Gary Benfold, Bournemouth
It’s mid April; yesterday, snooker player Mark Williams was knocked
out of the world championship. Today he’s quoted as saying it’s time
for a rest; he’s got a few months off and he’s going to ‘chill’.
Yesterday’s opponents are today’s friends anyway; no doubt some of
his ‘chilling’ will be with them. And why not? Snooker is his job,
but it’s only a game. It’s a good picture of what the Christian life
is not; it is not a game, but a battle. We cannot afford to take
yesterday’s opponents as our friends, and we cannot afford to take a
break.
When I was at school we still had school assemblies, and the Bible
was still read in them. There was one passage read regularly that always
caused us to laugh at the hapless sixth-former chosen to read it and,
usually, quite unable to get his tongue around it. It was from Romans 7
– AV of course – For the good that I would I do not: but the evil
which I would not, that I do. Now if I do that I would not, it is no
more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. I find then a law, that,
when I would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law
of God after the inward man… And of course if it was a girl chosen
to read it and having to tell us that she delighted ‘in the law after
the inward man’ it gave us something extra to smile at. Now, however,
I understand that this passage is telling us there is very little to
smile at!
When we become Christians, especially if we have had a prolonged
period of conviction of sin beforehand, we’re delighted to be free
from sin’s penalty and fully expect to be free of its power as well.
Even when we fail and fall in those early months, we expect our progress
to be rapid and a time will come when we look back at those ‘defeated’
times as part of our history. And the years go by, and sin continues to
be a problem. It should not surprise us: Paul has told us that it will
be, and the experience of every saint down the centuries has confirmed
it. Let’s look together at Romans 7:19-25.
First, he tells us that indwelling sin is real. This is his
experience: he has come to love God’s law (23); holiness is beautiful
to him because the Lord Jesus is beautiful to him. He passionately wants
to live a righteous life. But the more he tries, the more he finds that
sin is still in him: he sees ‘another law at work’, waging war
against his real self.
That would not matter very much if that ‘other law’ was always
defeated; if the believer never sinned. But he does – though he does
not want to sin, sin living within him makes him do it (20). The second
thing Paul tells us is that sin is a powerful enemy, there is a
constant struggle and frequent defeats.
Perhaps you know that there is a lot of debate about who ‘the man
of Romans 7’ is: is Paul describing an unconverted man, or a man who
is on the way to being converted, or a real believer who is defective in
some way, or is this a description of ‘the normal Christian life’? I
can only tell you, after years of living as a Christian and of reading
this passage, I am convinced he’s describing me! And Spurgeon was
convinced Paul was describing him, too. I’ll leave you to decide for
yourself which category the two of us fall into! But do remember that
the apostle John described sin as part of the ‘normal’ Christian
life: ‘if we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the
truth is not in us,’ he wrote (1 John 1:8).
Thirdly, indwelling sin is distressing. The believer no longer
delights in sin, he no longer lives in sin, and sin runs contrary to his
true desires. As he watches his weaknesses and sees his falls, he
laments them and cries out in distress: ‘What a wretched man I am! Who
will deliver me from this body of death?’ Christian friend, it is so
important to grasp that when you react like this – when you feel your
sin and are almost driven to despair by it – it does not prove that
you are unconverted. On the contrary, it is a sign of life! For once you
loved your sin and were comfortable with your sin and never, ever cried
out for deliverance from it until the Holy Spirit began to work in you
and with you.
Finally, indwelling sin is defeated. ‘Thanks be to God
through Jesus Christ our Lord!’ When a person becomes a Christian, sin’s
power is decisively broken and will, at last, be destroyed.
What then must we do in the meantime? ‘Therefore, brothers, we have
an obligation – but it is not to the sinful nature, to live according
to it. For if you live according to the sinful nature you will die; but
if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will
live…’ (Romans 8:13). In Christ we have been set free from every
claim of sin – we cannot, therefore, live like the unconverted. No, we
fight sin every time it shows itself. Every time we fail we call on the
gracious Lord Jesus to forgive us, and his Spirit to empower us again.
And we carry on with this battle, knowing – without a doubt – that
the victory has already been won, and knowing that his Spirit dwells
within us to give us victory. Provided we fight, we will, ultimately,
win; provided we put to death the misdeeds of the body, we will live.
Thanks be to God, through Jesus our Lord!
