Daily Devotions That Strengthen Your Day With Christ

FRIDAY, 28 APRIL 2023

TEXT: Romans 7:14-25

14: We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin.

15: I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.

16: And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good.

17: As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.

18: For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.

19: For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.

20: Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

21: So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me.

22: For in my inner being I delight in God’s law;

23: but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me.

24: What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?

25: Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.

(New International Version Holy Bible)

TOPIC: PAUL WAS HUMAN, JUST LIKE US

Some Christians claim that a believer can live a perfect life on earth. Unfortunately, they have not been able to reach that level of perfection themselves to proof that it is possible.

Here is Paul, one of the greatest apostles and servants of God who ever lived on earth. He served God and His Church beyond human imagination.

Yet he confesses that “I have the desire to do what is good, but cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do – this I keep doing. … it is sin living in me that does it” (verses 16-20).

Doesn’t that resonate well with you as you consider your journey as a child of God, irrespective of how long you have been a follower of Christ? Although we have been redeemed and renewed from the inner man, we still live in a body that has been redeemed and transformed.

John describes this sinful nature as the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye and the pride of life (1 John 2:15-17). This is part of the battle we must fight. But we must commit ourselves to endure to the end, through the power of the Holy Spirit.

QUESTION: Does your flesh and its passions control you or do you control and lead it every day?

PRAYER: Oh Lord, give me the power to overcome my weaknesses every day. Amen.