"There's Something Wrong With My Soul!?"

Verses 17 and 18: “It is sin living in me.” “I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature.” Verse 21: “When I want to do good, evil is right there with me.” When God takes an x-ray of our souls, he sees that there’s something living inside of us that’s causing us problems. Sin is living inside us, otherwise known as the sinful nature. Every time you want to do something good, the sinful nature that lives inside of you gets in the way.

There’s that old cartoon that everyone is familiar with, where the good angel is sitting on your one shoulder, and the evil angel is sitting on your other shoulder, and they compete with each other to get you to do certain things. The cartoon is humorous, but the real thing isn’t. There actually is a live creature living inside of you called your sinful nature, and it has damaged your soul. It causes you symptoms – you fail to do the good things you want, and you keep doing the bad things you hate.

I think it’s safe to say that so far, the Cubs have had a tough year. The good guys lose more way more than they win. Their record is not good. Your soul is having a tough year too. The good side of you loses way more than it wins. Your spiritual record is not good. The evil side of you is winning way too much. Your sinful nature is getting the best of you.

So what is the outlook? Not our fault, so we’re off the hook, right? Not the case. Verse 23 tells us that “another law is at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members.” Spiritually, you are a prisoner of war. There’s a war going on inside of you – your sinful nature is winning, and has taken you prisoner – you are a POW in your own body. The outlook for you is not good, because people who are prisoners of sin always die and go to hell:

“What a wretched man I am? Who will rescue me from this body of death?” You are living in a body of death. The Bible doesn’t have anything good to say to people who always give in to their sinful natures. You are condemned. Imagine what it would be like to live in a condemned building. Nothing in the building works correctly – the lights don’t work, the plumbing doesn’t work. And the wrecking ball is coming – it’s just a matter of time, when you’re living in a condemned building.

That’s what it’s like to live in a body of death, the body that you’re living in right now. It’s like a condemned building. It doesn’t work right. And the wrecking ball is coming – it’s just a matter of time before you die and are condemned to hell for your past failures. Together, with the Apostle Paul, we must ask the question: “Who will rescue me from this body of death?”

Here’s the answer: “Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord!” Jesus Christ rescues you from that condemned body that you’re living in. He takes that invisible “condemned” sign that you are wearing, and he puts it on himself. He allows himself to be condemned to hell instead of you. Jesus changes your outlook, your future, by what he did.