Romans Series # 32 April 03, 2002
Introduction: Welcome to New life in Christ. As most of you are aware, it is our practice to go through books of the Bible verse by verse. Tonight we continue our series out of the book of Romans. Would you please join me in a word of prayer?
Read Romans 7: 14-25
At some point in his or her life nearly everyone desires to be and tries to be a better person. Nearly everyone will strive, make an honest effort to be a to be a “good person.” People often long to try and change their life for the better. People are not completely blind to their own faults. They recognize a need for change. For example they might see that they have an anger problem and therefore strive for a better temperament and more patience. Some may not like the kind of things coming out of their mouth so they’ll try and clean up their act and have more godly speech. Others strive for a purer thought life, better self-control, etc.
You can see many examples in society of people’s desire to change and be a better person. The self-help books that line many bookstores are evidence of this desire. The abundance of twelve step programs and classes on such things as anger management is more evidence. The inability of people to get an appointment at Christian and secular counselors because of demand shows us that there is an abundance of people seeking to change for the better. Sometimes even church attendance is motivated by this longing and is evidence of this inward desire to be a better person.
I bring all this up because Paul, in this passage of Scripture, is talking about people’s efforts to be a better person. He is speaking about the desire to live a godly life otherwise known as a holy or sanctified life in Christian circles. He knows about such efforts to be a better person because he has sought to live such a life. He did so with all his willpower in the past. He also knows that despite all his efforts he did not become a better person. His strenuous attempts produced nothing but utter failure and frustration. His comments here help us to understand his and other’s failure to achieve this better life and why this is so. Later in chapter eight of Romans he points to a new way that really results in the kind of changes God and we desire through Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit. Before we get to the answer to really becoming a better person Paul wants to understand the inability of a person to really change in his or her own power. His message can be summed up as follows:
Summary Sentence: Trying To Be A Better Person Without Jesus Is Futile And Frustrating.
Striving to be a good person without the indwelling of the Holy Spirit will result in defeat and despair. We have to understand that, without Jesus, trying to live a good life is useless because we are powerless and hopeless in our strength. All of our efforts at self-improvement will only result in our being miserable and confused as Paul expresses very clearly in this passage.
In a moment I will cover this section of Scripture in a verse-by-verse fashion but first I need to comment on an important question. The question that we need to look at first is, "Whose experience is being described in this section of Scripture?"
There is great debate about that question and it is usually answered in one of three ways. Some people believe that Paul is describing the normal Christian life. They would point to the present tense verbs and the fact that all Christians struggle as evidence of this. Other people believe that Paul is describing a carnal Christian. They believe he is describing a genuine Christian who is in the flesh, but that he is not describing what should be the normal Christian life. Still others believe that Paul is describing a non-Christian. They believe Paul was describing a religious person who is trying to be good in their own power. This is my personal belief and I believe it is founded upon Scripture. To support this belief I would point to the use of the terms “slavery” and “prisoner of the law of sin” as being contradictory to what Paul has stated earlier about our present freedom from slavery to sin and contradictory to what he will state in Chapter eight as the normal Christian experience.
Read Romans 6:6,7,14,17,18,22 Romans 8:2,9
Summary Sentence: Trying To Be A Better Person Without Jesus Is Futile And Frustrating.
Read Verse 14.
First Paul says, "We know that the law is spiritual." In other words the law is good, righteous, and holy. There’s nothing wrong with the goal or the standard that we are shooting for. The desire to be a better person, that is a person who is honest, faithful, pure, kind, dedicated, etc. is a good and noble desire but we must also understand that such a life is a impossible to live out without truly giving your life to Jesus.
Why is this so? Well Paul answers that question with his next statement in which he says "We know that the Law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual” which literally reads "I am of the flesh" We must keep in mind that Paul is not speaking of his current status but of how he was before he became a Christian. When he says that he was “of the flesh” he is saying that he did not have what it takes to be a godly and holy person. To say that he was unspiritual or of the flesh is to say that he was weak and wayward in his human self. He is basically saying, “I don’t have the ability to live a spiritual life because of my condition (of the flesh.)”
To try and be a better person without Jesus would be like Gary Coleman trying to win a slam-dunk contest or like Christopher Reeves trying to win the Boston Marathon. They could not because of their condition. You can no more be a better person without Jesus than a man could have a baby. All the efforts in the world will not result in a pregnancy. Paul is saying that we cannot live a good life in our own power because of a our condition which is "unspiritual.”
Summary Sentence: Trying To Be A Better Person Without Jesus Is Futile And Frustrating.
It is essential to understand our human inability to truly be a better person or a good person. This principle is one of the reasons I have a problem with many of the self-help programs materials and methods. They fail to realize or acknowledge a person’s inability to live a better life without Jesus. They think that some method or discipline will do the job, but it won’t.
While a person, on rare occasions, may stop one particular sin through his or her own efforts they are still control by sin overall. They are still its prisoners and therefore their lives are not pleasing to God or truly better. You can see this in Romans 8: 6-8. Our self-help efforts are like making minor improvements to a condemned house. We make fix a squeaky door but the house still stands condemned and in ruin. It will never pass inspection.
Paul makes it clear what he means when he says "I am of unspiritual" when right after that statement he says that he was "sold as a slave to sin." In other words he is saying that anybody without Jesus is a person who is powerless to live a better life. They are slaves despite the fact that they think they are free. They fail to live a better life not only because a part of them wants to sin but also because they are slaves to sin’s power. He is saying that all people are powerless to be a better person because everyone without Jesus is a slave to the domination of sin. This means no matter how hard a person tries to be better and no matter how zealous and well intentioned their efforts; in the end they are useless and futile.
Summary Sentence: Trying To Be A Better Person Without Jesus Is Futile And Frustrating.
This was a discovery that Benjamin Franklin made in part.
Illustration: (From Franklin’s Comments on Virtue) It was about this time that I conceiv’d the bold and arduous Project of arriving at moral Perfection. I wish’d to live without committing any Fault at any time; I would conquer all that either Natural Inclination, Custom, or Company might lead me into. As I knew, or thought I knew, what was right and wrong, I did not see why I might not allways do the one and avoid the other. But I soon found I had undertaken a Task of more Difficulty than I had imagined. While my Attention was taken up in guarding against one Fault, I was often surpris’d by another. Habit took the Advantage of Inattention. Inclination was sometimes too strong for Reason. I concluded at length, that the mere speculative Conviction that it was our Interest to be completely virtuous, was not sufficient to prevent our Slipping
Summary Sentence: Trying To Be A Better Person Without Jesus Is Futile And Frustrating.
I realize that this goes against everything we see and are taught in modern society. It goes against what we see and hear on TV talk shows such as Oprah and PBS specials. It goes against what psychology teaches and what our culture accepts. It even goes against what most other religions promote which is the power of self-effort. We must remember that all people without Jesus are “unspiritual and sold as slaves to sin.”
Read Verse 15.
We can see from this verse that the problem that all people face is not a lack of desire or motivation to be a good person or a better person. If lack of desire or motivation to be a better person were the problem then people’s behavior would make more sense but rather than making sense people are often confused by their own decisions and actions. They can identify when Paul says, "I do not understand what I do!" This is the kind of frustration and confusion a person experiences when they try to be a better person without Jesus Christ.
Illustration: The person striving to be a better person without Jesus Christ has the same answer for their moral failure as my children do when they are caught doing something they know is wrong. When I ask them, “Why did you do this? Their usual response is "I don’t know. " and often that is the truth.
Many people today can relate to what Paul is saying here. They do not understand why they do the things they do and why they do not do the things they want to do. They not only have the desire, at least in part, to do what is right but they also recognize the hurt to others that they love, the harm they do to the self, and the guilt and shame that come from doing wrong and not being a better person. In other words they every reason and motivation to do what is right but they still can’t do it!
Summary Sentence: Trying To Be A Better Person Without Jesus Is Futile And Frustrating.
Read Verse 16
When we read this verse the New Living Translation we get a better idea of what Paul was saying. (Read Verse 16 NLT) He wants to point out that his inward desires prove that lack of acceptance of God standards is not the problem. The problem is not a need for higher goals, after all he already agrees that the “law is good.” Sometimes we seem to think that what people lack is knowledge of God’s standards or moral training. We act as though the teaching of Christian or moral character will be the solution. While I agree that it is good to teach and promote good character, I think we need to understand that a person can agree and accept God’s Holy standards and still be very likely to do the wrong thing. Why can’t a person who accepts God’s standards as good and who desires to be a good person do so? The answer is in the next verse.
Read Verse 17
This is a verse that we must be very careful not to take out of context. Paul is in no way excusing sinful behavior when he says "it is no longer I myself who do it." Rather when he uses the word “I" he is referring to that internal and hopeless struggle between his conscience, which accepts God’s law and his sinful self which is unable to keep God’s law. It should be noted that this is not the same struggle as Christians face which is between the flesh and the Spirit and is far from hopeless.
Paul’s point in this verse is that all the desire in the world to do right did not make him a better person because of the “sin living in him.” When he refers to sin living in him he is referring to the fact that sin is more than wrong desire but it is also is like a disease that is inside of him and has a greater power and hold on his life than the law did. He is referring to what is commonly called the “sinful nature” or the “flesh.” He does this so everyone will come to their reasonable conclusion that they need a Deliverer or a Savior. Paul wants everyone to understand that they need Jesus to save them from their sins, not just the penalty for sin but also from the power of sin that lives in them.
Summary Sentence: Trying To Be A Better Person Without Jesus Is Futile And Frustrating.
Read Verses 18-20
He comes to the conclusion that “no good thing that lives in him, that is in his flesh.” This is a conclusion that all people need to come too. We need to understand that we are not a basically good person. We need to understand that we need more than a little boost to help our lives. We need to understand that "nothing good lives in me." This is especially a message for the religious person or the proud person who believes in the power of self-effort for self-improvement. Such thinking does not lead to a godly life because we do not have to power in ourselves to be a better person. This is why Jesus says in the Gospel of Matthew "Blessed are the poor in spirit."
We have to come to the end of our rope. We have to recognize our total helplessness to live a godly life without Jesus Christ. No amount of discipline, strenuous effort, or human methods will truly result in us living a better life or being a better person. As verse 18 implies, sin is our very nature and the only solution for sin is the new nature given by a miraculous work of the Holy Spirit through Jesus Christ. Verses 19 and 20 reemphasize what Paul said earlier. The main point being that the power of sin in us makes us do what we do not approve of or want to do. WE NEED DIVINE INTERVENTION!
Read Verses 21-23
In verse 21 Paul emphasizes that there is no human escape from the power of sin. A person can never get to the place by their own power where evil desires are no longer present or overwhelming. The truth is that sin follows us wherever we go. This may be at home or at work or even in the church. Even when we are making our best efforts to do something good, as Paul says, “evil is right there with us.”
Illustration: It’s just like when you drive through a town with a paper mill. There is a terrible smell that you just cannot seem to escape no matter how long you drive in that town It does not matter if you roll the windows up in your car or you spray some kind of air freshener; the smell is still there. The moment you think you’ve escaped it the smell returns. That was Paul experience with trying to be a better person without giving his life to Christ. Every time he desired and determined to do good, evil was right there. There was no escape.
Summary Sentence: Trying To Be A Better Person Without Jesus Is Futile And Frustrating.
In verses 22 and 23 Paul once again expresses the hopeless conflict that goes on in a non-Christian. As a religious person and a person with moral upbringing, he delighted in God’s law but he always found a “another law” (controlling principle) at work in his life that kept him a prisoner of sin. This is a terrible and despairing place to be, as Paul notes in verse 24.
Read Verse 24
He says that his position is one of wretchedness and refers to a need to be rescued from a "body of death." This odd expression, "body of death", probably refers to an ancient form of punishment in which a corpse would be chained to a living person. No matter where they went they could not escape the corruption, decay and eventual death that came from being attached to the corpse. This corpse refers to our sinful flesh that we cannot escape from in our own power but rather we need someone to rescue us, otherwise we are condemned to only grow worse and worse in our sinful state.
Read Verse 25
In verse 24 Paul had asked the question, "Who will rescue me?" In this verse he answers that question with great joy and relief. The desire to change for the better and be a good person is not totally hopeless! The answer to the sinful self - the way to a better life is only found in Jesus Christ. When we ask a question how can I be a righteous person or a better person? The only answer is Jesus! As Jesus himself said, "He whom the Son sets free is free indeed." We’ll learn more about this next week in Chapter eight.
Summary Sentence: Trying To Be A Better Person Without Jesus Is Futile And Frustrating.
