Waging War - Romans 7:14-25

0:53His brother, John Wesley, would travel thousands of miles on horseback and preach all over the country of England, over 20,000 sermons. Can't imagine preaching that many sermons, 20,000 sermons. Together, they would spark the Great Awakening in England that would later spread to America. And the brother that I want to talk about is John Wesley, that preacher. He had quite a dramatic life. He had a lot of ups and downs. From the time he was a baby, he was thrown out of a window. Of a burning building and caught in someone's arms. And that kind of excitement lasted through his life. And he would remember the spiritual awakening. Many think his salvation, but this spiritual awakening when he was 35 years old that caused him to chase after the Lord and start to preach everywhere. And through his preaching ministry, he would spark two movements in America. And the first one was Methodism. He started forming these little pods, these little Bible studies for discipleship that would then later turn into churches, that would then later turn into a denomination, the Methodists. And so that spread across America. The other movement was known as Christian Perfectionism. And that's the one I want to talk about today. This teaching that Wesley started about how we as Christians can become entirely sanctified in this life, is what he would teach. That Christians in this life can become perfect. And he held to the teaching that though most Christians would achieve perfection only at death, there would be some that could become perfect maybe even 20 or 30 years before they die and live the life. Last few decades of their life totally perfect, totally sinless. Well, this became such a debate because this was directly contradictory to what the reformers taught. You know, Luther was famous for teaching that every Christian who's still alive, every Christian is simultaneously at the same time always a sinner and yet always justified, always forgiven.

3:27Well, this Christian perfectionism, Wesley just seemed to entertain this idea. He wrote about it some, but then other people took it and ran with it and taught that not only can we become perfect, but that the expectation in Scripture is that after we become believers, there should be this second level of Christianity where we also become perfect, where we never sin again in this life. The reason why I bring this up is because the Christian perfectionist, they've got to do something with the text that we're going to study today. Romans chapter 7, verses 14 through 25.

4:05This text is Paul speaking in the first person, Paul speaking in the present tense, and yet describing this battle that he has with sin. So the Wesleyan perfectionist needs to do something with this. How could such a mature Christian still say that he struggles with sin, still say that there is this battle? That he has with sin. And so you can do one of two things. Maybe you could say that this was about his life before conversion, even though he's speaking in the present tense. Or maybe you could say that he's speaking about someone else, hypothetically, impersonating someone else, even though he's speaking in the first person.

4:53But if we're being honest, even if we're not a Christian perfectionist, which is not the position of this church, we don't believe in Christian perfectionism. But even if we're not a Christian perfectionist, this text is still hard for us to deal with. Look at the end of verse 14. He says, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. Look down at verse 23. I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.

5:39I don't know that this sounds to us like a mature Christian. Look at verse 24, wretched man that I am. Look at the end of verse 25. With my flesh I serve the law of sin. And so for those of us who believe that Christians will still sin in this life, as long as we We're still in these bodies. For those of us who believe that we'll still sin, we believe that there should be at least some sanctification in the Christian's life, right? We believe the promise that God changes us. And so these statements seem so strong. You know, didn't he just say in chapter 6 that we are free from sin's dominion if we've believed in Christ?

6:26Didn't he say that sin is no longer our master? Sin is no longer our king? And so, how could he say something like, sin is taking him captive? So, we have several options, and put up with me for just a minute. This is just a highly debated passage, so listen to some of these options. So, either we go with the language and kind of assume the natural understanding that he's speaking first-person, present tense, about his own struggle with sin, or we have to assume that he's speaking of someone else, you know, impersonating someone else. So, some Christians that would take this position would say that maybe he's speaking as an unbeliever, he's impersonating an unbeliever, he's talking about how their battle with their conscience or something like that, they can't win it. They say that he's speaking of an unbeliever because he uses that phrase, sold under sin. But the problem with that is that this person also says that he delights. In the law of God and his inner being. He serves the law of God with his mind. He wants to do good. He longs to do good. To me, that doesn't sound like an unbeliever. And so then some people try and propose a middle position. Not a believer, not an unbeliever, but maybe something in the middle. Maybe Martin Lloyd-Jones was famous for proposing that this was maybe somebody just right in that moment where he's becoming a believer. Maybe Paul is impersonating someone like that to where he has started to hate his sin. He started to see the need to turn away from his sin, but he hasn't been forgiven yet. And it's capturing that struggle of that moment of conversion.

8:17Others would claim that this is the life of an Old Testament believer, someone who believes that the law is good, who wants to keep it, but they can't walk in the Spirit. They don't have the Holy Spirit. That's a new covenant promise for the Jew. Sorry. Others believe that this would be an immature believer, an immature believer. Maybe you've heard language like this. That this is a person who is a carnal Christian. Have you heard that word before? Those who would hold that position would claim something like: this is somebody who maybe they've accepted Jesus as their Savior, but they never accepted him as their Lord. And so though they're forgiven, they're still in bondage to their own sin. They would teach something like that, a position that we would reject at this church. So this passage is a passage that, on the one hand, speaks of somebody who loves the law, speaks of someone who is actively warring against sin, who trusts in Christ for deliverance, and yet seems to be saying that that person is captive to their sin. How can that be? Is Paul impersonating an Old Testament believer?

9:49Is he impersonating an unbeliever? Is he impersonating someone in the midst of conversion? Is he impersonating somebody who is a carnal, immature Christian? What's happening in this text? Well, I think what's happening is that this is just Paul. He's just speaking first person, present tense, Paul as a mature Christian explaining this battle that is waged in his heart and his mind. MacArthur writes, it seems that Paul is here describing the most spiritual and mature of Christians who, the more they honestly measure themselves. Against God's standards of righteousness, the more they realize how much they fall short.

10:38I agree with this position, and I agree with it for a few reasons. The first reason is that this text is not just a little bit first person. He uses the first person 46 times in this passage. And then at the end of the passage, he emphasizes it. Look at the end in verse 25. He says, So then, I myself, me, you know, I myself, me myself, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. So he seems to be emphasizing that this is happening in a single person and it's happening in him, this war.

11:18Another reason why I think this is speaking of a Christian who's waging war against sin is that there seems to be this transition in the passage. So look again at verse 24 and 25. He says, Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So it seems that he's expecting a future transition for this person. Those who would believe that this is an unbeliever would say, yes, that's salvation. That's when you become sinless. Or that's when you make this transition to no longer struggling in this way. But I think the rest of the scriptures are clear that. No, that's actually not how it works. It's not that we, as unbelievers, struggle really hard against our sin, and then as believers, we don't have the struggle anymore. I think the opposite is true, that as unbelievers, we haven't been convicted yet. We're not struggling and fighting against our sin. When we become believers, that's when the struggle really starts. That's when we start to hate our sin and start to wage war. And that struggle isn't going to go away until we are delivered from this body of death. And so, if we're just thinking about the timing, if we're thinking of this transition, then it seems like this is somebody not who's an unbeliever who then stops struggling by becoming a believer. It seems to be somebody who is a believer that's struggling and longs to be rid of this body to where he will never struggle with sin again. The third reason why I think this is a believer, and this is the hardest to deal with, is that I think that those strong statements, sold under sin, unable to do good. I think that throughout the text, he is quick to caveat those words. Here's what I mean: look at verse 18. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. Now, if he was speaking as an unbeliever, if he's impersonating an unbeliever, he wouldn't need to caveat that, right? He wouldn't need to insert that is in my flesh. As a believer, you do.

13:31There is something good that dwells in you. And so, you see what I mean? As a believer, he does need to make that caveat. Even the phrase sold under sin is specifically in reference to his flesh. He says, I am fleshy, I am of the flesh, sold under the sin, sold under sin. So I think his point is that in our flesh, if it were all up to our flesh, entropy would just guide us toward only sinning. If our flesh was the only factor, then we would only sin. But his point is that he is not only flesh, he serves the law of God with his mind. And so there is a battle.

14:22In this text, we'll read about the reality of this battle of what we truly want, waging war against our flesh. In chapter 8, I believe he gives us the secret to that battle, and that's walking in the spirit instead of walking in the flesh. As we go through this, you might not be convinced yet that he's talking about a believer, but I just hope that as we step through it, you'll keep an open mind. And hopefully, as we go through, you'll see that he is speaking of this struggle as believers, that we are waging war against our. Flesh, that there is this battle now that we're believers. Our flesh, if left to itself, will always choose to sin. And so we have to fight against it. We have to walk in the spirit. We have to wage war against the flesh. In our text today, Paul will give us four pieces of intelligence. Four pieces of intelligence in the war against indwelling sin.

15:27Four pieces of intelligence in the war against indwelling sin. And that's the terminology that he uses throughout. Look at verse 17. End of verse 17, he says, sin that dwells within me. End of verse 20, sin that dwells within me. End of verse 23, sin that dwells in my members. He's dealing with indwelling sin, this leftover sin that still dwells within our flesh. And he gives us four pieces of intelligence in the war against indwelling sin. And these are a little bit long. I'll say them now and then repeat them later if you don't get them down. But he says, My flesh cannot keep the law.

16:10My flesh is not the only factor. My flesh wages war against me. And my flesh is going away. Those are our four pieces of intelligence. My flesh cannot keep the law, but my flesh is not the only factor. My flesh wages war against me. But my flesh is going away. Follow along as I read in verse 14 through 25. For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. For I do not understand my own actions, for I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now, if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now, if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God and my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.

17:47Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then I myself serve the law of God with my mind. But with my flesh, I serve the law of sin. Let's pray before we begin. Father, we pray that you would help us with this difficult text, this text that so many have gone before and debated. I pray that you'd help us understand it. I pray that you'd help us understand that even though we have been freed from sin's dominion, and even though we have been forgiven of all of our sins, past, present, future, if we've trusted in Christ for salvation, I pray that even though that is true, you'd help us still fight against our sin, fight against our flesh while we still live in this flesh. Help us be men and women that walk in the Spirit, that keep in step with the Spirit.

18:56Help us be men and women that do not give in to the flesh. Help us walk in joy, walk in obedience as we wage this war against our flesh. We thank you for the promise that we're waiting for to be changed, completely made by Christ. In Jesus' name, well, the first piece of intelligence. And the war against indwelling sin is that my flesh cannot keep the law. My flesh cannot keep the law. Verse 14. For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. For I do not understand my own actions, for I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. I think this is the last bit of proof for what he's been talking about for all of Romans about the law. That though the law is good and holy and just, the law is perfect, it still is unable to form the righteousness in us that it demands.

20:22It's unable to produce the righteousness that it calls for, not because it is bad, like we talked about last week, not because the law is bad, but because we are bad, because we are sinful, and our sin as unbelievers seizes on the opportunity when it hears the law to just sin all the more. I think this is the last bit of proof of that concept because Paul is saying, even as a believer, he switches to the present tense, even as a believer. We know this is still true about our flesh.

21:01Our flesh still is like this. Our flesh can still bow up when we hear the law, when we hear somebody rebuking us. Verse 14, for we know that the law is spiritual, but I am fleshy. I am of the flesh, sold under sin. Never will his flesh choose to follow the law on its own. Verse 15, for I do not understand my own actions, for I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. And so, this flesh that's still with us until glorification, it acts opposite of the way that we want in this life. If we've been changed and our desires have been changed, our flesh is now at odds against us.

21:59Because what we desire and what our flesh desires is opposite. And our flesh acts in a fog. He says, I do not understand my own actions. All I know is that I keep doing the things I hate. He says, I keep doing the things I hate. Now, the question is: why is this good intelligence in this war that we're fighting? Why is this good intel? Doesn't this just sound disgusting? Defeatist? Doesn't it just sound like he's saying we can't win this battle?

22:37Well, no, I think it's the opposite. It would be defeatist if our only option was to walk in the flesh. But he'll make it very clear that, no, we can walk in the spirit. So instead of being defeatist, what I think this is, is good information. This is good intelligence. Now we understand our enemy in this war, and it's our own indwelling sin. We understand that our flesh is always going to be with us. We understand that if we just live our life on cruise control and we're not paying attention, there's no laying assist to our flesh to just keep us on the right track, keep us in between the lines. Our flesh will always choose to veer off the path, even as believers. Our flesh does not ever choose to please God. And it's our advantage to know this, isn't it? You know, there's a reason why nearly a thousand Hessian soldiers were captured at the cost of only four American lives. And it's because George Washington crossed the Delaware and took them by surprise.

23:49If we know that our flesh will never choose to not sin, then we can't be surprise-attacked by our own flesh. You know, sometimes. Believers come to me and say, you know, I never thought I would commit that sin. I can't believe I would have done that. And then you ask that person, well, you know, how has your time been in the Word? Well, you know, I was wanting to spend more time in the Word this summer when I have more time.

24:24Well, have you been praying that God would keep you from temptation? Well, you know, I'm a little too busy to pray right now. Well, have you been spending time in true fellowship with believers? Well, we've kind of had to rush off after the services lately. Well, if this is how you're living your life, then it should come as no surprise to you that all of a sudden you find yourself in sin. Your flesh will never just default to righteousness. It's not how it works. Your flesh will always default to anti-law. That's why we have to wage the war. So don't be surprised by that. We are fleshy. You know, I don't understand my own actions, for I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. So we need to understand that there is something to battle against. There is this fog that makes you do the very things you hate while you're in this flesh. If you're not paying attention, you're going to just end up sinning. Again, doing the very thing that you hate to do. Which leads to our second piece of intel. My flesh is not the only factor. My flesh is not the only factor. I think this is a very positive point. The first point was very negative: that our flesh cannot keep the law. I think that this is a very positive point: that yes, your flesh is still a factor. Even after you become a believer, you still live in your flesh. But now it is not the only factor. Look at verse 16. He says, Now, if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now, if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. So I think the main point of this passage, sometimes we read it as that the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing, as if we're stuck in this cycle. I don't think that's his main point. I think his main point is we can know from that, if we can know that we constantly are not wanting to do that, we can know from that that we have this new desire.

27:00He's kind of shifted subjects just a little bit. It's a new main point, and I think he repeats it in verses 16, and then again in verse 20. So look at verse 16. Now, if I do what I do not want, and then skip to 17, so now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. And then look down at verse 20. Now, if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. I think he's repeating that same point, and his point is a positive one. If he hates sin, if he does not want to do what he does, then it shows that he now agrees with the law. There's been a change.

27:47Now, if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law that it is good, so now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. In the core of his being, he does not want to do these things. This is an encouragement to the believer. It shows that we have been changed. It shows that something is no longer true. It's no longer I who do that. It's sin that dwells within me. It is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

28:27Every now and then we can panic as. As we look back, and maybe we've committed a sin that we're very ashamed of, and it can make us panic about our salvation. Can I even be saved if I just committed that sin? We hate that sin, and I think we should examine ourselves. We're charged to do that in Scripture. We should examine to see if we are truly in the faith. I think we should never take sin lightly. I don't think that's what he's saying at all.

29:02But I think that this is an encouragement for us, an encouragement that he'll repeat in verse 20, and then he'll bring up again in chapter 8 that if we hate that we sin, it shows that our sin is not the only thing going on anymore in our hearts. Something has changed, and we can know that because, look at verse 8:18, because, for I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. So, his point is: we can know that something has changed. We can know that it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me, because nothing good dwells in me, in my flesh. And so, if there's something good, it's not my flesh, it's not me. Because I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. And so I think he's taking as granted this idea that nothing good dwells in our flesh. Nothing good dwells in our flesh. The flesh only wants to do what is wrong.

30:29The flesh will never accomplish his desire to do what is right. It will only do the evil that he does not want to do. And so if he hates his sin, if he longs to keep the law, if he delights in the law, then he can know that there's something else going on. His flesh is not the only factor. And so he repeats his encouraging point in verse 20. Now, if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

31:05Now, I know what you're thinking, maybe. How convenient for the believer. Is that what Paul is saying? Did he just push aside all responsibility for his sin? Did he just say that his sin is not his fault? It's the fault of something else within him. He says, If I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. No, I don't think he's pretending that he's not responsible for his own sin. He's already made that so clear in this book. He's already said that the wages of sin is death. He's already said that, believers, we have no business in serving that old master. We are responsible for our sin. Instead, what I think he's doing is bringing up this point that there is a battle going on.

32:02And if you are waging that battle, then you can be encouraged. Because, yes, there is left over in the Christian indwelling sin. But there is this difference between what we want to do, what we long to do, and what our flesh wants to do. And so we need to be aware of that reality. We need to be aware that that battle is taking place in the life of a believer so that we're not taken by surprise. And so, again, this leads us on to our next point. My flesh wages war against me. Our third point: My flesh wages war against me.

32:42Verse 21, he says, So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God and my enemies. Being. But I see in my members, in my body parts, I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. So you can tell, he says, so then, or therefore, he's saying, what just came before, if we understand this, then we can know a law, we can know a rule, a principle that's always true about the believer.

33:31Now, this is a little confusing because he's been speaking about the Mosaic law, the commandments of God, and now he's using the word law in a little bit different way. He's using it more like we would use the laws of nature or the laws of thermodynamics, you know, these rules, these principles that never change. But Paul has proved it, proved this law through the idea that we do what we hate. He's saying, if this is true, if this is true about the believer, that we hate our own sin, even though we still sin, then there is a law that is true about us, that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.

34:19He says, for I delight in the law of God and my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin. That dwells in my members. So now he's using law for all kinds of things. He said that there is a law of sin. I delight in the law of God and my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. So there's this law of sin, this rule. I think that our flesh will always want to do what is wrong. Then there's a law of his mind that he wants to do what is right. He wants to follow God's law. And when you put those two laws together, those two principles together, this law of sin and the law of the mind, it leads to this law that is always true about the believer, that when we want to do good, there will always be this battle while we live in these bodies.

35:24The same is true for you as a believer, that since you delight in the law of God, in your inner being, since you long to be righteous in his sight, righteous in practice, I mean. And since you also have another law waging war against the law of your mind, then it is a law for you that when you want to do right, evil lies close at hand. So, practically, what does this mean for us? I think practically we know this. We experience this every day if we're believers, if we have trusted in Christ. I think that practically it means you never get a day off, right? You never get to say, oh, it's Tuesday. My flesh never tempts me on Tuesday. You know, I don't have to fight the battle today.

36:20No, every day, our indwelling sin wages war against us. Evil lies close at hand. God will help us. God does help us. We can walk in the spirit, but we can't just let our guard down. We can't walk down the street of the adulteress because evil lies too closely within us. Because it is within us. Our sin dwells within us, in our members. So, my flesh cannot keep the law, but my flesh is not the only factor. My flesh wages war against me. And the fourth piece of intelligence is: my flesh is going away. Praise God, right? My flesh is going away. He says in verse 24, Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So, again, this doesn't seem like a future transition between an unbeliever becoming a believer. To me, this seems like somebody who is struggling against their sin. And a mature Christian who hates his sin and longs for the day when he will never sin again, when he will be delivered from this body, this tent.

37:43I think this is the cry of a mature believer, of Paul himself, who hates his sin, who hates looking back on a day and realizing again that he sinned in a way that he wished he didn't. I think it's a cry of somebody who is tired of the fight against sin and longs to be relieved, longs to be perfected. And hopefully, this is a longing in all of our hearts that all of us, as believers, do not like the fact that our flesh cannot keep the law, that we do have indwelling sin.

38:24I think that as believers, we should long for the day when we're made like him. And so, who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. God will deliver me from this body of death. We can already give thanks through Jesus Christ our Lord. We can already trust that God will deliver on that promise, that he will be faithful to not just forgive us. We already are forgiven. We already are totally justified, forgiven in his sight, blameless in his sight. But beyond that, he also will somehow. Day, rid us of our sin.

39:06Not only wash us from our sins, but also keep us from ever sinning again, is what I mean. When he appears, we shall be like him because we shall see him as he is. And so we can rejoice, we can give thanks. Our flesh is going to go away someday. Well, Paul wraps up in verse 25. He says, So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. Again, emphatic, I myself, me, I myself. Both of these things are true in me, Paul says.

39:48I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. So, again, not an excuse by any means. Not some weird excuse that's saying when I sin, it's not actually me, it's something else that dwells within me. No, he's admitting. He's saying, I myself, right? He's taking responsibility for his sin, but he's also admitting that there is a war going on within him. And we can always know which side of the war our flesh is on.

40:25It is always fighting against us. And so, as he said, Chapter 6, let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness. He's saying in chapter 6, you're free from that dominion. Sin is no longer your master, but that doesn't mean that you can't pretend like sin is your master. He says in chapter 6, you can present your members to sin. You can let sin reign. It's just the command is: don't.

41:06Don't present your members to sin. Don't let sin reign. Battle against the flesh. Don't give in to indwelling sin, even though it lies close at hand. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle, says Sun Tzu in Art of War. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle. You know, much of the reason why we lose our daily battle against sin is because we don't pay attention to what God's word says about our sin.

41:44But now that we've read this text, we're well informed. We know just how wicked our flesh is. We know that we always have this indwelling sin, that our flesh will never choose to obey the law of God on its own. But we also know that our flesh is not the only factor anymore. So, there is this war that we can wage with God's help. And we can give it our all. We can fight with everything we have. We can walk in the spirit. We can wear ourselves out fighting this war because we know that someday, soon, God will give us rest from that battle. He will change us to where we never have to fight that battle again. We never will have that sinful flesh again in eternity.

42:36But in the meantime, since I can see you all still have your bodies, in the meantime, what are some practical steps you can take based off of this intelligence? Well, I think first, a piece of advice that you hear all the time at this church through the ministry of Thomas is get yourself into a godly routine. Get yourself into a godly routine. Because if you just coast, if you just let your flesh plod along at the pace that it wants, well, your flesh is never going to just cruise toward righteousness.

43:17It's not going to happen. So plan a routine. Get in God's word. Spend time in prayer. Treat these things as priorities. Don't let your flesh be in. Charge of how you spend your time. You know which way it's going to take you. And so keep in step with the Spirit. Make a routine for yourself. Another practical point is to listen to when others rebuke you. Don't be so prickly that you can't be approached about your own sin. Instead, I encourage you to invite people to rebuke you with honesty. Sometimes we can pretend to invite that, and then we still get prickly when they rebuke us. But I just encourage you to count it as a blessing when others come to you and say that they see something in your life that you're blind to. Because the reality is, is that we're all fighting this battle. We're all waging this war as believers, and we need each other.

44:27And so when somebody comes, don't pretend like nobody else understands. Don't pretend like nobody can understand why you're sinning or why your sin is not a sin or something like that, even though it's painful. We're in the same fight. You know, it's us versus our sin with God's help. It's not me versus you or you versus somebody else when you confront somebody. It's you and somebody else versus their sin. Okay, one more practical step you can take is to slow down and meditate and think about what it means to walk in the Spirit. And if you haven't done that before, I encourage you to read Romans 8 several times this week. I encourage you to read Galatians 5. He's saying, the Spirit has given us life, and so keep in step with the Spirit, walk in the Spirit. If we walk in the flesh, again, we know what direction the flesh is going to take us. And so the command, the secret to this battle, is to walk in the Spirit. He says in Romans 8, verse 10, if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

45:44Walking in the Spirit is the secret to winning this battle against the flesh. Well, as much as we wish that we could be perfect in this life, as much as we wish that we could be entirely sanctified so that we never sin, the reality is that we will always have indwelling sin while we still dwell in these bodies. Evil will always lie close at hand. And so we need to keep waging this war against indwelling sin, never excusing our sin, never pretending it's not our fault, but instead pressing on, fighting hard and waiting for the day when we will be truly perfected. Knowing already that we're forgiven, that we're justified, not fighting because we're trying to earn our way into heaven. Instead, knowing that we're forgiven, pressing on, waiting for the day to when we will be truly perfected to never sin again. Pray with me, Father.

46:54We thank you that you have freed us from sin's dominion. We thank you that sin is no longer our master forever. Sin is no longer our king. We can never point at a past action that we've done after we became a believer and say, I couldn't help it. I had to sin. That temptation was too powerful. I couldn't escape from it. No, you always. You always. We praise you that you always provide a way for escape.

47:32That you always are available in our time of need. We always can cry out to you. We praise you that since the Spirit has given life, then we can now walk in the Spirit. And though our flesh still lingers with us, though we have indwelling sin that we're waging war against, praise you that we, along with Paul, can. Look forward to the day when our flesh is totally gone, when we have been delivered from these bodies of death.

48:17So, help us, Father. Help us wage war. We thank you for your grace for when we do fall, when we do need forgiveness, and we just pray that you would help us fight hard and fight with joy. We thank you, Father. In Jesus' name, amen.