I know there's quite a few law vs grace debates going on...and I don't mean this to be one of those.
Please....
can someone explain to me Romans chapter seven, verse 25? I don't why I'm having such a hard time with it (understanding it, I mean) but it seems to say that our flesh is still bound or submissive to the law of sin??
A little help peeps, please....
thanks
Rom 7:12-8:4
12 Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good.
13 Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful.
14 For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.
15 For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.
16 If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.
17 Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
19 For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
21 I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.
24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.
8 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.
3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:
4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
KJV
Paul is making a dichotomy [a natural inherent split] between our old nature (inherited from Adam) which Paul calls the flesh, and our new nature (which results from the Holy Spirit's indwelling [the new birth]).
He is saying that there is still a spiritual battle in progress between a believer's two natures, which will continue until our physical death. While the Holy Spirit within us is helping us desire to please God, our sin nature (which figuratively died with Jesus on the cross) physically is still prompting us to act against God's will; so that sometimes when we want to please God with our lives, we blow it and fall into sin.
In verse 20 Paul says that ' the sin nature is not the real me anymore; my reborn nature is now the real me'
In verse 25 Paul is saying: 'thank God, my new nature, the real me, wants to serve God; but the old sin nature wants to serve itself.'
In 8:1-4 Paul is saying: 'All our sin (present, past, and future) is forgiven on the cross. It is good to want to please God; but, we can't do it in our own strength. The Holy Spirit not only helps us want to please God; but enables and empowers us to please God.'
