is dead to the law, that we're
dead to sin. But now, does that mean that
we never struggle with sin? That a believer who's dead to
sin never struggles with sin, never has a desire to sin? When
I sin, and we do, we have those sinful desires that we hate.
And then we read that we're dead to sin, do we need to worry that
we don't know the Lord at all? That in fact, we haven't been
made dead to sin yet? Well, of course not. You know
better than that. And that's what Paul's going
to deal with in these verses this morning. A believer has
a new nature, been born from above. And that nature cannot
sin. Yet, we still have that old nature
that we're born with that can do nothing but sin. Henry's title
he put on the lesson that he wrote was One Man with Two Natures. And that's what this is. And
those two natures opposing natures and there's going to be a lifelong
struggle between them. They'll never stop warring with
each other. Now, I did some reading this
week, like I always do, but this is kind of interesting. I read
Matthew Henry, who primarily ministered in the 1600s. I read
John Gill, whose ministry is primarily in the 1700s. I read
Charles Spurgeon, who primarily ministered in the 1800s. And
I read Henry Mahan, who primarily ministered in the 1900s. All
four of these esteemed brethren made this comment in their commentaries
on this passage of Scripture. Romans 7 is one of the most misunderstood
Scriptures in all the Bible. There is a debate that rages.
Is Paul talking about a saved man or is he talking about a
lost man here? What's he talking about? Well, he's talking about
a saved man. A lost man doesn't struggle with
sin. A man in the flesh doesn't hate
sin. He loves sin. He doesn't struggle
against it. A lost man doesn't have any desire to be holy or
be like Christ. His carnal mind is contrary to
those things. It's enmity to those things.
Paul can only be talking about a saved man here. And when people
get in trouble with this scripture or any other scripture, I'll
tell you why they get in trouble. They have their preconceived
notion of what they think is, you know, right. And then they
go to the scripture and they try to make scripture support
their idea. That's when we get in trouble.
You stay out of trouble. You avoid trouble. If we clear
our minds what we think and look at God's word and see what God's
word says and say, that's what I believe. That way we'll stay
out of trouble. But now before when Paul, when
he was Saul of Tarsus before the Lord Satan, that man had
no trouble with sin whatsoever. Look at verse 7, this is where
our lesson begins. Paul writes, What shall we say
then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known
sin, but by the law. For I had not known lust, except
the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. Now can we say that
the law made me a sinner? Can we say the law made me sin?
Paul says, God forbid. The law reveals sin. But it doesn't
make us sinners. It doesn't make us a sinner.
You can't get mad at the law because the law has revealed
to you that you're a sinner. We get mad at ourselves, but
we can't get mad at the law. Part of my job at work, we have
customers and we ship them products and then they don't pay it on
time. Part of my job is to call them and remind them we need
payment. And invariably, they get mad
at me. They just get so angry. And occasionally,
I'll say, Wait just a minute here. Did I cause this problem? Don't get mad at me. I'm not
the one getting paid the bill. When the law points out to us,
we're sinners. Can't get mad at the law. Can't
get mad at God's word for pointing out to us we're sinners. We're
the problem. I'm the problem. But before the
Lord unhorsed Saul of Tarsus, put him in the dust, that man
did not know what sin was. Matter of fact, he thought he
was holy. He thought he was keeping the law as long as he controlled
his outward behavior. At that time, he didn't know
yet what he wrote in verse 14 here of Romans 7. The law is
spiritual. He didn't know that. And the
proof that the law is spiritual is the 10th commandment. Thou
shalt not covet. See, the law just doesn't forbid
us from doing evil. The law prohibits us from even
thinking evil. It's not good enough that you
just don't take what doesn't belong to you. You can't even
desire to take what doesn't belong to you. As soon as you desire
to take what doesn't belong to you, you've broken the whole
law of God. And the law reveals sin, both
in outward disobedience and inward depravity. The depravity of that
man that we're born with. And Paul said, I'd never known
that unless the Lord revealed to me the law that said, thou
shalt not covet. Now verse 8. but sin, taking
occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law, sin was
dead. For I was alive, or I thought I was alive, without the law
once. But when the commandment came, sin revived and I died."
The law cannot make a person holy or righteous. All the law
can do with our sinful nature is work in us all manner of concupiscence. And that word means desire to
sin or lust. The only rule God gave Adam,
He put Adam in a perfect garden, in a perfect world, and He had
one rule. Just one. Don't eat of the fruit
of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Just don't
do it and you'll live. And Adam had to eat that fruit
because it was forbidden. And scripture tells us we have
Adam's nature. That's why we desire everything
that the law prohibits. The law says don't do something.
That's all we want. And the law says do something
and we won't do it. The law just works in us rebellion
against God's law. And Saul of Tarsus had a head
knowledge of the law, didn't he? Nobody in the head knew the
law better than Saul of Tarsus. He was a good student. He had
the best teachers. He was a good student. God gave
him a brilliant mind. And he understood. He memorized
the law. But he thought he was alive.
See, that's the difference between the head knowledge and heart
knowledge. Between head knowledge and heart faith. He thought he
was alive. Then God gave him a heart knowledge
of the law. And Paul realized, I'm dead. Not just that I'm sick, I'm dead. See, you can think a room is
clean as long as it's dark. But you turn the light on and
you see the dirt all over the place. You notice the sun shines
through the curtains and you see the little dust particles
in the air. You don't see that when there's no light. But when
the light's turned on, you see the true condition of the room.
And when God turns on the light, we see the true condition of
who we are, of our heart. We realize we're dead, that all
we are is wickedness and sin and lust. Now, before God revealed
the truth to Saul, what did he write? He said, I was as touching
the law blameless. That's what he thought. Outwardly,
he may have been. After the Lord revealed the truth
to Paul, when God turned the light on, what did he write?
I'm the chief of sinners. I'm less than the least of all
the sins. That's the difference between head knowledge and heart
knowledge. He knew who and what he was. Now verse 10. And the commandment which was
ordained to life I found to be death. Now God gave the law for
our good, for man's happiness. Now he did. The law doesn't prohibit
anything that's good for you. Not one thing whatsoever. But
we're sinners. We have that sinful nature that
makes us incapable of keeping the law. So all the law can do
is pronounce death and judgment to us. God gave it for our good,
but we broke it. All it can do is produce death
to us. Now verse 11, for sin, taking occasion by the commandment,
deceived me. And by it, it slew me. My sinful
nature used the law to deceive me. being excluded. It's like
a thief. Comes knocking at the door and
deceives you into letting him into your house. Maybe he says
he needs help or he's, you know, the cable repairman. Whatever
they do, they deceive you into letting him into your house.
And once you let him in, he steals everything you've got and then
kills you. That's exactly what sin does.
It deceives us and it gets in and steals everything we've got
and ultimately it kills us. Look over at Jeremiah chapter
17. Here's where we get deceived.
Jeremiah 17 verse 9. The heart, the heart that we're
born with, man's heart is deceitful above all things and desperately
wicked. Who can know it? Well, the only
person that can know it is the person that God gives life to
and knowledge to. But that heart is so wicked and
deceitful, it made me think I was keeping the law. It made me think
I was doing everything just right and gave me a false refuge. And
you know the same thing is true, I tell you this now by experience,
the same thing is true that you could say about Saul of Tarsus
is by a young boy. growing up under the sound of
the gospel. And that wicked heart will make you think because you're
a Calvinist and you've got all the doctrine up here, everything's
good. That heart will take the very
best news man's ever heard and will turn it into a false refuge
unless God gives grace. And He will. It will. It's wicked
and deceitful. Who can know it? Now verse 12,
wherefore the law is holy. and the commandment holy and
just and good. 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." See,
there's nothing wrong with the law. All the law requires is
holy things, things that are good for us. And the only thing
that the law forbids is things that are bad for us. The law
of God comes from a holy God. It's His law, so it's holy and
just and good just like He is. And we'd be a lot happier. We'd
be a lot better off if we could keep God's law perfectly. But
we can't because we're sinful. And the problem's not with the
law. The problem's with us. And my sinful nature is what
kills me. The law is not to blame. It's
my sinful nature that damns me. Our nature is so depraved, we
take something holy and good and use it to condemn ourselves,
to kill ourselves. So the law's purpose is not to
make us holy. It's to show us who and what
we are, that we are exceeding sinful. Paul couldn't think of
a worse name to call sin. There's just nothing worse. So
he calls it exceeding sinful. That's total depravity. Every
single molecule of this flesh is exceedingly sinful, totally
depraved. And the only way we can see how
sinful we are is for God to give us eyes to see something holy
laid next to it. Then we see the contrast. Then
we see how sinful we are. We live in an old house. And
one of the beautiful things about old houses is the walls are never
plumbed. Nothing's ever just exactly square.
You know, the ceiling, it kind of waves along, you know, the
plaster the way they did it. And you can put something up,
you can eyeball it, and you think that looks straight, you know,
next to the ceiling or maybe next to the baseboard. Yeah,
that looks straight, looks parallel. Then you put a level on it, you
see it's going like this. So, you put something up level,
but then it looks crooked compared to the ceiling. So, you know,
you've got this dilemma all the time. Well, I was putting a shelf
up in Savannah's room last night, and I went and got the level.
Because I could eyeball that thing, and then everything she
sat on that shelf would have went down this way, you know.
So, I got my level. Put it up. That's a good-looking
job. Go downstairs to watch the basketball
game, and Savannah comes, and she says, Daddy, you hung my
shelf up upside down. Isn't that our nature? That's
our sinful nature. Even if we had a level, we got
it upside down and backwards. That's our nature. But if God
turns a light on and gives us the level, then we see how sinful
we are. And He won't let us put it on
upside down, because He does the work. And we might be parallel
to other sinners, but that's not the standard, is it? It's God's holy law. And when
we see ourselves compared to that holy law, then we see, I'm
dead. Verse 14, here's the problem.
The law is spiritual, but I'm carnal. I'm sold under sin. The
law is spiritual, but I'm flesh. See, the law doesn't just apply,
like I said a minute ago, to our outward actions. The law
applies to the thoughts and intents of the heart. And that's where
God deals with the heart. God looks on the heart. And the
problem is, I'm flesh. I'm the exact opposite of spirituality. You are too. We all are. The
nature of God's law is the exact opposite of the nature of my
flesh. This old man, the nature that
I'm born with, is born sold under sin. We're born in slavery to
sin, under the control and direction of sin, and we cannot do anything
but follow sin because we are flesh. We can't do anything but
go the opposite way of God's spiritual law because we're flesh.
We're sold under sin. But, once God moves in grace
and regeneration, everything changes. Something changed in
Paul. Look at verse 15. For that which
I do, I allow not. For what I would, that do I not. But what I hate, that's what
I do. If then I do that which I would not, I consent under
the law that it's good. Now what Paul's describing here
is the experience of every true believer. The word allow means
approve of. It means to indulge or give in
to. And Paul says what I do not want
to do, what the things that I do not approve of and all sinful
things that I do. I don't approve of those things.
I don't approve of the sinful things that I think. I desire
to be holy, to do holy things, but I cannot do them. I can't
do them perfectly. The believer loves God's law. You love God's law. You love
God's Word. You love to help the brethren. But you can't do it. You can't
do it perfectly. You can't keep God's law perfectly
even though that you love it. Now the believer does pray, don't
we? The believer does worship. We do serve and help our brethren. Even though we don't do it perfectly,
we do those things. And when we don't do those things
perfectly, we hate ourselves. That's what Paul's talking about.
I hate that. Look over at Philippians chapter
3. He's not saying we never do these
things. We never worship. We never pray. We never do things
to help our brethren. We don't do them perfectly. Philippians
3, verse 12. Not as though I had already attained,
I haven't arrived, either already perfect, but I follow after,
if that I may apprehend, that for which also I am apprehended
of Christ Jesus. I can't do these things perfectly
because of that old man, but that's not going to keep me from
following after. from following after holiness,
from following after Christ. And I will follow after, but
now it's going to be a struggle. Because there's a civil war going
on inside of a believer. There's those two natures, those
two opposite natures in one person, and they are warring against
one another. That old man that we're born
with, he can't do anything but sin. And even after God saves
you, he'll never change. never improved one iota. All
they'll ever do is sin. That new man who's born of God
can't do anything but perfect holiness. He cannot sin. He's
been born of God. And as long as you live in this
body, those two natures are going to war with one another. They're
going to pull you in opposite directions as long as you live.
Look at Galatians chapter 5. Galatians 5 verse 17, For the flesh, that old man,
lusted against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh.
And these are contrary the one to another, so that you cannot
do the things that you would. That's why you cannot do the
things that you would, because the flesh is lusting and warring
against the Spirit. Now the believer. I'll just give
you some examples of those two natures. The believer loves God's
Word. Don't you love God's Word? Then
why can't we fall asleep reading it? Isn't that awful? That's
awful! The believer loves to pray. We
love to talk to our Heavenly Father. Then why can't you fall
asleep praying? Our Lord, the disciples did.
Our Lord was praying. And they fell asleep. Look at
that in Matthew 26. Why'd they do that? Well, the Lord tells
us. Matthew 26, verse 36. Then cometh Jesus with them unto
a place called Gethsemane. And saith unto the disciples,
Sit ye here, while I go and pray yonder. And took with him Peter,
and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and
very heavy. Then saith he unto them, Now
get this, this is their master, this is the Lord of glory. And
he says to them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death. Tear
ye here, and watch with me. Now you'd think that would have
got their attention, wouldn't you? And he went a little further,
and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my father, if it be
possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not as I will,
but as thou wilt. And he cometh unto the disciples,
and findeth them asleep." The Master just asked them to watch
and pray with him, and he found them asleep. And he saith unto
Peter, What? Could you not watch with me one
hour? Watch and pray that you enter not into temptation. Here's
why they fell asleep. The Spirit indeed is willing,
but the flesh is weak. That warfare was going on and
they fell asleep. You know, and believers, now
you pray. You said your prayers last night. Where did that desire
to pray come from? Who prayed? Was it the old man
or the new man? It was the new man. Well, was
that prayer perfect? Absolutely not. Because it came
through this body of flesh. This body of sin. But you love
to pray. And even though it's not perfect,
we're going to talk to our Father more. The believer loves to worship. We wake up on Sunday morning.
We're happy. It's the day. It's the Lord's
Day. We gather together. We read the
Word. We hear the Gospel preached.
We gather with our brethren and sing praises unto our God. We're
so happy, we love to worship. Then why does our mind wander
so much when the preacher is preaching? Why do we start fidgeting
around in our seat? Well, I thought you loved to
worship. It's that warfare going on. Years and years and years
ago, our pastor told me this. He said, the Spirit can easily
listen to preaching, last well over an hour, but your high knee
only takes about 30 minutes. The flesh and the spirit warring
against one another. Every believer does things we
detest, don't we? Just, oh, I hate that. Well,
that's proof that we agree the law is good. God's law is good
and I take sides with God against myself. When I mourn over my
sin, when I hate my sin, when I hate those sinful things that
I think, I'm taking sides with God against myself, saying His
law is good. Now verse 17, now there is no
more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. Now Paul's not
making an excuse for sin here. Believers never make an excuse
for our sin. And he's not trying to put the
blame somewhere else. He's taking the blame himself.
There's a new man that's been born, but sin's still present. The Lord saved you, but sin's
still present. That old man is still alive and
well. Now he's not in control anymore,
but he's still alive. And he still influences everything
we do. I sinned. It was me that sinned. And I sinned because I still
have that nature with me. But the opposite's true too.
Look over in 1 Corinthians chapter 15. There's some things we do because
there's a new nature, a new man who's present. 1 Corinthians
15 verse 9, For I am the least of the apostles,
that I am not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted
the church of God. But by the grace of God I am
what I am, and his grace which was bestowed on me was not in
vain. God's grace is never in vain, is it? But I labored more
abundantly than they all. Yet not I, but the grace of God,
which was in me." See, the opposite is true, too. Who labored? Paul
did. But who gets the credit? God's
grace does. Now, when I sin, who gets the
blame? I do. But when we labor more abundantly than they all,
who gets the glory? God does. Because it's His grace.
Because He worked in us. Now, verse 18, back in Romans
7. For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no
good thing. For the will is present with
me, but how to perform that which is good I find not. There is
nothing good in me by nature. In my flesh there is nothing
good. There's nothing I'll ever do,
nothing I'll ever produce, nothing that will ever be good. Not one
blessed thing. There's nothing good in my flesh.
But I'm telling you what, there is good in me. In a believer,
there is, it's in me because God put it there. That new man,
he's perfectly holy and he's in you because God put him there.
Now it's in me. It's not of me, but it's in me. It's of God, but it's in me.
That's what Paul says, the will is present with me. Where'd that
will come from? From the new man. Look in Philippians
chapter 2. That will, that desire is there. But how to perform that which
is good, I don't know how to do that. I can't do it. Because
I've got this warfare going on in me. Philippians 2 verse 13. For it is God which worketh in
you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. John Gill
said something that will help you here. God does work in his
people both to will and to do. He does not work both alike equally. He gives you the will, but He
doesn't give you near as much ability to perform that which
is good because you've got that sinful man, that sinful nature
that you're still dragging along with you. There is a desire to
do good, but we can't perform those things perfectly because
it's filtered through this body of sin. Now verse 19, for the
good that I would, I do not. But the evil which I would not,
that's what I do. Now if I do that, I would not.
It's no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. I find
in a law that when I would do good, evil is present with me. That's why we can never do anything
good because everything I desire to do good, evil is present with
me. And just a hint of sin pollutes
it all, makes it totally sinful. I still do evil things, I think
evil things that I don't have any desire to do. Things that
new man hates, but I still do them because that old nature
is always going to be present with me. Now verse 22, for 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.
That inward man Paul's talking about here is the new man. That
new nature is born of God. He loves God's law. He loves
God's Word. It is my delight to love the
Lord my God with all my heart, soul, strength, and mind and
to love my neighbor as myself. I love that. That desire is a
strong force that's in me because of the new man God put in me.
But there's another strong force in me that comes from that old
man. Now, he's no longer the ruling force, but he's strong. He's a strong man. That new man
that's been born, that God put in you, has got a bad roommate,
doesn't he? When my daughter Holly went off
to college, you know, we were real worried. What kind of roommate
is she going to get? Is it going to be a good roommate?
Is it a bad roommate? Because a bad roommate can make your
life miserable, that existence miserable. And we found out she's
got a good roommate and we're all happy. That new man has got
a bad roommate, doesn't he? Fletch. And the law that Paul's
talking about here is a law of nature. It's a force of nature. And that old man is going to
violently war against that new man. He's always going to be
pulling, trying to bring me back into captivity to the sin and
to the law because that's what that old man does. That old sinful
man is still in these fleshly members that we have. So verse
24, Paul says, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver
me from the body of this death? Now every one of us is born a
wretch. Amazing grace that saved a wretch
like me. Now we're not wretched in Christ,
are we? We're perfect, we're holy, we're
upright in Him. We're not wretched in Christ.
But that new man lives a wretched existence. because of his roommate. That new man is perfectly holy. He hates sin. He loves holiness
and righteousness. But for a while, he's going to
have to live in a body of sin which lives in a world of sin.
It's like a millionaire being forced for a while to go live
in the sewers. Now, down there in the sewers,
he's still wealthy, but he can't enjoy the advantages of his wealth
until he gets out of that sewer. And that's what Paul desires.
I want to get out of this sewer. Who's going to deliver me from
this sewer? From this body of death? And
from what I read, I heard this illustration years and years
and years ago and I finally found someone else backing it up. What
Paul is referring to here is an old ancient Roman ruler who
ruled before Rome became Rome, you know. And if you know who
that is, you've probably got too much time on your hands.
But Mesentius. And I looked him up on the internet.
This fellow was known, he's kind of a cruel ruler apparently,
and he would take a murderer, and he'd take that murderer as
punishment, and he'd tie him to that dead corpse of his victim.
He'd tie him face to face, nose to nose, hand to hand, arm to
arm, chest to chest, leg to leg, exactly mirroring each other.
And he'd make that murderer carry that victim's body around with
him. Can you imagine how miserable
that would be? At first, the weight of it would
be tough, wouldn't it? Just the dead weight of that
body. Eventually, it would stink. Oh, can you imagine the stench
of that right up to your nose? You're carrying that dead corpse
around with you. Eventually, I would imagine The
disease from that corrupt body would just get into your body
and kill you. Imagine. That's exactly what the believer's
existence is. We're carrying around that old
dead corpse. It stinks. It's dead weight to
us. It interrupts and gets in the
way of every movement, everything that we do. And we just cry,
who was going to deliver me from this body of death? Who's going
to set me free from being tied to this stinking, decaying corpse? Well, I thank God. It's the Lord
Jesus Christ. I thank God through Jesus Christ
our Lord. That's how I will be delivered.
So then, with the mind, I serve the law of God. But with the
flesh, the law of sin. I thank God He sent a deliverer. He'd bear our sins, set us free
from sin. He'd cleanse us from the filth
and corruption and the disease of this body of flesh, wash us
in His blood. And one day, He's going to deliver
us from this sewer. He's going to deliver us from
this body of sin, and we're going to awake in a glorious body,
like His glorious body. And then, finally, there's going
to be no more war. There's going to be peace within
and without. But until then, we're going to
have to live in this civil war. We just are. With a renewed mind,
we'll serve the law of God. We'll follow after Christ. But
with the flesh, we're still going to serve sin. We're still going
to sin, because He's never going to do anything but sin. You can't
hope for Him to improve. And I'm afraid, the older we
get, the more we're going to have to think we're carrying
around. And when the time comes, We'll be glad to put him down.
All right. Well, Lord bless you.