Read Romans 7:13-25 .
Everyone misbehaves sometimes. We all do things that we regret later on. It’s part of being human. But we don’t celebrate our failures. Two weeks back, we were also looking at Romans, and Paul was saying why we shouldn’t rely on grace to do more sin. We should remember who we are: baptized children of God. We should behave that way, in love for our God and our neighbour.
Here today, Paul is still writing to the Romans. He opens up about himself. He was a respected Christian leader whom many looked up to. But here, he admits that he is tempted. He has a hard time fighting wrong urgings that happen inside him.
How does he name this tendency to do the wrong thing? He talks about sin living in him. But at the same time, “it is no longer I that do it, but sin living in me” (Rom 7:17). The true Paul – the baptized child of God – wants to do the right thing. Yet something in him which he calls “sin” works against that.
In one translation, he says that nothing good dwells inside him – that is, his flesh (Rom 7:18). How is “the flesh” sinful? It seems that Paul sees a problem with his body. In verse 24 he calls it “this body of death”!
Of course, God made everything, and everything has a purpose. God made our bodies, and we should look after and respect them. What is it about the body that lets Paul separate it from his “inmost self” (v 22)?
We know that our brains do a lot of work. They work out what we see, hear, smell, taste and touch. They also do the complex things, like speaking, or making decisions and judgements. In our day, we don’t speak about our body’s members as having their own wilful independence.
But Paul wasn’t wrong. Our brains are connected to nerves, and our nerves connect to our eyes, ears, mouths, stomachs and skin. Our nerves send signals about this moment. They are all about now. They tell us about pain and pleasure, here in our body, here and now.
The law of God is about loving God, who is here but whom we cannot physically see or touch. The law of God is about loving our neighbour, who may sometimes be nearby, but who is never quite as close as the nerves of our body. Deep inside our brains, we know that “the law is spiritual” (Rom 7:14). Yes, the “law of our mind” (Rom 7:23) is actually God’s law. That’s the way we live when we are truly ourselves. Our true selves think beyond this time and beyond this place. Our true selves care about more than here and now. We are in tune with God and each other, including generations to come after us.
But our bodies do keep reminding us of “here and now”. What we spend today on an impulse is less money to give to charity. A rubbish TV show or video game is a lost chance to phone a lonely person. Wasteful living means less for future generations.
Paul was a great leader, but he knew about the struggle inside each person. He wanted everyone to know that no Christian is free from this struggle. We must all be willing to forgive each other, including our leaders – nobody’s perfect.
And yet “the real we” are a holy people – we must never give up the struggle. Paul knows that the pressure for here and now will not be forever.Our life is for eternity. For this, Paul ends with a word of thanks to God, through Jesus (Rom 7:25). So should we!
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