I delivered this message at Calvary Baptist Church in Findlay, Ohio in 1999.
Prefer what I actually said? Read the transcript (lightly edited for readability).
Romans 7:14–25
Introduction:
If I say the words Columbine or Conyers, Georgia, you all know exactly what I’m talking about – violence, school shootings, kids killing their classmates and themselves. About a month ago yet another shooting took place in Conyers, GA, just one month after the slaughter in Littleton, CO. It’s tragic, and Christians are not the only ones realizing that their is a problem. So what is the problem? This is the question that many are asking. An article in last month’s Time Magazine asks the question, “What is wrong with our kids, and our culture, and our schools and our hearts? What will need to happen so that this won’t happen again?”
People are asking questions, but sadly they are coming up with the wrong answers. In relation to the problem with our kids, the answer comes up as too much TV and rock music etc. And I agree, but this is not the real problem. And in relation to our culture and our schools, the answer comes up that we need stricter gun laws and better school programs. And this may be true as well. But the last question really pinpoints the heart of the problem, and that is a problem of the heart. That is where the real problem lies. Moral reform only delays the problem and covers it for a time, we need regeneration. We need the message of the transforming gospel of grace preached to a lost world.
We all know that. You all could have told me the solution to the problem. But what does that have to do with us? Our hearts are not are problem, or are they? As we look into our text this evening, I believe we will see that our greatest problem lies in the same place as the worlds, in our hearts.
READ TEXT & PRAY
The passage that we will be discussing tonight is a hotly debated one, and has been since about the time when Paul wrote it. Without getting into all the details, the issue boils down to this – Is Paul in verses 14–25 referring to a lost man or a saved man? I’ve spent a lot of time reading and studying through this passage over the last few weeks and have concluded that indeed Paul here is dealing with his own experience as a born again man. And this struggle is not unique to Paul, but it is a struggle through which all who are truly regenerate face. For time sake we will not go through the reasons why I believe we are dealing with an experience of a saved man, so I am just assuming tonight that you are in agreement with me concerning this.
If you have an outline tonight or saw the title in the bulletin, you see that it is, “Can We Have Victory?” And you may be asking, “Victory over what?” What is it that we need victory over? Are we referring to Kosovo or what? With this question in mind I would like to cover four important truths that are foundational to us having victory.
I. We must realize that life is war. 23
Obviously, if we are going to have victory, we must find out what we are talking about. Notice in your outline with me the first point. We must realize that life is war. Before victory is even a possibility, you must know that you are in a war.
Have you ever been playing a game with someone, and you thought you were just playing for fun, but the whole time the other person was keeping score. And all of the sudden the he says, “I won.” And you say, “Wait a minute, I’d didn’t even know we were playing for real.” If you don’t know you are in a competition, most likely you aren’t going to win.
Look with me at verse 23. Paul uses some very terms that are clearly military terms. The word for warring against has the idea of making a military expedition, opposing, or fighting a battle against. And the word for bringing into captivity literally means to take prisoner with a spear.
If you are at all familiar with this passage, you recognize that there is definitely some sort of struggle or battle going on. What ever the case, Paul is fighting with something. Remember that familiar text in 2 Timothy 4:7 where Paul is approaching the end of his life and he says, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.” Paul’s life was a struggle, it was a fight. Or remember the text in 1 Timothy 6:12 where Paul instructs Timothy to “fight the good fight of faith, [and] lay hold on eternal life.” Life is war, Paul makes this abundantly clear. It’s no easy ride. Anyone who thinks that life gets easy at salvation and is downhill hasn’t read what Paul says. The word for fight which Paul uses in these two verses is the Greek word agw/n. This is where we get our word agony and it refers to a fight or intense struggle.
No battle can be approached with a carefree, relaxed, attitude. My cousin is in the Marine Corps and he was telling me of the training that they went through during boot camp – all the running, and training, and disciplining. Why is all that necessary? Well, fighting in a war takes a certain physical and mental discipline.
Notice what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9:26–27, “I therefore so run, not as uncertainly; so fight I, not as one that beateth the air: But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.” Paul says literally that he beat his body until it was black and blue and made it his slave.
Yet the attitude of most of Christians today, including myself, is a peace time attitude. We live our lives like their is no urgency, their is no battle to fight, no war to be won.
Were we to go into WWIII people would start living differently. But the battle that we are in is much more serious than Kosovo or and WWIII. The stakes are much higher. In this battle people don’t just lose an arm or a leg or the physical life, but people lose their souls for eternity in hell. Every day the casualties are over a hundred thousand who lose their souls and go to hell.
We are in a war, and there is no peace until Jesus comes!
II. We must identify the enemy. 14–18a
It is not just enough for us to realize that there is a war going on. That is the first step and it is foundational, but we must go further. We must identify the enemy. Who are we fighting against?
In athletic competition there are usually two teams. You must know who is on your team, and you must know who is the opponent. Last Monday night a basketball, someone was guarding his own teammate. There is no progress until you identify the enemy.
Paul deals with only one specifically in this passage, but we will notice three. Who are our enemies? They are not people. Ephesians 6:12 tells us, “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” Our enemies are not people.
1. The world is our enemy.
The first enemy who we are fighting against in this war is the world. Not the world as people, but the world as a system with its values and beliefs and philosophies. The world is our enemy. Notice the following verses that talk about the world. 1 John 2:15–17 says, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.” Or Romans 12:2 “And be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind that ye may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” Or James 4:4 “Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.” Or James 1:27 “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.”
This world is our enemy. Its value and beliefs are in direct opposition to God, and it is continually trying to conform us to its mold. The newspapers, magazines, bulletin boards, Internet, TV, music, mall, all of these influences are trying to conform us. Worldliness is waging war against the people of God and it is taking many captive.
Turning on the TV anymore is like walking on a mine field. You must tread very carefully on very dangerous ground. There is in Scripture a principle taught about exposure. Psalm 106:35 says that the Israelites “were mingled among the heathen, and learned their works.” Exposure to anything for extended periods of time will have its affects on you.
Jesus said that we are to be in the world but not of the world. Christians are losing their effectiveness today because there is virtually no difference between many Christians and the world.
Oh, let us be aware of the great attack that is being made on us by the world.
2. Satan is our enemy.
Not only is the world our enemy but Satan is our enemy as well. 1 Peter 5:8 instructs us to “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.” Christ warned Peter of Satan who “desired to have [him], [so] that he [might] sift [him] as wheat.” In Revelation 12:9 Satan is called the one “which deceiveth the whole world.” John 8:44 calls Satan the father of lies.
Satan and his demons are real forces. They are as real as you and I. He is continually tempting us and trying to deceive us with his lies. He is subtle and attacks us the same way as he did Eve. Let us be on guard against this great enemy.
3. Our flesh is our enemy.
But worse than the conforming influence of the world, or the incredible power of the demonic forces, is our flesh, our old man, the indwelling sin principle. This is the enemy that Paul is struggling against here.
Inside of all men their indwells a horrible beast that is our depraved fallen nature. It is opposed to God and always chooses to sin.
But I thought that at salvation we died to sin and were freed from sin. Look up at 6:22. It says that we are free from sin. At salvation we were saved from the penalty of sin. The chains of sin were in a sense broken, and we no longer were in bondage in that sense. But in spite of that, indwelling sin, our flesh, still remains a very powerful force for evil. Paul felt this strong force constantly pulling against his new man.
Look with me a the text. Paul says in verse 14 that he is carnal or fleshly. And in verse 17 he says that this indwelling sin principle is the reason for his sin. And in verse 18 he says that in his flesh dwell no good thing. It is corrupt and sinful to the core. This old man is in a struggle with his new man. Notice what Paul says about this struggle in Galatians 5:17 “For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.”
In 1 Peter 2:11, Peter warns us to “abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul.”
Jeremiah 17:9 “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Just as the problem in our schools is a heart problem, so our greatest problem is a heart problem as well. Even as born again people our hearts, our flesh, is still deceitful, more deceitful than even Satan himself.
For this very reason Paul said in Philippians 3:3 that he put “no confidence in the flesh.” Paul says he couldn’t even trust himself.
Back at school, right before I came home, I was informed of two men who had to leave the ministry because of immorality. When I got home, Pastor Dickson shared with me three men that he had heard of in just a few weeks time who had to leave the ministry as a result of immorality. Why? How does this happen? I don’t know for sure, but one good possibility is that they began to put confidence in the flesh, they began to drop their guard. You know what Satan tells us, the more spiritual you are, the less guards you need around you. After all you’re a pastor; you wouldn’t do that. But I think that it is the opposite. Paul said in Romans 13:14 “But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof.”
Paul recognized that his flesh was bent toward sin. He could not trust it. Jesus said in Mark 14:38 “Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak.”
III. We must acknowledge our inability. 18b-23
Now that we know that life is war, and we know who our enemies are, there is a third thing that we must recognize along with Paul. We must acknowledge our inability. We cannot win the war on our own. Having seen the enemy, we don’t stand a chance by ourselves.
Notice what Paul said in verse 18. Paul said that his desire was to do good and obey the law of God, but the ability to do it was not there. Because of this indwelling sin, Paul was not able to freely do the things he wanted to. Every time Paul would have a decision to make, his flesh would rise up in revolt.
Is this your experience? Do you feel this struggle within you? If so, take hope. This is a sign of being a Christian. You are in company with men like Paul, John Bradford, Samuel Rutherford, Jonathan Edwards, David Brainerd, Adoniram Judson, John Newton, C. H. Spurgeon, and many other.
So what did Paul do? We realized the answer to his problem was not found within himself. He had to look outside of himself for power to win this war. Look at verse 24, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” He knew that he could not.
How often do we go a day or two, and live in our own strength? Are not these the times that we are spiritually defeated? Let us not be so foolish as to think that we can win this war on our own, in the power of our own flesh. We cannot! The enemy is too great, and we are too weak.
If we were to end the message right now, many of us would leave discouraged. Thank the Lord that Paul does not leave us here.
IV. We must depend upon God. 24–25
We know that we are in a war, and that the enemy is great, and that we cannot win this battle on our own. So lastly, we see that we must depend upon God. Notice verses 24–25. Paul cries out for help to the only one who can give him the victory. But what Paul ultimately discovers is that this victory is future. This battle will not ultimately be won until the Lord calls us home.
So do we have to go on in defeat? It their any hope for the present?
Turn with me to Galatians 5:16–17. Here is where I believe that the answer lies. It reads, “This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.” This is the key. Walking in the Spirit. But how do we do that?
In closing, go with me over to Ephesians 6:17–18. This sheds light on how we are to walk in the Spirit. It reads, “And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God: Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit.” We are to take the sword of the Spirit and we are to pray in the Spirit. I believe the way to walk in the Spirit comes back to these two basic things, the Word and prayer.
1. Through the Word. Eph. 6:17
No one in this room would even consider going to war without a weapon, yet Christians do it all the time, walking unarmed into the battlefields of life
First of all the Word of God is essential to having daily victory in this war. It is our only weapon with which to fight the enemy. If you want victory in this struggle of life, you must run to this book, and carry it with you in your heart. The Psalmist said, “Thy word have I hide in mine heart that I might not sin against thee.” You must read it, and read it some more, and meditate upon it, and love it, and delight in it, and obey it.
2. Through prayer. Eph. 6:18
Secondly that we must pray. Notice that there is no break in the sentence between verses 17 and 18. Rather verse 18 explains the manner in which we are to take the sword. Take it praying. Take it praying. Prayer is the power that wields the sword. Without prayer we are powerless to use the sword. Without the sword we are weaponless. Take the sword praying. Both are essential. Jesus said, “Watch ye and pray that ye enter not into temptation.”
Daily we must be on our faces before the Lord, begging Him to guard us from temptation. Daily we must be filling ourselves drunk with the Word of God.
Is there any hope? Can we have victory? Yes victory is possible, but only as we depend upon God through the Word and prayer.
Conclusion:
In closing realize that life is war, and that the enemy is great, that you cannot win the battle on your own, and that victory is only possible as you daily depend on the Lord through the Word and prayer.
PRAY