We're going to look at Romans chapter 7 and hopefully finish this chapter. I'm really tired, so hopefully everything goes okay. When I am weak, He is strong. All my best sermons are always when I'm completely out of it. I never told anybody that. You just got to be weak for Him to accomplish something through you. Okay, let's have a word of prayer. And if you need to get in fellowship, you can do that now. Father, thanks so much for this day. Bless this teaching of your Word in our lives. Help us to understand it by your Spirit whom you've given us. And help us to know and understand how to and how not to live the Christian life. These are such important chapters on how to, and we appreciate them, so we ask that you help us to understand them and employ them. Use them in our daily life, not just skip on by and, oh yeah, yeah, I know what that says, but try to listen to the text and let the Spirit teach us. We ask this in Jesus' precious name, amen. OK, so we're going to work on verses 14 to 25 in Romans 7. These are really controversial verses, and the reason, as you may well know, is because commentators differ on whether this section is addressing Paul's experience as an unbeliever, which he has been talking about. Paul has been talking about his life as an unbeliever in verses 7 through 13. So many people think that this is a continuation of a description of Paul's life as an unbeliever. But a lot of commentators also believe that no, Paul is shifted here and is relating his experience as a new believer, as a new believer. And they say it's significant because if you kind of just glance at 7, 7 and through 13, you know, things like verse 9, you can see pretty clearly. He says, I was once alive apart from the law. So it seems like he's talking all you know about experiences in the past Whereas if you look at verse 14 You see he shifts to the present tense for we know that the law is spiritual But I am not I was I am verse 15 for what I am doing I do not understand for I am present so there's a shift in the in the grammar from past tenses to present tenses. And many people think that means that, well, he's he's shifting now and he's going to talk about himself as a believer. So one thing we should note, of course, is that what we already know from verses seven to 13 is that the law is good and it's holy and righteous. And Paul realized that as an unbeliever, he was not able to keep the true intent of the law. It killed him spiritually and it awakened him to his realization that he needed to turn to faith. So in these verses that follow, verses 14 to 25, we're gonna look at the fact that Well, I think in the exposition we'll see that indeed he is a believer here. And I think what happened to the Apostle Paul was as an unbeliever, he was trying to keep the true intent of the law and he couldn't do it. So he's like, okay, I need to have faith. But once he became a believer, he was like, okay, now I'll be able to do it. Now that I'm a believer, I will be able to keep the law. And of course, what we're going to find out is that while the willing was present in Paul, the ability to do it is not, is not. So verse 14, he says, we know for, we know that the law is spiritual. And that's the conclusion to the previous section. Okay. We know that he already said that. So we know that. However, Paul says, by contrast, he says, but I am of flesh. The law is spiritual, but I am of flesh. Now, the key observation, I mentioned this in my email, the key observation to the whole thing is this. In verses 14 to 25, Paul uses I 24 times. So if you highlight or you underline your Bible, you might underline that because that is a very indelible observation. It should be indelibly written on our hearts. I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I. 24 times. Now, when you get to chapter 8 verse 1 through 17, guess how many times you find I? Zero. Big fat goose egg. But you find spirit 14 times. That is cool, isn't it? Because it solves everything, essentially, for us, just in one observation. OK? So. Here's the first I, verse 14, I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. Now that last phrase is the one that causes so many people trouble, sold into bondage to sin, because they say this could not possibly be a description of a believer. So let's talk about, first of all, I am of flesh, and then talk about the phrase sold into bondage to sin. Paul says, I am a flesh. Now, this word flesh, you probably know from first Corinthians three, where Paul talks about the new believer being carnal. So this is the word when he's talking to the new believers at Corinth. And they were new plants, neophytes. And he says, they're carnal. And so this is that exact same word. And Paul's saying, I am, I am carnal. Okay. So he's recounting his life, I think, as a new believer. So sometime very soon after the Damascus Road, immediately after the Damascus Road, those events in Roman, I'm sorry, Acts 9, 20, 22, 23, that section. Now, there's something that's very important about this phrase, of flesh. He says, I'm of the flesh, okay, present tense, because back in 7-5, how did he describe himself in 7-5? while we were in the flesh. Okay, that's different. In the flesh, in 7.5, of the flesh, or of flesh, in 7.14. So look at the phrase in flesh again in verse five. We know this describes, see it's past tense, while we were in the flesh, past tense, right? Speaking of self as an unbeliever. Look over at chapter eight, verse eight, Chapter eight, verse eight, you'll find the same phrase, in the flesh. You know, he's talking about verse seven, the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God, for it does not subject itself to the law of God, it's not even able to do so. He says, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. So this expression in the flesh refers to a person who is an unbeliever, okay? But this expression of flesh is a description of a believer who's carnal, a new believer, a new believer. So I'm thoroughly convinced that in 714, he's referring his current, you know, his early experience as a new believer. He says, I am of flesh. He was a carnal believer. Then he says he describes himself as sold into bondage to sin. That is a little bit misleading because the Greek says sold under sin. It doesn't say sold into bondage to sin. I don't have a lot of problems with it because if you're sold under sin, I guess you're in bondage to it. That's probably an equivalent type idea. And later in verse 20, Was it three? Yeah, 23. He refers to himself as a prisoner of the law of sin. Right? So prisoner and bondage, I mean, these ideas are related. So what does this mean, sold under sin or sold into bondage to sin? This, people say, this doesn't seem to square with what Paul said earlier. He said we died to the sin nature. He said that in chapter six. Remember, in chapter six, the story is this. Know something. believe something and present yourself to him. So what do you need to know? You need to know that you died to your sin nature. What do you need to believe? You need to believe that reckon that to be true that you actually did die to your sin nature and it's no longer your master. And then you need to present the members of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. So we have died to sin, but there's more to it than that. That's a fact, but we have to reckon it to be true, and we have to make a positive presentation of ourself to God in order to be useful. It's not enough, the fact that we are dead to the sin nature, because as we've said, it's not necessarily dead to you. So look back at chapter six, verse 12. Well, 1111 is the reckoning, the believing, the considering it to be true, he says. Even so, consider or reckon or we said this word can even mean believe yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God. In Christ Jesus, therefore, verse 12, do not let. We said the sin nature, right? Rain in your mortal body so that you obey its lust. So is it a possibility that we could let sin the sin nature rain? Well, of course. Now here's the deal. When you do that, When I do that, we are in bondage to the sin nature. We have put ourselves back under it as master. So when you come to a verse like 714 and it says, Paul says, sold into bondage to sin. Remember, he's talking about his life as a carnal Christian when he was a flesh. He says, I am a flesh. I'm about his new believing experience. He was a carnal believer. And as a carnal believer, he was sold into bondage to sin, meaning he kept presenting his members to the sin nature to be used for sin. And you already know how he did it. because we've discussed it many, many times. He said, I'm going to keep the law. And the moment you say that as a Christian, you are on performance. And your sin nature uses the law as a fulcrum to produce sin. And when you're doing that, of course, you're in bondage to sin because you've Slipped into the fallacy of the law being that which can sanctify you and it can't do anything of the sort. So so that's not going to work, but this is what Paul's early experience was as a believer. He was not presenting his members. To the Lord to be used for righteousness, he was saying I'm going to keep the law. And that only results in you, your members being used for unrighteousness. Now another interesting thing about where it says sold into bondage to sin is that it's a perfect tense. That's very odd. And perfect tense means a past completed action with ongoing results. It means you started doing something and like it just, it continues. So, This is what I think Paul is saying. He's saying, this started in the past, is what he's saying, where I was sold into bondage to sin. Because how was he raised? He was raised as a Pharisee. So he put himself under the law long before he was a believer. And he's just described that in verses 7 to 13, when he was an unbeliever, how he kept presenting himself to the law to keep the law, and it killed him. But he carried that over, it kept going, perfect tense. He kept doing that when he first became a believer. And as a result, well, all he was doing was putting himself under the bondage to his sinful nature. So that was Paul's basic problem, and that's why he's described this way as a new believer. Now, I want you to look at Acts 21, 20. Just hold your place and look at Acts 21, 20, because I want to show you this is a real tendency for Jews. I mean, it's not for you and me. I mean, how many of you were raised under the law of Moses? Everybody raise your hand. Like, nobody's gonna raise their hand. But if we were in a synagogue, how many people would raise their hand? It would be universal. Me, okay. Look at Acts 21, 20. This is when Paul makes it to Jerusalem finally. And when they heard it, Acts 21, 20, when they heard it, and this is the reports about Gentiles and so forth coming to salvation. When they heard it, they began glorifying God. And they said to him, to Paul, you see, brother, how many thousands there are among the Jews of those who have believed and they are all zealous for the what? The law. And they've been told about you, Paul, that you are teaching all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children nor to walk according to the customs. See, by this point, Paul had figured it out, you know, but they hadn't. They had not figured it out. They had not figured out that as a new believer, you can't keep the law. That's not how to be sanctified. But they're doing the same thing that Paul had done when he was a new Christian. So you see, this was a common problem for Jewish people. So let's go back to Romans 7 and pick up in verse 15. This is not what Paul expected. I mean, he did not think this was gonna be the way it worked. He's like, oh, well, now that I'm a Christian, now that I'm a believer in the true Messiah, now I can keep the law. And he found that that's not right. That's not right. Verse 15, for what I am doing, I do not understand. He did not understand how he was failing to keep the law now that he was a believer and a new man in Christ. But he was failing, but he didn't understand it initially. He says, for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. So he thought, like many Christians, okay, once you become a Christian, you think, okay, now I can obey God and please God. Most Christians, that's what they think. That is exactly what most Christians think. And Paul's saying, no, that's exactly wrong. He says, the thing I want to do, I can't do. But the thing I do is the very thing I hate. I do the opposite of what I want to do. Now, don't forget, what's the key word in this whole section? I. And look at that verse. What I am doing, I do not understand. I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. Okay? So here's the deal. When I am the one who is doing it, I am the performer. Now, if you are the one who is doing it, isn't there merit attached to what you do, what you perform? Yes. If you, if it is I who am doing it, then I earn merit. Okay, this is why this is impossible. This is why God will never let this work. Because when we are the one doing it, we are the performer. And performance has merit attached to it. And that's why sanctification can never proceed on this basis. That's why. Fundamentally, that's the principle in the whole section. So as long as I'm the performer, guess what? I am doomed to failure. Now, in this verse, he expresses something very interesting, this desire. He has a desire to do, you know, obviously what is good, which in this case is the law. And here's the thing. It's good. We should all, and we do, we desire to do what is right. But I'm going to tell you, it's more important to realize that you can't do it. It's more important. It's important to realize that you desire to do what's right, but it's more important to realize that you can't do it. So desire is good, but desire is not enough for victory. Desire is not enough for victory. Verse 16. But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, then I agree with the law. I'm making a confession that the law itself is good. So by doing the very thing that he didn't want to do, which was the opposite of what the law said to do, he says, look, it shows that I agree with the law, that I agree the law is good. And we know that already because he already told us in verse 12, the law is good and holy and righteous. So we know that. But he's saying his failure to do it, is actually a testimony to the fact that the law is in itself good. So his conclusion, his preliminary conclusion is verse 17. So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. Now it sounds at first like he's dodging responsibility. No longer am I the one doing it, okay. Well, he's not evading responsibility. All he means is that What he was doing was in conflict with what he desired to do. He wanted to do good. He ended up doing the thing he hated. So what he's doing is just saying, hey, there's a conflict within me. So this showed him that there is something else going on inside of me. There is something else going on in me. And that's something else he describes as the sin nature dwelling in me. He's discovered, oh, it's still there, okay? Remember, he was a pretty new believer at this point. So he learned that the sin nature still dwells in him, okay? And we already know the sin nature kind of has a life of its own, right? It's autonomous, it's the source of rebellion against any other authority. So any form of legalism, the sin nature will rebel against it. So it's very obvious from this verse and others that yes, believers still have a sin nature. But Paul didn't expect it. He didn't expect it because he's a new man in Christ, but he found in fact that it's true, we still do. Verse 18, for I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is in my flesh. For the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not in me. So again, he came to know that there's nothing good that dwells in me, he says specifically, that is in my flesh. Now, what's the flesh? Well, pretty much what it sounds like. The flesh is the physical members of our body. What did he say in chapter six, verse 12? He says that you should do not go on presenting the members of your body. See, your hands, your eyes, your mind, your will, all those things. You should never present all those things to the sin nature because it will use them as instruments of unrighteousness. And that's why we had to present all those things to God, to be used for righteousness. So we make this positive presentation. We say, I'm here for you, to do your purpose. I want to think your thoughts. I want to know your will. I want my hands to accomplish good for others, and so forth. But in there, in verse 18, he says, I know nothing good dwells in me. That is in my flesh. It's the physical body through which the sin nature expresses itself. There's nothing good there, okay? But he does say that, you know, the willing is present in me, but again, the doing of that good is not, it's not in us, okay? So we can't do it, and he had to come to this conclusion that there's nothing good in my flesh. This was the bottom line, and I don't know how many people are willing to make that admission, but Paul was. There's nothing good. Nothing. Now, verse 19, for the good, this is the struggle, okay, the constant struggle. He says, for the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want, okay. So, again, I, I, I, I, I. Like, can we get enough of ourselves here, right, about how great we are and how we're going to accomplish all this. No, you're not going to accomplish Jack Diddley. Okay, except you're going to produce evil. Notice how he equates the sin that we do with evil, okay? And of course it's something he didn't want to do, but he was doing it. And this leads to the same conclusion in verse 20 that we already saw in verse 17. So there's quite a bit of repetition here, as I'm sure you noticed. He says, but if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. Again, he's not dodging responsibility, right? But he's saying, hey, there's something inside me that's going on. OK, there's something evil inside of me. It dwells in me. It's the sin nature at the end of verse 20. It's the sin nature that has sort of a life of its own. In our flesh, in our physical members of our body, it's constantly trying to express itself, right? Yes. I'm assuming that means there's no defined good. Right. Right. Right. Yeah, nothing. Yeah, nothing. No divine good in our flesh. It's not. Maybe it's also good. Just hold our place here. Flip to the right to Galatians 2 20. Because you'll see him say he'll talk about his life in the flesh, meaning in this earthly body, the physical body that we live in. He explains here a very similar principle of what's going on. And here, of course, he's telling us how to live it. Over here in Romans, he's saying this is how not to live it. You can have the desire, but you can't do it. So we have to live a different way. So here's where you find a similar expression, his life in the flesh. He says, I have been crucified with Christ. It's no longer I who live, but here it is, Christ lives in me. the life which I now live in the flesh, meaning these physical bodies, these frail physical bodies hampered by sin nature, right? He says, I live in this fleshly body by faith. So what we're gonna find is that all the stuff in Romans 6, you know, about know, believe, present, when you present yourself to him, right, what are you saying? You're saying, not my will, but thy will. That's what you're saying. I don't want to do what I want to do, I want to do what you want me to do, I want to be used by you, right? And isn't that living by faith? Because faith is saying, you know what's best for my life, I don't, so I want to trust you to be in control of my life. So the same things like 8.18 in Romans and Galatians 2.20, these kind of passages, these link up as to how we live, you know, how not to live and, of course, how to live in the flesh. So verse 20 then, right, I'm doing the very thing I don't want to do. I'm no longer the one doing it. Again, the sin nature has a life of its own within us. It dwells in our flesh. I find then, verse 21, a principle or law. Okay, we're going to find out, and I'm not going to bury you in this tonight. There are six laws in Romans. Okay, and I'm not gonna go through them all tonight. But look, for example, the law of Moses is one. Okay, so you already know that. That's not too complicated. But there are six laws. This is one of them. I find in the principle or the law that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. So obviously there he's equating the sin nature with something that's evil inside of us. He doesn't distinguish sin from evil. I know that some theologians have done that, And in some passages, that may be correct, but that's not correct in this passage. They're being used synonymously. The sin nature dwells in me, and in verse 21, it's an evil principle that is within me. The one who wants to do good. Paul, of course, wanted to do good. Verse 22, for I joyfully concur with the law of God. So here's another law, okay, the law of God. I joyfully concur. I mean, see, I delight. You can hear the psalmist. The psalmist would say this. I delight in thy word. I delight in thy precepts. I meditate upon them day and night. OK, this joyful concurrence or delight in the law of God. And he says, I do this in the inner man. Here we go with more terminology. the inner man in 2nd Corinthians 416. It uses the same phrase. Might as well look at it, because we've looked at it in the past. 2nd Corinthians 416, to the right, 2nd Corinthians 416. And he also uses it in Ephesians chapter 3. But 2nd Corinthians 416, I think is the best passage to illustrate this, because you'll see why. Paul says, therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. Momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison. So what he's talking about is the sufferings that we face, right? Well, we don't lose heart in the face of those sufferings. Though our outer man, let's just, this is another terminology for the physical flesh, our physical members. He says it's decaying, it's going to death, right? Yet our inner man, there's this inner person that we have as believers, which is our true person, who we are in Christ. This aspect of who we are is being renewed day by day. So it is what is strengthened in the process of sanctification. And here, in this context, it's strengthened by the afflictions we face, which says it produces an eternal weight of glory for us. The Ephesians passage, Ephesians 3.16, it's a prayer. Paul is praying for the Ephesians, Ephesians 3.16, and there he prays that God would grant you according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with power through his spirit in the inner man. So the Spirit of God is one who imparts strength to us in the process of sanctification, becoming more and more like Christ. So those are the only three references to the inner man, and it's contrasted in the Corinthians passage with the outer man, right? But a very important concept because in our inner man, this is where we delight in the law of God, okay? His precepts. and so forth. In contrast to that, our outer man is decaying, it's going to corruption. And so we have these desires to do what's good, that's coming from our inner man. And Paul says in verse 22 and 23, he says, especially 23, he says, but I see a different law in the members of my body. Again, talking about the flesh, right, the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind. So there is a war within you. I don't know if you've experienced that. I suspect you have experienced that, but there's this war going on. But let me say something that I think is very important. Everything in verses 14 to 25 is not the normal Christian life. So if this does describe your life, You're living like a new Christian. This is not describing the normal Christian life. The normal Christian life is Romans 8, 1 through 17. That is the normal Christian life. This is the abnormal carnal Christian's life. I mean, if you read this, Paul has no victory anywhere in here. He always loses. It's a total lose, okay? So this is not describing the normal Christian life. But I know that you know about this war because you have been in the Christian life, all of you, for some time. So there's a different law, he says, in the members of my body. It's waging a war against the law of my mind. So the law of my mind is associated with the inner man, isn't it? That's where we have the good desire to please God. But he says, this law in the members of my body, which is the sin nature, this evil principle within me, he says, it wages war against the law in my mind, where I wanna do good, and it makes me a prisoner of the law of sin, which is the sin nature, which is where it's dwelling in our members, the members of our body. So, you know, he kinda comes to the end of his rope, right, in verse 24, And this is the most important I in the whole passage. There's 24 I's and this is the most important one. Because it's the realization that I cannot do it. What does he say? He says, wretched man that I am. So he's finally come to the point like, hey, there's nothing good in me. I cannot perform the Christian life. I cannot do it. Whenever I am on stage, I fail. So this was his conclusion. And he asked the question, okay, fine, who will set me free from the body of this death. So see, your sin nature dwells in the body and what does it produce? It produces death, right? And that's all that Paul has experienced from verse 15 all the way to verse 24. That's why I say it's not the normal Christian life by any means, because it's just complete loss, failure. And so in verse 25 then, he finally, of course, understood. Unlike the Jews at Jerusalem in Acts 21, right? Where they say there's thousands of Jews who are believers and they're zealous for the law. And they're all in Romans 7, 15 through 23. That's where every single one of them are. Because the Jews' way of doing things was, oh, now I believed in the Messiah. Finally, I'm going to be able to keep the law and please God. Finally, I can perform. And Paul's saying, look, when I try to perform, I have good desire, what I want to accomplish, but I end up doing the very thing I hate. So I don't think that this is a possible mode of sanctification, and this is what I call the performer mode, because we're the ones who are putting ourselves on stage and saying, I'm gonna perform. And Paul realized, wretched man, that I am. And so he asked, who's going to deliver me? And he got the answer, right? Thanks be to God, verse 25, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. So this goes back to God, and it goes to Jesus Christ. And the reason it goes to Jesus Christ, as we're going to see, is because who was crucified for us but Jesus Christ? and he was raised to live a new life, right? When you believe you are crucified with Christ and you are spiritually raised to live a new life. So this verse and this mention of God through Christ is reaching back to 6, 6, 5. So take a look at it, 6, 5. body of sin, body of this death, both passages are talking about the same thing, 6-5, if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, and we have, right, the moment we believe in Christ, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of his resurrection, knowing this, that our old man, our old person, was crucified with him in order, here's the purpose, and this is the most important part, in order that our body of sin, that is our body that the sin nature animates to produce sin through us, might be rendered inoperative, might be done away. So we'd no longer be slaves to the sin nature, see? But what Paul is struggling with in Romans 7, 14 and following is he keeps putting himself under the law, and that means that he does become slave to sin. That's the whole point. To say that this is not Paul as a believer is to greatly misconstrue the ideas of not just Romans 7, but also Romans 6. And it's to distort what's coming in Romans chapter 8, where he's gonna tell us how to live the Christian life. Because Romans 7 is how not to, how not to. So back to 7.25, thanks be to God. through Jesus Christ, our Lord, hearkening back to the fact he was crucified and so forth, and we were crucified with him to be raised to live a new life. So then, and this is his, the Arahun, it's a Greek for like the logical final conclusion here to this matter, where he kind of just lays it all out at once, and he uses a lovely Mende construction in the Greek, but you don't care about that. On the one hand, that's the men construction. On the one hand, okay, over here, I myself, with my mind, am serving the law of God. That's the inner man. The inner man wants to please God, wants to, you know, meet the criteria of God, which is, let's say, the law of God. He wants to meet God's righteous demands, right? But there's the other side, the de, men de. But on the other hand, with my flesh, I serve the law of the sin nature. But what's, so what, you're like, okay? What's the answer, right? What's the answer? He figured it out by verse 25. Well, I already hinted at the answer, right? Because what's the main word in this section, 24 times? I. What's the main word in 8.1 to 17? Spirit, okay? We already know where this is going, okay? Let's just conclude, we have plenty of time, this is great. So the Christian discovers, when you become a new believer, you discover at some point that you have this inner person, okay, this person wants to please God, wants to do good. But you find out the ability to accomplish it is not in us, because we are the performer when we come at it that direction. And the sin nature just uses, You know the law to rebel against and produce death So the thing we want to do we can't ever do we end up doing the very thing we hate now That's the defeated life not the normal Christian life Now what's the solution a not to try harder? That's not the solution. I'm going to try harder To make a New Year's resolution. That's not the answer Okay I mean, well, maybe it is if you make the right resolution, but, okay, but we have to know what that is. The solution is not to commit your life anew to Jesus Christ or to rededicate your life. That's not the solution. Yet, there's a lot of that that goes on. I'm going to rededicate my life. This year, I'm going to do it. I'm going to stop drinking. I'm going to stop smoking. I'm going to stop going with the girls that dance and so forth, right? I grew up Baptist, so I know how it works. The solution is not even to memorize the law or something like that. The solution is this other solution that Paul has mentioned. It's another law, actually, in Romans 8.2. Romans 8.2 talks about the sixth law that we'll talk about, and I'll go through all six of them next week, but it's the law of the spirit of life in Christ. This is another law, and this becomes the solution. Okay? Because the spirit, who he's already hinted at, he's the one who gives us new life. But here's the deal. When we walk by the spirit, okay, who is the performer? Yeah, the spirit. The spirit is the performer, see? Not I. The spirit. And that's why it works. because then it's non-merit based. I'm not gaining merit with God because of what I am doing, but the Spirit is the one who's performing through me, so all the merit really resides in Him. And this is why sanctification is also by grace. It's not by works. Works are the result. When we live by faith, when we walk by the Spirit, there's this production of a good work, right? But we can't just say, I'm gonna do this and perform it. God won't permit that to have any merit. Because Romans 6, 14 said what? You are not under law, but under grace. And that's for sanctification. And he's already hinted at the Spirit two times, so it's worthy to look back real quick at 6-4. Actually, the Spirit is not explicitly mentioned here, but you will like to see this. 6-4. Therefore we have been buried with him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk. So walking is talking about how to live the Christian life. Walk in newness of life. So that's a lovely expression, this newness of life. Take a look at chapter seven, verse six, which does mention the Spirit in connection with this newness of life. Because he says in 7.6, but now we have been released from the law. See, you're not under the law at all. Having died to that by which we were bound so that we serve in newness of the spirit. It's the new life, newness of the spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter. And of course, we know from Galatians 5, it puts a dichotomy between the spirit and the flesh. Doesn't it? Galatians chapter five. So everything Paul's saying here is in harmony with what he says elsewhere. Galatians 5, 16. But I say, walk by the spirit and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. Did he say, walk by the law and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh? No, in fact, in Romans seven, he says, when you walk by the law, you end up fulfilling the desire of the flesh. Verse 17, 517, for the flesh sets its desire against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh, for these are in opposition to one another, so you may not do the things that you please. So you may please, right, to do good, but you can't do it. Only the spirit can accomplish it. So verse 18, 518, he says, but if you are led by the spirit, you're not under the what? The law. Now, did Paul contradict himself anywhere, or is he just saying the same thing in Galatians 5 that he said in Romans 7 and many more words? He's just saying the same thing over and over. And then he describes the deeds of the flesh. He says, I mean, these are obvious. They're obvious. You don't have to wonder if you have the deeds of the flesh. And then he goes into verse 22, the fruit of the spirit. So when you are walking by the spirit, there's a certain quality of life that's produced. We call that the fruit of the spirit, right? And that's what Paul has hinted at already in Romans 6 and 7, but he's going to capitalize in chapter 8. So again, the main thing is that you are not the performer. That's the main thing. You are the depender, and the Spirit is the performer. When we depend on Him, He performs, right? So then, let me say this and conclude with this. There are not two ways to live the Christian life. You got to get that idea out of your head. It's in a lot of Christians' head. They think that what this all means is I have freedom to live by the spirit or I have freedom to live by the sin nature. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's completely wrong. When you live by the sin nature, you're enjoying slavery. That's not freedom. Now yes, I get it, you have a choice, you can choose that, but you're choosing slavery, that's the point. And it is misery. What did he say in 8.6? In 8.6 he says it's death, misery, right? All the words that you could pile in under death, like misery, are all the things that happen when we live by our sinful nature, okay? So there's not two ways to live the Christian life. There's only one way. Obviously. Because when you live by the spirit, he produces what? Life. And it says it. I mean, it says it. Eight, oh, I'm in First Corinthians. I'm like, this does not look right. Eight, Romans eight. Is it five, six, where is it? We're gonna get there next week, but it's nice to see Oh yeah, verse six. Yeah, verse six. For the mindset on the flesh is what? Death. But the mindset on the spirit is? Life and peace. Okay. So, I mean, this isn't, it's not ultimately that complicated, but the biggest struggle for all of us in the Christian life is to say, not I. But Christ, live in me. That's like the biggest struggle, because every one of us wants to think that we can accomplish some good, that we can do it. And we can't. So if you really want to be successful, you'll learn how to be a depender, not a performer. a depender, not a performer. That's the way to success. Okay, let's pray and then we can ask for prayer requests. Father, thank you so much for the fact that you have set us free from the shackles of the law, which all it did was bring bondage. Even at the Council of Jerusalem, they say, why would we put this yoke of bondage upon the Gentiles when we ourselves could not bear it? Putting ourselves under law, under performance basis, is always going to produce death. But the Spirit gives life. Help us to learn how to depend on Him, how to be dependers. It removes all arrogance, and it produces a humility in us, and respect, and an awe, and an appreciation for what you can do in our lives. the thing that we can never do. So help us to understand these principles and apply them in our life. We ask this in Jesus' name, amen.