Romans 7:14-25
14 So the trouble is not with the law, for it is spiritual and good. The trouble is with me, for I am all too human, a slave to sin. 15 I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate. 16 But if I know that what I am doing is wrong, this shows that I agree that the law is good. 17 So I am not the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it.
18 And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature.[d] I want to do what is right, but I can’t. 19 I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. 20 But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it.
21 I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. 22 I love God’s law with all my heart. 23 But there is another power[e] within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. 24 Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? 25 Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. So you see how it is: In my mind I really want to obey God’s law, but because of my sinful nature I am a slave to sin.
In 2018 the iconic Banksy painting, the Girl with the Balloon, was sold at auction for $1.4 million. After a serious round of bidding the gavel slammed down: sold! But no one could have imagined what would happen next. Suddenly the painting started to shred itself. The security guards panicked, trying to see the danger but it wasn’t external. The danger came from within the picture itself.
Can you relate to that? I think that often the greatest battle that we face is the internal one. It is the one that we face inside our thoughts, the whispers that undermine us and lead us self-destruct. In this passage Paul says that he wants to do what is good but doesn’t, he doesn’t want to do what is bad but does. It is like there is a war inside his mind.
There is a war inside you. This isn’t just an occasional skirmish—Paul describes it as all-out war. Two armies battling for control, and he’s caught in the crossfire of his own heart. It leads him astray, it undermines his confidence and it confuses him. Despite huge persecution and threats for people wherever he went, Paul believed that the biggest threat to the life he was called to live was not external but internal. It was the battle for his mind.
So, what is the answer? “Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord.” (v25). Paul says that the answer is not in knowing what is right or wrong - the Law did that. It is in being able to live it out. The Law could diagnose the problem but couldn’t cure it. But Jesus doesn’t just tell us what we should be—He gives us the power to become it. Through the Spirit (Romans 8), we get what willpower alone could never deliver.
Where are you currently experiencing this “want to but can’t” struggle?
What would it look like to stop depending on willpower and start depending on Christ’s power?
How does knowing Paul struggled this way change how you view your own struggles?
