Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayerful attention to Romans, Paul's epistle to
the Romans, chapter 7, and we'll read for our text verse 22. Romans
7 and verse 22. For I delight in the law of God
after the inward man. And we'll read verse 23 as well. But I see another law in my members,
warring against the law of my mind, and bring me into captivity
to the law of sin which is in my members. Romans 7 verses 22
and 23. a contested delight in the law
of God. Paul, who had been caught up
into the third heaven, who had a conversion that changed his
life from being a hater of the Lord Jesus Christ to a lover
of Him and His people, one that was greatly taught of the Holy
Spirit, writes here of personal experience, not before he was
called, but after he was called, of the conflict with sin in his
members and that conflict going against the delight that he had
in the law of the Lord. It's very important for us to
realise that it is only God's people that experience what the
Apostle speaks of here. It's amazing how many I've come
across that question whether or not this is written of someone
else or of before he was called because they cannot reconcile
the idea that one that is a believer has such a conflict. And the
reason why people cannot is because they do not know it in their
own soul. If you and I have been brought
to know it, then this chapter will be a precious chapter to
it because it will be a key a key to the whole of our lives. The Apostle Paul is very methodical
in his teaching. He has gone from the chapters
4 and 5, teaching the justification by faith alone in Christ. And when he has established that,
then he thinks that People will take that doctrine and they'll
use it in a licentious way. And so in chapter 6 he asks the
question, what shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that
grace may abound? And he answers it, God forbid,
how shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein? And the whole chapter 6 is insisting
on a godly walk, an upright walk, a holy walk, a warfare with sin,
a hatred of sin. and are not sinning that grace
might abound, not saying, well, I'm justified by faith in Christ,
I'm saved by the grace of God and therefore it doesn't matter
how I live and doesn't matter if I slip up here or there, I
can be just a little bit lax and allow myself a little bit
of freedom to live as the world lives. The apostle very, very
clearly shows that this is inconsistent with a Christian faith. But then
he, as it were, thinks, if I had been so severe in this way, there
would be those children of God that look at their lives and
they would see so much sin and they would be so tempted to think,
I am sinning that grace might abound, I'm not walking in a
right way. So then in chapter 7, he is dealing
with the reality, the experience with the child of God, with the
conflict with sin. And he sets it forth that the
good that he would, he does not. and the evil that he would not,
that he does. O wretched man that I am, who
shall deliver me from this body of death? He said, If I do that
which I would not, is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth
in my members." And so he asks this question and he states in
our text, I delight in the law of God after the inward man 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. A very clear warfare, a clear
conflict, a difference between that which is the new nature
and that which is the old nature. And it's made very clear in the
following chapter that there is a walking after the flesh,
and a walking after the Spirit. We have these contrary things
within us. And it is our blessing if we
clearly understand this and see that this is according to God,
that there should be this conflict. And instead of it being a mark
against a child of God, it is a mark for them. So, in that
way, I want to look at this word this evening. Now, because we
are speaking of the law, we've read this in the Psalms as well,
in the Old Testament, Torah, the law, it is meaning the Ten
Commandments or the first five books in the Word of God. In the Greek word here, For law
it brings in also the gospel and it is a principle, a law. So it embraces not only the commandments
of God but also the gospel of God and we hold that our rule
of life is the gospel and not the law, the gospel including
the law, includes all of the scriptures. It takes it all in
view. And so what he delights in is
all of the word of God, all of the gospel, all what is revealed,
all that is opposite to all sinful flesh and nature. We have another
word here, delight. If we delight in something, we
find great pleasure in something. Something that certainly by nature
we do not find a pleasure in. So Paul says, I find a pleasure
in the law of God after the inward man. Well, I want to confine
our thoughts to three points. Firstly, our souls when in nature's
darkness. I want to look at the picture
that is there before we are called by grace. And then secondly,
a quickened soul's delight in the law of the Lord. And I want to look at why and
how we do delight in the law of God. I want to look at some
ten points under that heading. And then thirdly, the conflict
only known by God's children. So firstly we have how we are
in nature's darkness. When Paul writes to the Ephesians,
he speaks to them as those that were once dead in trespasses
and sins. And what a picture in that second
chapter. And you hath he quickened who
were dead in trespasses and sins. wherein in time past ye walked
according to the course of this world, according to the prince
of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the
children of disobedience." And when he writes to the Corinthians,
he speaks of them and a long list of sinners and transgressions
and wicked ways, and he says, and such were some. of you. And the word is very
clear that the natural man, it receiveth not the things of God,
neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. And when we look at The Gospel
according to John, we find through chapter after chapter, natural
men having occasion against the Lord's teaching when he is teaching
in a spiritual way. Nicodemus, how can a man be born
again, enter into his mother's womb? He cannot grasp a spiritual
birth. We have the woman at the well
of Samaria. The well is deep, there is nothing
to draw with. She cannot grasp at first the
idea of spiritual water and living water. And the Lord brings her
to that in conviction, in telling her what her life was and how
she was walking. In chapter 6 we have the same.
The Lord working the miracle of loaves and fishes, they follow
him over the sea, and he says he follow him not because he
saw the miracles, but because he ate of the loaves and were
filled. Labour not for the meat that perisheth, but for that
which endureth unto eternal life. And then when he insists on,
except you eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of
Man, you have no life in you. And they say, this is a hard
saying, who can hear it? How can this man give us his
flesh to eat? They're all the time looking
at it in a natural way. They cannot grasp in a spiritual. But our Lord said, the words
that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life. But
they said, who can hear it? They went back and walked no
more. And so you see the natural man all the time is struggling
to grasp and cannot grasp those spiritual things because he is
dead. He is incapable. Until the Lord
passes by, when we are in our sins and bittersleep, we are
incapable of receiving the things of God, because they are spiritually
discerned. And right through our Lord's
teaching, this was very, very evident to those that could not
receive the Word. They were incapable of doing
so. Many errors in the Church of
God stem from the idea that man is not really so dead. The idea so often put forth is,
well, here is the Gospel, but to receive the Gospel you must
exercise your faith in the Gospel. You must exercise your faith
in repentance, otherwise the Gospel is locked up and shut
up to you and no use to you. But for a poor sinner who feels
that they cannot repent, they need that as a gospel gift, they
need life as a gospel gift, that is no good news. That is only
half a gospel. That is saying, you do your bit
to save yourself and I'll do the rest. But what we need is
that which comes all from the Lord. The law has its place and
is vital as a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ. by nature
until the Lord begins and instigates that work, then there is no movement,
there is no comprehending at all. Yes, there may be, as the
Apostle Paul it was said, it was hard for him to kick against
the pricks. Those things that happened, we're
not told what, but I think many of us who've known a quickening
have had things that have happened beforehand. that's unsettled
us, that's put questions. We can't say that we've been
brought into clear light, but there's been those things that
have gone before. Everyone is different, but one
thing that is the same for everyone, the Lord has begun a good work. What a comfort that is. He which
hath begun a good work in you will perform it unto the day.
of Jesus Christ, and if we ever thought, well we began that verse
is of no comfort or help to us at all. We need the Lord to begin. Without grace we are at enmity,
enmity to God, even if we are religious. This is really taught
with the Apostle Paul. He was a Pharisee of the Pharisees. And our Lord told the parable
of the two that were going up to pray, the publican God be
merciful to me a sinner and the Pharisee telling all his good
works. Well Paul was that Pharisee.
And yet one marked that when the Lord began with him, behold
he prayeth. Not as a Pharisee, but real prayer
like the publican. A difference in worship. And this is what later on in
Romans 10, Paul looks back and he sees his countrymen that he
desires to be saved and what are they doing? They have a zeal,
a zeal for God but not according to knowledge and they are going
about to establish their own righteousness. They are ignorant
of God's righteousness, trying to establish their own, trying
by deeds. We are made under the covenant
of works and that covenant was broken. We are under that sentence
of death. We are not, as it were, sinners
as a direct consequence of the fall, but we are sinners because
of that, but our death is by sentence of God. If we have someone
that commits a felony in this land, just because they have
committed murder or stolen something, doesn't mean to say as soon as
they've committed that they're hastened off and there they are
in jail. They're in jail because they've
been found out, they've been brought to court, justice has
said you are guilty, this is the sentence, to jail you go.
And so They're suffering because of
the judgement of the land, what the law determined. And our Lord
said, in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
A man then is under this sentence of death. God has executed what
he said that he would. But the very fact that he did
not slay us and Adam immediately, that gives life and a lengthen
of days, That raises hope. That is an expectation of hope. While there is life, there is
hope. That was so with the children of Israel in the wilderness.
It was with the 40 days with Nineveh. Wherever that there
is a lengthening of time, there is a hope raised up that man
is spiritually dead, though he's alive naturally. And man will
always have. that old nature. In Romans 8
we read of the whole creation groaning under sin and even he
says, we which have the first fruits, we groan within ourselves
waiting for the redemption of our body. But the reality of
what we were by nature, that many of us can go back and look
at the years that we spent in unregeneracy where we did not
know anything spiritually, did not even hear anything that was
said, did not understand what was being told us at all. It just didn't enter in. We can
have, even in a natural illustration, times where people might tell
us something, And we agree to what they've told us, but they
might say to us, did you really hear what I said? Do you understand
the implications of it? If we are planning on going on
a holiday and we all getting ready, we're going to go the
next day, and the husband comes in and says, look there's something
wrong with the car, we need to get this repaired, is this quite
a serious thing wrong? And you say, yeah, well how much
will it cost? And you say, but did you hear
what I said? Do you realise that we cannot
go on holiday now? This is just cut through that
whole thing. And it's putting the two together,
and by nature we hear but we don't hear. We hear about death,
we hear about hell, we hear about the judgment to come, but we
don't ever think that this belongs to us, or that we have a soul
and we must die and we must stand before the judgment seat of Christ. We are not concerned and we are
not allured by the gospel either, because we don't feel the need
of it. And it's important then for the people of God to always
remember what they once were, and for those who do not know
the new birth and cannot discern spiritual things, be aware that
you are on the road to hell. You are on the road to destruction. If we die as we were born, we
are lost. We are lost sinners. And we need the mercy of God,
we need the grace of God, we need that to be imparted to us
ere we depart this life. The law was given that sin might
appear sin, and it shows in the preaching of the Gospel, in the
setting forth of the law, what our true state is. The Apostle
Paul describes it in this chapter. And he says, I was alive without
the law once. In his own eyes, in his own thinking,
he was a religious man, alive, not under any condemnation, happy
with his own religion, happy with his faith and believing
all was well. Until the Lord changed things. Time to look secondly at the quickened soul's delight. We read Psalm 1. And Psalm 1 sets forth the beautiful
blessing of one that delights in the law of the Lord. Blessed
is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor
standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the
scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in
his law doth he meditate day and night. A very clear blessing
pronounced upon one that delights in the law of the Lord. We also have in Psalm 37 an exhortation
to delight in the law of the Lord. In other words, though
by grace it is something that flows forth from that life, we
are still with spiritual life exhorted to delight in the law
of the Lord. Thus for delight thyself also
in the Lord and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. We read in Psalm 119 and the
verses that we read, that's why I didn't confine just to the
paragraphs there. We started with verse 16, I will
delight myself in thy statutes, I will not forget thy word. And we finished with verse 70,
Their heart is as fat as grease, but I delight in my law." Often
there is a contrast, as there was in Psalm 1, between the ungodly
and the godly. And it is regarding the law of
God that that contrast, that difference, is actually seen. If we go back to verse 35, there's
a petition Make me to go in the path of thy commandments, for
therein do I delight. I will delight myself in thy
commandments which I have loved." And right through Psalm 119 is
the profession of the love that he has to the word of God and
to the law of God. So why is it? Why should we do
so? And what is the marks of that
love that we have to the law of God? The first thing I'd mention
is that in the Gospel, the Lord Jesus Christ came to fulfil the
law and make it honourable. If that law was unfulfilled,
if that law was still upon us, it would be but terrors to us. Whenever we read this, that a
poor sinner can delight in the holy law of God, we must think,
how can that be so? That is the law that has brought
us as to convicted of sin. But the law Jesus Christ was
made under the law, that he might redeem them that were under the
law, made of a woman, brought into the place of a near kinsman,
brought into a place where he could be a substitutionary offering. brought into a place where his
own life would be a constant obedience. And as Paul says to
the Philippians, obedient unto death, the death of the cross,
wherefore God hath highly exalted him and given him a name which
is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee
should bow. And so when we think of the law
of God, And we think of delight may always be led to the Gospel
and to what the Lord Jesus Christ has done in fulfilling that law. How can a sinner delight in it
otherwise than seeing it fulfilled? How can it be a rough-ending
sacrifice if it did not satisfy the just demands of the law? So when we think of delighting
in the law, We delight in our Lord Jesus Christ who fulfilled
it on our behalf, who rose again from the dead and ascended up
into heaven. The Old Testament saints, they
looked forward, they believed, they understood the Lamb slain
from the foundation of the world. They understood that. In Hebrews
11, they all died in faith. They were expecting, they were
looking, they had, as it were, the Gospel in the Old Testament
dispensation in the sacrifices and in the offerings. Abraham,
my son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So that is the first thing. The
second is that God's perfections are seen. Sometimes we might read the Word
of God, the Law of God, and especially things like the man that was
caught gathering sticks on the Lord's Day. There was no mercy.
He was stoned to death. We think of the severity of the
law. We think of how it was at Mount
Sinai that the people could not bear the sight that the mountain,
it smoked. the greatness of the law. They
saw how terrible, how perfect that law was. And there's no
one that can read that law and think that they or anyone else
can fulfil it in every jot and tittle without one transgression,
one thing done wrong. And then when we review that,
and we realise the Lord has fulfilled that, We see how perfect God
is, how holy God is. He who cannot look upon sin without
utter abhorrence, that he should look upon his beloved son, this
is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased, and that he should
raise him from the dead, that he should see no imperfection,
no sin upon him at all. The law of God magnifies the
perfection, the holiness and uprightness of God himself. If we even in a natural sense
were to have a community, perhaps a business situation, and they
had laws but they were very weak laws. and they allowed all sorts
of wrong things to be done. It wouldn't glorify the management. It wouldn't glorify the people
and those that were obeying it. They couldn't be very proud,
if you like, of saying, well, I'm keeping this law. It's rather
a weak law anyway. It doesn't take much to fulfil
it. But if it's a very, very high standard that glorifies
the law giver, and it glorifies the law-fulfiller. And so we
are to look upon the law in that way that God's perfections are
seen in that law. The third way in which we are
to delight in the law is that when the Lord gives the new birth,
that new birth is holy right from the start. Thy people shall
be willing in the day of thy power, from the womb of the morning,
right from the beginning. Thou hast the dew of thy youth,
Psalm 110, right from the very beginning. That birth is not
just a turning over a new leaf, is not just making the old nature
better, It is perfect from above. And that's the only way we can
understand that John's epistles, if you read John's epistles,
yes, you get to John 1. If we say that we have not sinned,
we make him a liar, the truth is not in us. All have sinned
and come short of the glory of God. But later on, He's speaking
as if we should be perfect and God's people, they have no sin
at all and no transgression at all. And you say, how can that
marry up with what you've just said? But he's speaking of that
new birth from above, impressing upon us what is the Spirit's
work. What is the new birth is perfect
and spotless. It is not mixed, it's not tainted. with sin and with the old nature
at all. It is from above. And that is
central to this later, the conflict that we have. But this is a reason
that we're to delight in the law of God. Because when the
Lord gives new life, that new life It delights in that which
is holy and pure, though it knows, it knows that in ourselves, like
Paul realised in this chapter, that we cannot fulfil that law. We cannot walk uprightly here
below in perfection, but the Lord has done that. It is his
righteousness, it is his blood that is atoned for our sin, and
that that which we walk in, We walk in because of love to the
Lord. And that brings in another reason
why we are to delight in the law of God. Because it is an
expression of love. The Lord says, if you love me,
keep my commandments. And then he speaks of his friends.
Ye are my friends. If you do whatsoever, I command
you. And so an expression of love
and friendship for the people of God to the Lord is that they
esteem his law, they esteem what he has suffered, bled and died
to atone for their sins. that those laws are upright,
those laws are good, and they delight in them because the Lord
delights in them and has fulfilled them. And so may we view that
as well when we view the gospel, we view the law, we view all
that the Lord has set before his people to walk in, and we
delight in it because we desire to express our love to the Lord
and for what he has done for us. Imperfect though it is, if
you think of that word, she has done what she could and the people
of God, they do what they can and their aim is, their desire
is that they would serve the Lord Christ. They would follow
him and walk in his ways and obey his word. Another reason
why we are to delight in the law, in the gospel, in the law
especially as it reminds us what we have been saved from. We get
a real contrast in Hebrews 12 where we have the law set forth
as the Mount Sinai smoking and all on fire and says we are not
coming to Mount Sinai, the mount that might not be touched, but
you come unto Mount Sinai and to innumerable company of angels,
the blood that speaketh better things than that of Abel. And it's a contrast. It's thinking
what the option was if we did not have Christ, if we did not
have that atonement. what it is we are actually saved
from and delivered from. And that is why we are to delight
in it by viewing, viewing what it is the Lord has fulfilled
and saved us from. We're not to forget the cost. We're not to forget what the
Lord went through. Also allow thee ten commandments
on their own Not the rule of life for a believer. The whole
gospel is. Yet it is a rule of life. And we should delight in that
which the Lord instructs us and teaches us how to walk, what
to do and how to tread. We should delight in that. Lord,
what wilt thou have me to do is one of the first things that
the Apostle Paul said when he was called. He desired that the
Lord would have a way for him to walk. Acceptably, and of course
we see in Romans 8, the emphasis is on the walk. There is therefore
now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus who walk
not after the flesh but after the spirit. And the law is spiritual. We are told that, Paul says that
in chapter 7, that the law is spiritual because God uses it
in a spiritual way. And so with the way that we are
to walk is after, not the flesh, but after the spirit. The righteousness of the law
might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh but
after the spirit. And put in another way, those
who are after flesh are minding the things of the flesh and those
after the spirit, the things of the spirit. In other words,
minding the law, minding the gospel, thinking of those things,
taking pleasure in those things rather than the things of the
flesh. It also brings to a deeper relationship
with our God. If we do not have any thoughts
and any meditation on the very central work of the Lord Jesus
Christ in his redemption, then there is not that fellowship
and union with the Lord. If we have no idea how hard it
is to fulfill the law, we won't value him who has. And we walk
in that way that is pleasing to him. The Lord bids his people
to be followers after him, to learn of me, I am meek and lowly
in heart, ye shall find rest unto your souls. In John, in
opening up his epistles, truly our fellowship is with the Lord
and with one another. He speaks of that way. a clear token of being a child
of God. We love the brethren. We pass
from death unto life because we love the brethren. And there's
a drawing to those that love the same things and is a fellowship
then with the Lord and with his people. In verse 10 of chapter 7 we read
this, and the commandment which was ordained to life I found
to be unto death. That is another reason why we
should delight in the law of God. It is ordained unto life. By the law is the knowledge of
sin. Paul says the law was our schoolmaster
unto Christ. It was used by the Spirit. to bring into conviction and
to bring us to Christ. The law is to slay us in the
hope of saving ourselves. Only when that is dealt with,
you think of the book of Ruth. When Ruth asked Boaz to cast
his skirt upon her because he was a near kinsman, he said,
there's a kinsman nearer than I. that kinsman had to be eliminated
first before she could marry him. We don't know anything about
that kinsman, only the fact that he could not redeem it for himself. He could if it was land, but
not if it was a person, not if it was Ruth. He couldn't marry
her. And we think then that near kinsman
is ourselves. The first one to consult in redeeming
We're told no man can redeem his own soul, but how do we know
that needs to be dealt with first? Because without the shedding
of blood, there is no remission. But if we shed our blood, we're
dead, we're lost. So we can't redeem ourselves
with sinful blood. And so that must, under the Spirit's
teaching, be ruled out first. But we're to remember this, that
the Lord used the law of God In that way, it was ordained
unto life. May some of us here look back
to those times when we were under the law, and I certainly can
look back where the Lord began with me, that wherever I looked
in the Word of God, Gospel as well as law, it condemned me. Every sentence, every part, it brought me under conviction
as a sinner. When the Lord blessed my soul,
when he opened my eyes to the gospel, from cover to cover of
the word of God, there was a gospel. Right through the law as well,
there's a gospel. You read at Mount Sinai, and
there is the tables cast down and broken at the bottom of the
mount. But then the Lord himself restores
them, and they're put in the ark. The ark, a beautiful type
of Christ. He has fulfilled the law and
made it honourable. We are broken in. So right there
at Sinai, there is the law fulfilled. And no wonder the psalmist is
praying in this way, open mine eyes that I might behold wondrous
things out of thy law. It's things like that. When you
read it and you suddenly realise here is the gospel, this is pointing
to the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the use of the law man
was never ever meant to save himself by the law. The law was
given because of transgressions. Where there is no law, there
is no imputation of sin. The law was given that all the
world might be brought in guilty before God. It was to make a
way for the Lord Jesus Christ to be made precious. but also
it shows for the character of God. And Paul tells us this in
verse 12 of this chapter, Romans 7. He says, Wherefore the law
is holy and the commandment holy and just and good. And he's showing us something
of God's character. He is a just God. You have this
through the Proverbs, a just weight and a just balance. He
condemned those who when they were buying something, then they
had in their scales a weight that said a kilogram, I'm using
today's weights, but actually it was 1.2 kilograms. So they paid for 1 kilogram and
they got 1.2. And then they condemned the other
way when they were buying something and it was done the other way. So whether they were selling,
they put the weight so that they sold less than the kilogram.
When they were buying it, they got more than their kilogram.
A bag of deceitful weights, the Lord says. And so with the way
that God deals, he is just and righteous. And so when we look
at Calvary, can the Lord be unjust, unrighteous? Can he not have
fully atoned for the sins of his people? Only half? No, he is fully. Otherwise there
wouldn't be the empty tomb. And so in all of our lives, in
all what the Lord does, he is holy, He is just. He is good. I'll make all my
goodness pass before thee in the way. And this is what the
apostle is saying here in this chapter before then he comes
to the conflict. And he's clearly stating in verse
22 of our text, I delight in the law of God after the inward
man. That is his song. He delights
in the law of God. Now I want to look at our third
point, the conflict that is really only known by God's own people. In Romans 8 verse 7, we read
that the carnal mind is enmity against God. It is not subject
to the law of God, neither indeed can be. We read in Hebrews 12 and verse
4, you've not yet resisted unto blood. striving against sin. Sin is an active principle fighting
against the soul. And the people of God are set
forth as striving against it. Then we have in Ephesians, take
upon you the whole armour of God. that we might be able to
resist the wiles of the devil and the whole armour is given.
The whole picture of the life of God in the soul is a life
of conflict with sin. The Puritans used to say that
impress upon a young believer that he is called to a daily
battle with the corruptions of his own heart. We are to resist
the devil and he will flee from us. We were to call upon the Lord
in our trouble and it is him that saves us. It is set forth again and again
as a race, running the race, striving to enter in at the straight
gain, It is not an easy path. In me, says the Lord, you shall
have peace. In the world you shall have tribulation. And for God's people, their tribulation,
yes they have the illnesses that those that not have, they have
car accidents, they have all sorts of things happen to them
the same. But there's another element to
it. I hear a saint now in glory over in Australia. He was in
Geelong and he was crippled with arthritis. He used to have gold
injections every three months. And one day I said to him, I
said, you know, Paul's thorn in the flesh. I don't think that
that would be an illness or an affliction because it's said
he's a messenger of Satan. And he looked at me and said,
it's not the illness, it's not the affliction, it's what Satan
does with it. How it makes me to fret, how
it makes me to question my God, to speak against him. That is
what is the messenger of Satan. So for the world, yes they have
the painful arthritis, but they're not troubled if they have an
argument with the Lord and speak against him. It doesn't trouble
them like that. But with God's children, when
Satan comes in and said, if you really were a child of God, he
wouldn't allow this to happen. And if he's a good and kind God,
he wouldn't give you this pain and this trouble. And those thoughts,
those suggestions, They trouble, they plague the child of God
and that's the messenger of Satan. And so that's an aspect that
again is only known to God's children. This conflict is only
known to God's children because unless there is a new birth,
there's complete harmony between the flesh. There is no spirit,
there's no conflict, there's no opposition. but those who
have passed from death unto life. Why? The law is light. You will not come unto me, saith
the Lord, that ye might have life, or they come not to the
light because their deeds are evil, lest their deeds be found
out. But the old nature, it's still. It still doesn't like the light.
It still would rather hide from it. But the new nature says,
no, I want to come to the light. I want to be searched. I want
to know the truth. I want to walk in God's light.
And so there's the conflict that is going on. You know, Even the
faults of God's children, they emphasise this. David was a man
after God's own heart, but did he walk sinlessly? No, he didn't. He fell, Samson fell, Peter fell. The very faults of God's people
recorded in the Word of God have their stamp upon it, that their
righteousness was of God and a conflict they still had with
their old nature. We think of the measures also
some of the Lord's people have taken that they might deal with
this sin in their members. Dear Job, he said, I made a covenant
with mine eyes, why then should I think upon a maid? And you
think, he has trouble with these sins and therefore he's taking
these steps so that he is not going to fall and walk in this
way. But there is that conflict within.
You think of Joseph fleeing when he's tempted by his master's
wife. Why does he flee? He doesn't
trust his own strength. He has no power, his power is
to flee. We think of our Lord, how he
describes it, of taking up the cross and following him, of plucking
out wide eyes and cutting off hands, as it is a hard thing. Why? Because of that conflict,
because the flesh all the time is lusting against the spirit
and the spirit against the flesh, so he cannot do the things that
he would. And this is a very real battle
and conflict. In Romans 8 we have, If ye through
the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. Mortify
the deeds of the body. The deeds of the body are working,
but instead of attacking them or trying to dwell on them, you
say, I'm not going to deal with you, I'm going to go after the
things of the Spirit. Now sometimes you might see perhaps
a speaker and there's a heckler or someone that's opposing them. And they'll come and speak to
them and try to hold them back. And the way he deals with it
is just pushes past them, basically ignores them and goes and speaks
to everybody else. And that person's mortified because
they've just been pushed aside and ignored. and their aim of
stopping him from speaking to everyone else has failed, they
haven't disrupted it at all. And so sin is like this. It tries
to destroy. If it can stop the reading and
prayer, stop prayer, stop from going to the house of God, it
would try. But that child of God, through
the Spirit, will mortify that in trying to just, instead of
dealing with that sin which it feels no power or might against,
just pushes past it and seeks to have their aim and sights
on the things of God, to delight in them and not in the flesh. One of the things the devil really
likes is that we somehow have this thought, we can deal with
this, we'll fight with this, we'll get rid of this temptation
and this sin, but all the time we deal with it and all the time
our mind is on it, he's won his case. The way that we are to
walk is to delight in the law of God. It's in a positive way,
not in a negative way. And the conflict then assures
us of the reality of the new birth. Not what Satan would say,
that you haven't been born again. It assures us the other side
that we have. If it be so, why am I thus? The reality is You know, that
was Rebecca, wasn't it? She had the twins. The commotion
going within, the conflict within. If the promised child is going
to be born, why all of this conflict within? Well, the answer is here,
with the Apostle Paul speaking of this conflict. I delight in
the law of God after the inward man. As it were, that is put
in the ground. That is to be a fact. Then there's
a but. I see. He sees it. Do you see it? Do you struggle
with it? Do you have that conflict? The
same thing as what the apostle is. I see another law in my members,
warring against the law of my mind. and bring me into captivity
to the law of sin which is in my members. Is the effect the
same with you as it was with Paul here? O wretched man that
I am, you shall deliver me from the body of this death. Do you have the same answer? Do
I have the same answer as he had? I thank God through Jesus
Christ our Lord and then to realise this, so then with the mind I
myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of
sin. I believe in the real realisation
of this is a lot of the comfort and help for the people of God
and how they view the law of God as well and delight in that
will change when we see clearly how the Lords use it, and why
we are to delight in it, and to realise that that conflict,
that is ordered of God. The fire shall try every man's
work, what sort it is. If it's from above, it will endure
that conflict and that battle. The flesh is always there, the
world is always there, and the only reason why we don't go back
is because of the grace that is constantly given and the evidence
of the life which is from above. Eternal life is eternal life. And blessed soul that realizes
that, like bunion, the oil poured on as well as the water, the
life not only kindled but kept going in spite of all the opposition
from the world, the flesh. and the devil. May this word
be an encouragement and a help to you and in these two verses
you see something of your own experience and encouragement
that that delight that you have in the law of God is a true delight
though it is so opposed within. May the Lord add his blessing.
Amen.