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Our sin nature
- Thread starter Hol
- Start date
I think neither. In Romans 7 he's not speaking of salvation, he is speaking of sanctification. He's describing life after placing faith in Christ when his focus is on trying to live up to the demands of the law. He knows what is wrong: sin. He knows what he needs to do: conquer sin. But he is facing his inability to do that. He is living the experience that John Bunyan wrote about 1600 years later:
Paul recognizes the righteous demands of the law but does not find within the law the ability to live up to them. This is the sad lot of so many Christians today and, for that matter, throughout history. But then the apostle learns the lesson: he stops looking to his efforts to fulfill the law and instead trusts that Christ has already done that and he is, therefore, free! Just like John Bunyan did all those years later:
Like Paul describes so well in Romans 7, people tend to put the focus on their efforts, figuring that they need to live up to what the Word of God says we should be. But the Word of God is not a book of rules; it is a picture and a mirror. In it we see a perfect picture of the righteousness of God (and therefore the righteousness required to enter His Presence) overlaid with a reflection of our own unrighteousness. We see perfection pictured and our weaknesses and inability reflected. When faced with this truth, Paul is forced to face the fact that he's in an impossible situation. He desires to please God; but he is totally incapable of doing so. This is why the joy of his outburst in Romans 7:25!
Up to this point in Romans 7, Paul has simply described this misery that arose by his failure to live out the perfection he so desired. He rounds it all up in these seven poignant and painful verses:
And then when face to face with the impossible conundrum he just outlined, the realization dawns-- he is looking to the wrong source for his sanctification. God has already taken care of his sanctification, as well as his salvation. And He did it through Jesus. Thus Paul can now exult over the answer!
And then in the very next sentence (remember Paul did not write in chapters and verses but in sentences in one long letter) in the very next sentence, Paul lays out the result of his realization, the result of not looking to self but to Christ for victory:
Glory to God! What a wonderous salvation He has wrought for us! Not only deliverance from hell but entrance into heaven. Regardless of our sin, by Christ we have been washed, we have been sanctified, we have been justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. (1 Corinthians 6:11)
I hope this helps you, sis, and anybody else wondering the same thing. So many Christians whom I meet struggle like the Galatians who were saved by faith but tried to work out their salvation by their fleshly efforts (Galatians 3:2-4). Our God is an awesome God! And He has wrought an awesome salvation for us! Perfect and complete, lacking nothing. Beyond anything we could have ever hoped for.
To repeat that short but pithy ditty of John Bunyan:
G L O R Y ! ! !
Run, John run! the Law demands,
But gives me neither feet nor hands.
Paul recognizes the righteous demands of the law but does not find within the law the ability to live up to them. This is the sad lot of so many Christians today and, for that matter, throughout history. But then the apostle learns the lesson: he stops looking to his efforts to fulfill the law and instead trusts that Christ has already done that and he is, therefore, free! Just like John Bunyan did all those years later:
A better thing the Gospel brings,
It bids me fly, and gives me wings!
Like Paul describes so well in Romans 7, people tend to put the focus on their efforts, figuring that they need to live up to what the Word of God says we should be. But the Word of God is not a book of rules; it is a picture and a mirror. In it we see a perfect picture of the righteousness of God (and therefore the righteousness required to enter His Presence) overlaid with a reflection of our own unrighteousness. We see perfection pictured and our weaknesses and inability reflected. When faced with this truth, Paul is forced to face the fact that he's in an impossible situation. He desires to please God; but he is totally incapable of doing so. This is why the joy of his outburst in Romans 7:25!
Up to this point in Romans 7, Paul has simply described this misery that arose by his failure to live out the perfection he so desired. He rounds it all up in these seven poignant and painful verses:
18 I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh; for I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want to do. Instead, I keep on doing the evil I do not want to do. 20 And if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. 21 So this is the principle I have discovered: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God’s law. 23 But I see another law at work in my body, warring against the law of my mind and holding me captive to the law of sin that dwells within me. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?
And then when face to face with the impossible conundrum he just outlined, the realization dawns-- he is looking to the wrong source for his sanctification. God has already taken care of his sanctification, as well as his salvation. And He did it through Jesus. Thus Paul can now exult over the answer!
25a Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord!
And in case we miss his point, he concludes that verse with the following words:25b So then, with my mind I serve the law of God, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.
And then in the very next sentence (remember Paul did not write in chapters and verses but in sentences in one long letter) in the very next sentence, Paul lays out the result of his realization, the result of not looking to self but to Christ for victory:
1 Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For in Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set you free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful man, as an offering for sin. He thus condemned sin in the flesh, 4 so that the righteous standard of the law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
Glory to God! What a wonderous salvation He has wrought for us! Not only deliverance from hell but entrance into heaven. Regardless of our sin, by Christ we have been washed, we have been sanctified, we have been justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. (1 Corinthians 6:11)
I hope this helps you, sis, and anybody else wondering the same thing. So many Christians whom I meet struggle like the Galatians who were saved by faith but tried to work out their salvation by their fleshly efforts (Galatians 3:2-4). Our God is an awesome God! And He has wrought an awesome salvation for us! Perfect and complete, lacking nothing. Beyond anything we could have ever hoped for.
To repeat that short but pithy ditty of John Bunyan:
Run, John, run! the Law demands,
But gives me neither feet nor hands.
A better thing the Gospel brings:
It bids me fly and gives me wings!
G L O R Y ! ! !
