Well, we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin. I want to begin there again. This verse that leads is crucial to understanding everything that follows. We know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do, I allow not, but what I would, That do I not, but what I hate, that do I. If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good. Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. For I know that in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. For to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not. There is a transition in verse 14. I know some of you were not here last week in consideration of the other verses, just before verse 14, but there is a transition in verse 14 from Paul's pre-regenerate, pre- meaning before. I thought when I said pre-regenerate, I wonder if the children will understand this. I believe in talking adult language to children so that they can learn. This is important. Verse 14 marks a transition from the preceding verses, speaking of Paul's pre-regenerative experience, or his life experience before he was born again, or his pre-faith experience, his experience before faith possessed his heart and set him free from the torments that he felt as describing himself as a living dead man. a transition from that pre-regenerate, pre-faith experience to his experience as a renewed person. In other words, before the 14th verse, the Apostle Paul is speaking of his own experience as part of his conversion in which he was brought to Christ. And yet his experience of the law and its work upon him before faith possessed him, before he was regenerated by the Spirit of God. But in the 14th verse and following, he begins, he is now talking about his life here and now. Now this has been questioned by some expositors. Some, for example, cannot imagine how Paul, as a regenerated person, can be speaking in verse 14 of himself, saying that, I am carnal, sold under sin. And so they would say that Paul continues to speak of his life before he was renewed by the Spirit of God. I say there are some commentators that move in this direction. But such an approach is really untenable and unwarranted. for two reasons. And the first and perhaps the simplest reason is that there is a change in the verb tense in verse 14. The Apostle Paul says, I am carnal, that's present tense, sold under sin. In the preceding verse he has spoken in the past tense. For example, in verse 8. Sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me. That's past tense. All manner of concupiscence. Same in verse 9. I was alive without the law once, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. Again, he's speaking of an experience that lies in the past. Or in verse 11, sin taking occasion by the commandment deceived me, past tense, and by it slew me. But in verse 14, he's speaking of the here and now. I am carnal. All of these things happen, but see that I am yet sold under sin. Now, there's another reason why I would maintain here, along with what I regard as the best commentators and men that we would all look up to and respect, that there's another reason why we should not conclude that the apostle here is speaking of his pre-faith experience. in verses 14 and following. Because there are expressions in these following verses that really could not come from an unregenerate person. For example, the Apostle says in verse 22, chapter 7, I delight in the law of God after the inward man. I delight in the law of God. Paul delights in the law of God because it is holy, because it is a transcript of God's nature. The law of God is a looking glass into the moral perfections of the Godhead when we understand the spiritual depth of each one of those commandments. And Paul, because he loved God, loved the law of God. I delight in the law of God. As the psalmist said, O how love I thy law. This is something that an unconverted person can never say. In fact, Paul goes on to say in chapter 8, speaking of the carnal mind. The unrenewed mind is enmity against God. For it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. The natural, the carnal mind is enmity against God. The natural disposition is, I don't like God. I don't want to hear about God. I don't want God to tell me what to do. If I go to church, I'll go because my parents tell me to. But down inside of me, there is, I don't have much use for God. That may be like some of you children here this morning that are dead asleep in your sin. A lot of people think children who are church members don't need to be converted. I disagree. Jesus said, except ye repent and be converted, ye shall all likewise perish. And Paul said, I delight in the law of God. I love God's law. The same one who says, I'm carnal, sold under sin. says I delight in God's law. Not only that but in verse 25 he says in the last verse of this chapter with the mind I serve I myself serve the law of God but with the flesh. I'll be talking about that in a minute the law of sin. With my mind I serve the law of God. I will, I choose to do the things that pleases God. I will to do what is good. He says in these verses also that follow verse 14. With my mind I serve The Law of God. He says in verse 18, to will is present with me. In other words, I can will, I can wish, I can purpose in my heart to keep the commandments of God. An unregenerate person does not will to do the things that please God. Martin Luther wrote a book about that state called The Bondage of the Will. I don't know how many pages, several hundred pages to show that the will of the unrenewed person cannot will to do anything pleasing to God. The will is in total captivity to the corruption of which Paul speaks. But Paul says, I can will to do the things that please God. But I find always that there is an opposite force in me always working against the thing that I will to do. It is sin. It is a law of sin. The unrenewed person could never delight in the law of God. He could never say that he chooses. It is his will and delight to do the things that please God. And so I say there's a transition here. In verse 14, the apostle Paul begins to speak of his experience in the here and now in light of those things that he discovered in his pre-regenerate, pre-conversion experience, if you like. And this text that we read from verse 14 through 18 is divided really into two parts. First, there is, in verse 14, Paul's assessment of himself. And second, there is the resultant conflict that proceeds from this assessment of himself. How many children know what the word assessment is? You should know. If your grandmother were to give you a diamond ring, maybe you weren't sure it was a diamond, but you would take it to an expert jeweler and he would make an assessment of that stone and tell you whether it was a true diamond or not. And if it was a true diamond, he'd tell you the quality of the stone, how good it was and how much it was worth. That's an assessment. We have an assessment center. in the Presbyterian Church in America for those that would be church planters sent out by the MNA. And there they assess them, they watch them go through all kinds of exercises and everything for a full week. And they assess whether they have a magnetic personality. They grade them on how much magnetism they have, the ability of their personality to draw people to them. Because that's what we want in our church planters. They are graded on personal dynamism on a scale of 1 to 10. How much dynamism do they exhibit? And so on. How much self-image they have. They have to love themselves a lot. They have to think very well of themselves so that they're not going to be deterred and frightful of other people. And this is nothing new. You know about these things. That's an assessment center. At the end of that week, they determine, they make an assessment as to whether or not they're going to be sent out by the committee to do home mission work. Paul, in verse 14, makes an assessment of himself, and he says, I am carnal. The law is spiritual. What does he mean the law is spiritual? Do you ever think the Ten Commandments are spiritual? They are spiritual because they deal with the mind, the attitudes, the thoughts, the affections, the law of God is spiritual because it requires not only an outward conformity but inward purity in every one of these areas. Our Lord Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount really expounds the spiritual meaning of the Ten Commandments. The law is spiritual. And it is a reflection of God's holiness and purity, of his own righteousness. And in contrast with that, Paul says, I am carnal, fleshly, sinful. doesn't mean carnal in the sense of physical flesh, but it means he refers to the whole mass of corruption, moral corruption, which he is as a person. I am carnal. The passions of sin still work in him. As he said in verse 5, when we were in the flesh, the motions or the passions of sin which were by the law These passions, when confronted with the law, rise up and overflow it, and are even excited by the presence of the law, because the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, he says in Galatians. These passions boil over in the presence of the perfect law of God that would restrain our evil desire. Yet they are multiplied. These desires are multiplied by the agency of the law. That's why covenant children sometimes rebuild so violently. It's because of the presence of the law and the instruction of their parents. The passions of sin which were by the law did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. Paul says, these passions still work within me, mightily prevailing. Psalm 65, the psalmist says, our sins rise up and prevail against me. The Apostle Paul has spoken about this in the 7th verse. May I had not known sin, but by the law. The Apostle here, just briefly for those of you who weren't here last week, he's not speaking of, I had not known this or that transgression, this particular thing in my life, that particular thing. Paul is saying, I had not known sin as a corrupt nature. until he was convinced by the 10th commandment, I had not known lust, meaning desire. The word meaning longing and desire, that longing and desire hidden within our hearts that work against the keeping of the 10 commandments. Not just in the outward way, but in the inward way as well. Paul says, I would never have discovered this well of polluted desire that was ever working against the commandments of God, except I had been convinced by the 10th commandment, which says, Thou shalt not lust. This commandment came with force upon Paul. and reveal the hidden disease within him, this corrupt desire that was the source and the wellspring of all other transgressions in his life. Why is Paul saying this? Not just because he thought you might be interested in how God converted him. All Scripture is profitable for you. Have you discovered this spring of corrupt desire within? This longing and desire that ever works against the Ten Commandments. Until you find that, you will never cry out in your heart, Oh God, be merciful to me a sinner. The law is covered for Paul and for Luther and for every other person who's ever been converted. Lust. Meaning in the original, desire. Desires and longings that thwart the commandments of God. Paul says, I am carnal. He means that evil desire is still in me. And later he says, it's the law of sin that wars in me against the commandments of God. I am carnal. And then he goes on to say something even stronger. He says, I am sold under sin. This nature, this carnal nature that I have is like a slave in bondage and it can in no way be free. It can not be changed. It can't be anything different. It's sold under sin. That corrupt nature within me, that corrupt desire, can only sin. Can't be anything else. It can only war against the commandments of God and therefore I am sold under sin. Even as a regenerate person. I want to read to you from the Westminster Confession of Faith that speaks about this original corruption. And you got that corruption when you were conceived in the womb of your mother. You came into the world just a pretty little baby and everybody ooed and awed about you, but there was a pool, a well of iniquity within. In sin, the psalmist says, my mother conceived me. I did not come to be. When I was knit together in the dark womb of my mother, I came to be as an evil, corrupt heart. Isn't it remarkable here that Paul just bares his life in the Spirit of God? And when God's Spirit fills you, you're not afraid of anybody or anything, and you can let the truth come out. Paul here speaks by the Holy Ghost. I'm carnal. I, Paul, am sold under sin. The Confession says this original corruption, meaning that we receive from the time of even our conception, It doesn't mean that I inherited this nature, by the way, from my mother, that it was passed on to her seed and my father's seed. It means this corrupt nature was inflicted upon me because I sinned in Adam, because I am guilty of his sin. And therefore, God, in his righteous judgment, afflicts me with a corrupt nature from the moment of my conception. But it doesn't mean that moral evil is transmitted through sperm cells or ovum. I'm not sure if I pronounced that correctly. From this original corruption, whereby we are utterly indisposed disabled and made opposite to all good and wholly inclined to evil. From this nature proceed all actual transgressions." But notice what the Confession says. Why does it say this nature, this corrupt nature, makes us utterly indisposed? Not just indisposed, utterly. How clear is the Confession? And disabled, we're unable to do good. And not only that, but we are made opposite unto all good because of this corrupt fountain within, this lust, this hidden disease that wars, desires against the commandments of God. Is it only unconverted people that have this nature? The confession goes on to say, this corruption of nature during this life doth remain in those that are regenerated. I am so glad for our confession of faith. These men knew their scriptures and they knew what Paul says here, I am sold under sin. Can you imagine a nature that is indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all that is good? This nature is sold under sin. It can only sin. It can only do evil. And Paul carries about within him this corruption. And from this corruption comes a great conflict. By the way, before we speak of the conflict, but just speaking what Paul says, I am sold under sin. Calvin knew the meaning of these words when he said this remarkable statement, and many others like it, that we, meaning we Christians, are the bondservants of iniquity, except the Lord put forth his hand to deliver us. But it is the presence of this evil within. It is just because of this mass of indwelling sin, of evil desire, that there is ever a fierce conflict within the believer. It is just because of this mass of desire, of lust that works against the commandments of God, that there is a fierce conflict in Paul's heart and in the heart of every believing person. He says in verse 15, for, meaning that's linked to what he says before, I am carnal, sold under sin, for that which I do I allow not. That which I do, I find myself doing the very thing that I don't want to do. That I purpose not to do. Isn't that what he says? For what I would, that do I not. The good that I would do, I find that I don't do it because there's something always pulling me back. And that's concupiscence, translated lust. In verse 7, that's that desire that resists the commandments of God. You find something in you that's always resisting God's commandment, leading you to do the things that God has forbidden and holding you back from doing the things that he requires. There's a conflict. For what I would, he says, that do I not. The things that I would do, the things that I would be as a regenerated person, Because God had given Paul a new life, new affections, new desires, made him love God and love Christ and love the commandments. And so, in that renewed person, renewed in the image of God, Paul chooses to do the things that are pleasing to God, and to avoid and refrain from all that he is forbidden. And yet, He finds himself doing the opposite. What I would, that do I not. But what I hate, that do I. The evil that I hate. See, the problem of the unconverted person is he doesn't hate the evil that he does. The believer has been enlightened. And he hates his selfishness. He hates his self-love. He hates the many forms of lust. that war, the passions of sin that rule in his members. The law of sin opposes at every point the new creation within the believer. What I would, Paul says I don't do. As a matter of fact, what I hate, that do I. The law of sin opposes at every point the new creation within the believer. And the reason for this Paul gives in Galatians chapter 5 verse 17. For the flesh lusteth against the spirit. The flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh and these are contrary the one to the other so that you cannot do the things that you would. You can't do the things that you would because the flesh, that corrupt nature, that's what the flesh means, that corrupt nature rots against the spirit. Its strong desires are always moving against the spirit. The spirit meaning that life of which the spirit of God is the author and creator within the new man. But the strong desires of the flesh always are moving against the spirit so that you can't be the person that you really with all your heart want to be. And so Paul and the believer often find themselves doing what they hate. The evil that I hate, that too I. The believer wants to love without asking for anything in return. He finds himself being selfish, self-centered. He sees his own heart. In his relationships, in the home and at work, he sees, I'm all wrapped up in myself. No one knows it but me, but the Spirit gives me to see it. As a matter of fact, I am the very thing that I hate. I hate the world and its opposition to God. I hate the display of lewdness all around me, but I find my soul drawn out toward these very things that I hate. It's a conflict, and it's because of sin in our members. The flesh lusts against the spirit. In other words, its strong desires that are corrupt move in opposition to the spirit. The knowledge and experience of this conflict, which Paul had and of which we read in the 15th verse, yields two conclusions. I say this conflict that Paul, as a renewed person, found within himself, leads to two conclusions. And the first is that he consents to the law that it is good. He says in verse 16, if then I do that which I would not. If I do the things I hate, then I consent unto the law that it is good. The very fact that I find myself being drawn to do the thing that I hate, to be the thing that I hate. I hate it because I'm consenting with all my heart to the goodness and the loveliness and the purity of God and of his law. Otherwise I wouldn't hate what I do, but I would love it. And so Paul finds in this conflict a testimony. He finds encouragement in the fact that he loves God's law, else he wouldn't hate the things that he does. Because an unconverted person would be just the opposite. He says again in Chapter 8, verse 7, the carnal mind is enmity against God, the fleshly mind. When all there is, is the corrupt nature. If that's all you've got this morning, your mind is enmity against God. You don't really like God. You may tolerate religion, but you don't really love God. Your heart's like a stone, and you don't have much love for God's law either. Paul's doing what he hates. The conflict teaches him that he consents to the law, that it's good, that he loves God's law. Psalm 19, we find this attitude. Speaking of the commandments of God, the judgments of the Lord, meaning his word, his truth, The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold. That's why you're here this morning, many of you. Some people go to church because they want to hear the synthesizers, they want to feel religious, they want to feel good, they want to be entertained. But the psalmist would go to the house of God to hear the words of God and God's truth that is better than the finest gold. More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold. Sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. Sweeter by far. Have you found the word of God to be sweet? When you do, you'll find also this fierce conflict of which Paul speaks. Moreover by them, that is by God's commandment, is thy servant warned, and in keeping of them there is great reward." But notice he says, then immediately who can understand his errors? Here's someone that has seen the law of God. What I'm telling you this morning can only be taught by the Spirit of God coming into your heart and showing you, when you see that law, that you are full of errors and corruption and evil. Paul says, when I confronted the law, it slew me. I became as a dead man. And all the things in which I had hoped as a Pharisee, as a good person, came crumbling down around me. Who can understand his errors? Cleanse thou me from secret faults. In other words, I see an innumerable transgressions in my own life. Sin breaking out everywhere and sin from within. But then there are all those transgressions that I don't even see or recognize. secret faults, cleanse thou me from them too. You see, loving the law brings conviction of sin. And if you love God's word and meditate upon it and receive it as the pure word from the mouth of God, you also know the evil of your own heart. And yet, you see that the very presence of this conflict shows that Paul consents to the law, that it's good. So that's the first thing that comes out of this conflict. And the second thing, and this leads to another conclusion in verse 17, where he says, then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. We have to be very careful here, Paul is understanding the limitation of words and exactly what Paul is saying here. He doesn't mean that he's forced to do something against his will. The evil that he does, he chooses, he wills to do it, but it's as if here he's addicted to sin. So that he can only sin. And that to which he does not consent. As a believer, It is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. It is not really me, Paul, a new creation that loves God and wants to keep His commandments and that loves His purity, His moral purity and excellence. It's not really me as a new creation in Christ that sins, but it is the working of sin in my members. as these lusts war against the soul and against righteousness in me. As we read, and I think I referred to a moment ago in Psalm 65, iniquities prevail against me. They rise up as great mountains and threaten to undo me. But Paul doesn't identify, you see, with this massive sin within him. Yes, the believer sadly finds himself loving the things that he hates. as a new creation in Christ. And so he can pray, take away the love of sinning, yet he is identifying with what he is in Christ Jesus. That is his anchor of his soul and not those corrupt lusts and desires and longings that move within him. It is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me, because that nature is sold under sin. It's only going to sin. It's only going to move opposite to God's law. This is a conflict. How many can say, I found this conflict in my own life? How many of you can synchronize? or what Paul is saying here. See, this is not the experience of an unrenewed person. This is the experience of Paul, the apostle, a servant of Jesus Christ, a holy man. Verse 18 provides the clarification of what he has just said. I know that in me, that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. That's why it's not I that sin. It's no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me, because in me, that is in my corrupt nature, there dwelleth no good thing. There's nothing good in there. There's nothing redeemable. It's only evil. Oh, how important this is. Is this only true of Paul? Is this true of every single person in this room? In all that you are by nature. In all that you do of your own accord, it is only sinful. Out of your own nature. In my flesh there dwelleth no good thing. For to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not. In other words, this mass of sin, of indwelling sin, hinders every good work that I seek to do. It's always pulling me back. How helpless the believer is. How to perform that which is good, I find not. Have you ever found that to be so? How helpless the believer is before a whole train of evil thoughts that moves through the mind. and sometimes even striving with all the might to divert the attention to something else, and even praying that God would have mercy upon him, for a moment those thoughts are derailed, and yet they come back with fierce force, and you find yourself utterly helpless before the power of indwelling sin. Bishop Ryle says, one of the greatest exhibits of the power of sin and evil is the tremendous power that it exerts even in the lives of those that are born of God's Spirit and sanctified and delivered from the tyranny of sin. Even in them, it comes with such power as often to render the believer helpless before the presence of indwelling sin. Let us never forget that no matter how advanced we are as Christians, at the end of the day we're still sinners. Paul says, the great apostle to the Gentiles, I am carnal, sold under sin. All that you have to offer to God of your own accord is your sin. Because in my flesh there dwelleth no good thing. If there's any good in me, it's of God. And anything I do that is good is never perfect. It's always mixed with sin. And insofar as it's good, it's wrought by the Spirit of God in me. Because all I can do of my own accord, of my own self, is sin, because I am false and full of sin and evil. This is profound material here, in this chapter. We're still sinners. Let us banish all thoughts of our own goodness. Do any here this morning nurture some thought that there are some good things after all in me? Hear what God says. Hear what the Holy Apostle says in me, that is in my flesh. In what I am by nature, in what I do of my own accord, I am wholly addicted to sin and can do no other. This mass of indwelling sin is all I am. All I have to offer to God is my sinful self, my only shame. And no wonder somebody wrote, penned the words after that, my glory, all the cross of Christ. We are all as an unclean thing, the prophet says, and all of our righteousness is this filthy rag. All that men recognize as good, all my charity, all my courtesy, all that I'm a good neighbor, good citizen. I do many good things. I call people. But all that I do of my own accord is sin. All of our righteousness is a filthy rag. This is saying nothing more than the Old Testament. The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? As our Lord taught us in the 17th chapter of Luke, he said, so likewise, when ye shall have done all the things which are commanded you, which you will never do, but if you could do all the things that are commanded you, say, we are unprofitable servants. This is humbling. The first and great use of this doctrine is that we should be humbled and that all thoughts of our own goodness should be destroyed. God forbid that any should leave this passage this morning thinking that there's some good thing in them by nature of their own accord. Every day our prayer should be, God be merciful to me, a sinner. Not just because I've done this, I had this short Transgression, I went a little bit too far here. Oop, I lost my cool here. No! Yes, these things should be confessed. But how often do you confess that well of iniquity within, that evil nature, that lust in the sense of all those longings and desires, that hidden disease from which all transgression springs, all other transgressions. How much do you confess that day by day? Every day, the Christian's prayer should be, God be merciful to me, a sinner. And in your prayers, confess not only particular sins, but the evil corruption within. And if you feel it, you will confess it. Because when you recount those particular transgressions, you will be led to see that I'm only scratching the surface. There is a well of hateful, evil, of pollution in me. And I can't even begin to measure, but I feel the power of it through moving through all my members. You know, in the final analysis, this is what conviction of sin is. This is what conversion is. It was for Paul. He said, I was alive once without the laws we saw last week. I was getting along fine, but when the law came, when God opened my eyes and showed me the spirituality of his law, I found that hidden disease within me. Epithumia, desire. Desire that works against the righteousness of God, always there. And the law only caused those desires to break out all the more fiercely in me. And some of you may, in the presence of the law of God, feel these desires breaking out and making you miserable as they did Paul. There is an answer, a remedy, in the Lord Jesus Christ. Come to Him and pray. Ask Him to save you. and to make you clean and whole, to make you His, and to give you power over these lusts. I want to ask the young people this morning, has God shown you your heart? I pray that someone will see their heart this morning in the light of God's Word. Because all who come into the kingdom of heaven must have some degree of humiliation before God. There must be this work of the law. You must be brought to see that you are guilty, vile, and helpless. And not just to a sight of it, so that you in a church membership class could say, yes, I agree, I'm a sinner. I've heard the doctrine since I was two years old. I believe it. But have you come to sense it in your own heart? Can you talk like Paul? Not in the same words, but can you relate? You see, this is experiential. This is experimental. Paul is not just giving us a doctrine here that he believes. He's describing, moved by the Holy Ghost, the things that are within his heart. In fact, he comes at the end of this chapter to say, Oh, wretched man that I am. Everyone looks up to me, but I am full of sin. And second, if this evil nature is within, we should be careful to watch against all occasion to sin. No wonder our Lord said, Watch and pray lest ye enter into temptation. Our evil hearts are easy prey for Satan because he puts that little pleasurable thing out there that our nature is attracted to and we're drawn like a magnet. Watch and pray. To enter, lest we enter into temptation, avoid all occasion of sin. Avoid those things that will bring us into a trap so that we find ourselves so bound by the temptation that we're going to fall before it. But we don't need the tempter. All we need to tempt us is our evil heart. James says every man is tempted when he's drawn away of his own lust. Isn't that true? Watch and pray. Keep thy heart, the preacher says, with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life. Out of the dangers within me, I am full of sin. Watch and pray. Be watchful against all occasions of sin. Let us adore the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ also. Our Lord Jesus Christ didn't come down out of heaven and enter into the torments of hell to help those who already had some good in themselves to improve. He didn't enter the bowels of hell and the deepest miseries ever endured by any creature to help those that had some good in them. This is a popular belief today and on the part of many people only the Spirit of God can rob a person of this thought that there's some good in them by nature. Surely I can't be all evil. Yes, you are. No one can then hate Calvinism. That's what our Confession says. It's just being true to the Scripture. Do you believe it? Have you found it to be true? Our Lord didn't enter hell to redeem and deliver those who had some good in them left. Because if you had some good, then improvement could be made. You could do something to help yourself. God didn't send his Son into the world to help those that were almost helpless, and just to give them a boost. Oh no. For those who know and can say even as Christians, I am carnal, sold under sin. And here's a word of encouragement this morning to those who have great conflicts with sin. You see what Paul is saying? The very presence of this conflict in your life is a sign that God is dealing graciously with you. Because an unrenewed person doesn't have any conflict. He's like Paul, before the Spirit began to take hold of him in a process of conversion. The unrenewed person gets along. There is no conflict. The law has not done its work, and the Spirit of God doesn't dwell within. Sin reigns. And men are alive in the sense that they seem to be getting along perfectly well, even though, unbeknownst to themselves, they are dead in trespasses and sins. The very fact. Some of you may feel that you're losing at times, that this battle is so fierce that it threatens to undo you. And, do you know what? The holier saints get, the more fierce the struggle becomes. That's why, I'm sure, I didn't understand it at the time when my teacher, who was then 72 years old in the classroom, Dr. Van Til said, I find my greatest struggle is sin in my old age. Because he was holier, he saw more. And if you feel helpless, in this struggle against sin, be encouraged that this is God's grace, that this is a certification that you have been delivered from blindness and that God's Spirit is in you, otherwise there would be no conflict. Oh, what a comforting thought it is. And to you I say, that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin. John says, if we say we have no sin, the truth is not in it, but he says in the first chapter of his epistle, if we walk in the light, if he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, his son, cleanses us from all unrighteousness. It steadily and continually cleanses those that are chosen, elect, and precious, and those for whom Christ died. And when they confess their sin and fall on their faces and say, God, be merciful to me, a sinner, the blood of Christ. He is faithful to cleanse them from all sin and unrighteousness. And so be not discouraged in your struggle. but rejoice in Christ who was crucified for us and be thankful for the Spirit of God that has delivered you from sin's tyranny and given you a heart to choose the good and to hate yourself and to hate evil and to mortify even that sinful longing and desire within. Let us pray. O Lord our God, who hath brought us into fellowship with Thee and into conflict with sin within. We thank Thee for this word that speaks so clearly of our corrupt nature and how it works against all righteousness. We, O Lord, confess that we are vile and sinful and that that we are so slow to see what we are, imagining some good thing to be in us, when, as Thy Word says, that in me, that is in my flesh, there dwelleth no good thing. Forgive us not only the sins that we commit, our Heavenly Father, but the sin that we are, and from which we cannot be removed as long as we live in the world, and that nature that is thoroughly corrupted and sold under sin. Grant that the knowledge of these things may humble us, may increase our dependence upon thee, may increase our hatred of sin and of ourselves as sinners, and that we may love thee and get out of ourselves and forsake all the evil that we are and fly to thee that thou mayest be all of our life, and comfort, and joy, and that we may live henceforth no longer to ourselves, but unto him who loved us and died to redeem us from all iniquity, to make us pure and holy. Psalm 14 on page 12, that there is not a God the fool doth in his heart conclude. Let us sing the entire psalm, the tune St. Flavian, tune number 100. Rise for the benediction. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all. Amen. I don't have any special announcements to make this morning. Do we have to take anything down today?