The Apostle Paul has presented several cogent theological truths describing our position in Christ. How then do we explain the struggle that is described in Romans 7? Later in this epistle, Paul describes us as a living sacrifice. The problem with a living sacrifice is that it wants to crawl off the altar. Romans 7 depicts the struggle of attempting to live the Christian life apart from the enabling grace of God’s Holy Spirit. As we look at Romans 7, the personal pronoun I, me, or my is mentioned over thirty times, but the Holy Spirit is not mentioned at all.

Building upon the truth of Romans 6, Paul indicates that we were made to die to the Law. We soon discover however, that our old self still wants to assert itself and we experience a struggle between our fleshly desires and the Spirit. Paul confessed his experience with this struggle:

For I do not understand what I am doing; for I am not practicing what I want to do, but I do the very thing I hate. (Romans 7:15)

Can you identify with Paul’s dilemma? His fleshly desires were causing him to do what he did not want to do, but he also knew that God had given him a spiritual nature:

However, if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, that the Law is good. But now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that good does not dwell in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. But if I do the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin that dwells in me. (Romans 7:16-20)

The Apostle Paul: theologian, missionary, and individual who wrote a significant amount of the New Testament, was the person who penned these words. I find this passage encouraging as we face struggles because we’re in good company. We experience the same frustration that Paul encountered and we learn in Romans 8 that he overcame them.

Why then do so many people struggle? One of the reasons is because people know that Jesus has promised us an abundant life, but they are not experiencing it. Then we may wonder “What’s wrong with me?” We can identify with the struggle that Paul described for we are not doing what we want to do, but we’re doing the very thing we hate.

Our problem is that we are attempting to achieve godliness in our own strength and we soon discover that our flesh cannot overcome the flesh – that’s why we need a Savior. The more we try, then the more frustrated we become. Deliverance comes when we despair of our self-effort and turn to Jesus: 

Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? (Romans 7:24)

Do you sense the depth of that frustration? The problem is that many of us have not sunk low enough to fully depend upon Jesus. Paul asked the right question, he did not ask “what” but “who” will set him free. The solution to overcoming the struggle is ceasing in our own strength and yielding ourselves completely upon God:

Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin. (Romans 7:25)

Fortunately, the struggle in Romans 7 is not the end of the book. In our next lesson we move into the rarified air of Romans 8 and learn how God can give us the spiritual victory.