Struggling with Sin: Paul's Cry for Deliverance

I find them a law that when I would do good evil is present with me for I delight in the law of God after the inward men 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. [00:00:19]

What he was concerned to show to us in the previous three verses 18 19 and 20 as we saw last week his main thrust there is to explain why it is that he performs evil acts though he doesn't want to do so now what he's doing particularly in these verses that we're looking at tonight is this he is showing why it is that he fails to do what he wants to do. [00:03:35]

What I find is this that invariably when I would do good evil is present with me that's what he's concerned to say this is something he says which seems to operate in me as you see the laws operating in nature as the night follows the day as you get Springs on the northern winter that sort of law I find he says that the moment I would do good evil is present with me. [00:08:11]

I delight in the law of God after the inward man now here is a very significant statement again take her first of all this word delight you've noticed that there is a progression in the statements that he makes about the law he started off in verse 14 by saying we know that the law is spiritual in verse 16 he says I can the law that it is good but now he goes beyond that he says I did lighten it. [00:10:32]

I delight in the law of God after the inward men now that year we come to the most important term the inward men this play is a very great part in the discussion about the exact interpretation of this passage and those who hold the traditional reformed view after lean very heavily upon this in their endeavor to prove that this is the regenerate men even at his very best. [00:11:55]

I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind now then there you see is a further explanation of what means by the n-word men the inward man is surely synonymous with the mind I delighted in the law of God after the inward man then he puts that in verse 23 by saying what is in the law of my mind yes there's something against that. [00:12:52]

He later you see in the same verse calls it the law of sidon the law in his members and the law of sin are the same thing they are identical now then here is his picture this first thing that this does is to wage this war against this spiritual view of the law and his desire to keep it because you know delights in it but unfortunately doesn't stop at that that would be bad enough. [00:24:34]

The fact that this perpetual warfare was going on i say would be terrible enough to contemplate in and of itself that the moment the good asserts itself the other asserts itself and does it with its devilish strategy but he goes beyond it it isn't merely that the law in the members is warring against the law of the mind he says it brings me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. [00:25:00]

What makes him say all wretched men that I am is the persistence of defeat is the feeling that he is down rather than up that it's failure rather than success I cannot see how any other exposition of verse 23 can possibly lead us to verse 24 if he is merely describing the fact that there is a calm clicked in the life of the believer in verse 23 that doesn't lead him to say all right your men no no there is nothing that leads to this accept defeat. [00:36:38]

He cries out saying who shall deliver me now in a most amazing way again Robert Holden says at this point that this shale refers entirely to the future he emphasizes the shale meaning this says Holden that he knows that nobody can do it now but that it is going to happen he says this is the Christian man at his best he knows that he'll never be delivered while he's in this life and in this world but he knows that at the end in death Christ will finally deliver him out of the body and it's thraldom and they'll have the glorified body shell he says is entirely future. [00:38:17]

Here is a man in anguish in failure and exhaustion says who will deliver me who came deliver me that's what he saying that that's a part of the very question he's not a man making a pronouncement about what's going to happen he's crying up in despair for deliverance the body of death we needn't stay with this this is the same as the law of sin in my members the thing he's just been talking about at the end of verse 23 says this is the trouble that this other law in my members is bringing me into captivity to this law send us in my members who shall deliver me from this law of sin that is in my members which he calls this body of sin this body of death. [00:39:46]

He is not bemoaning the fact that there's anything in in contrary to his godly is Christ the cross the spirit they have not mentioned here at all you see and another exposition you have to import all that but it's not here not here at all it's in the next chapter in great profusion but not here and yet we are concerned about the man who is here this is the man we're dealing with the man who is in a position that he simply can cry up hmm can shall will deliver me there yes what this tells me is that our good friends these great men because of a controlling theory which they began can allow themselves to have to resort to these devious ways of attempting an exposition now we'll go on with this next time God willing we'll just glance at the remaining statements and then gather up all these evidence that we've been garnering and accumulating. [00:42:47]