Set Free

For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. What I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that the Law is good. So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me (Romans 7:14-17).

      Does this passage teach even though we want to do right, our flesh takes over and does wrong anyway? I have to admit I have felt that way at times. How often have I committed to quit yelling at my family? But the stress hits and it happens again. How many other examples could I give?

      The mistake I have made is to assume Paul was talking about every time he ever sinned, including the first time. I no longer believe he is. When he wrote “I am of flesh,” he was not saying “I have a fleshly body,” but that he had walked according to the flesh, instead of the Spirit (Romans 8:5-6). He had presented his members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness (Romans 6:13). Because he had done these things he became “of flesh.” Since he was of flesh, sin had become his master (Romans 6:16). Paul was not talking about the beginning of his sin. He was talking about the consequences of it.

      In another passage he wrote, “Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath” (Ephesians 2:3). “Nature” here, does not mean “born that way.” It refers to a long established habit of practice. In modern vernacular we would say, “second nature.”

      Paul is talking about habits. Whenever we sin, we begin to walk a path. Each time we walk it, that path becomes easier. Finally it is the only path we walk. Walking another path is nearly impossible. Sin becomes habit. Sin becomes master. Then we are by nature children of wrath.

      Sadly, our modern society has robbed the gospel of its greatest power. Too many people act as though the gospel is about removing the guilt of sins we are always going to commit. That is not what Paul said in Romans 6:17-18:

But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.

      The gospel is not just about setting us free from guilt; it is about setting us free from the sin that destroys us. We often preach sermons about stopping our sin. It seems Paul had tried that approach and it hadn’t worked. Perhaps we need to learn to preach the gospel that sets us free from sin.

      There is more on this topic to come.

Edwin L. Crozier