating ourselves.
We understand the strength of an enemy not by surrendering but by resisting. This is easier said than done. It's been said that there are two dogs in us--a good dog and a bad dog who are fighting--and the one that wins is the one we feed the most. We are responsible for what we feed ourselves. We think we're being influenced by the world, when in fact we're choosing to be influenced. The books and magazines we read, the music we listen to, the movies we watch, the websites we browse, all have an affect on us.
In verse 24 Paul describes himself as “wretched”, a word used to describe soldiers exhausted after a battle. We've all felt wretched at times. Yet wanting to live God's way is a sign of genuine faith. Paul desires to be delivered from this “body of death,” the indwelling presence of sin. C.S. Lewis observes that “Satan wants to go on being Satan”...the Apostle Paul does not want to “go on being” Paul. He is wretched, fed up with his inability to overcome his corrupt nature.
Some people are hoping that when they stand before God, their good will outweigh their bad--but that's not how it works. The Law of God demands perfect, personal, and perpetual obedience. Paul knew this, and so he rejected using the moral law of God as a self-effort means of self-justification. No one can ever be “good enough.” But there’s hope--if, when we ask the question of verse 24, we embrace the answer of verse 25...
“What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?”
“Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!”
We're taken over by sin, and we can't free ourselves. We're unable, on our own, to overcome our sinful desires. We desperately need rescue, and—“thanks be to God”—rescue is available! Jesus can deliver us! When we try, we fail; when we trust, Jesus succeeds. Jesus is the Great Restorer, not us. His grace is sufficient to save us. Apart from Him we could not stand for even a moment. We underestimate the power of sin in us and we underestimate the power of God to overcome sin. A friend of mine said, “When I take over the steering wheel I discover I’m not a very good driver.” “True conversion does not occur until we lose all hope in ourselves and realize that God alone is the way to life” (David Wells).
The Christian life is a process of slow, steady growth, and the further we progress, the more in touch we are with our faults. This causes us to depend all the more on Christ. We're engaged in spiritual warfare, a battle from within, against our sinful nature, and against external forces that seek to defeat us.
Christians aren't sinless...but we ought to sin less. Instead of running towards sin, we ought to be running from it, resisting the enticements of sinful thoughts and behaviors. Our problem is, in the words of Oscar Wilde: “We can resist anything but temptation!” “Every temptation to sin is, in the moment, a temptation to disbelieve the gospel—the temptation to secure for ourselves in that moment something we think we need in order to be happy” (Tullian Tchividjian). We choose to feed or resist temptation, and we bear full responsibility for our actions. No one makes us sin.
Paul finds it impossible to do what he “wants” to do, and that's a mark of genuine Christianity--wanting to live God's way. So what's the remedy? Surrendering to God and trusting in His grace. Apart from Jesus we can't withstand the world, the flesh, or the devil. And when we fail, God still loves us and continues to work in us. We need to be content with where we're at in our journey, but never complacent. We see in Paul's confession that the Christian life is a matter of progress, not perfection. In our journey we discover that that God accepts and pardons us. He does not hold our sins against us. They are covered by the blood of Christ. We are God's forgiven, beloved children. God uses our failures to guide us to the Light—to a better Way. Amen.
