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Not only this, but the truth of the passage now before us has been the experience of
countless Christians all down this age. It is significant that where the Apostle describes
his life before his conversion there is no trace of spiritual conflict or of a divided self.
Gal. 1: & Phil. 3: depict a Jew who is practicing his religious beliefs more successfully
than his contemporaries and blameless in his observance of the law of Moses.
After salvation the situation has completely altered. Why? Because God has
introduced something that is entirely opposite to the human mind which has come under
the influence of sin. It is nothing less than a portion of His own divine and sinless nature.
Peter, in his second epistle, describes this:
"His (God's) divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness
through our knowledge of Him Who has called us by His own glory and goodness.
Through these He has given us His very great and precious promise, so that through them
you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by
evil desires" (II Pet. 1: 3, 4, N.I.V.).
The Holy Spirit effects this divine implantation in the sinner at the moment of
believing in Christ. Consequently it can be expressed as `spirit' with a small `s' and
placed in opposition to the `flesh'. While the words `flesh' and `spirit' are used in more
than one sense in the N.T. and by Paul himself, when they occur in the same context they
generally represent this divine nature in absolute contrast to the sinful nature inherited
from fallen Adam. As the Apostle writes in Galatians:
"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" (Gal. 5: 17).
The word `spirit' in the A.V. could have been spelled with a small `s' and then the
conflict between these two natures, the new and the old, is clearly set out. It is this
conflict in himself that Paul is describing in Rom. 7: 14-25:
"We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do
not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if
I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I
myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is,
in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.
For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do--this I keep
on doing. 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. So I find this law at work: when I want to do good, evil is right
there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at
work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making
me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am!
Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God--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" (Rom. 7: 14, 25, N.I.V.).
These words graphically describe the conflict between the two natures. Sin is
personified as a mighty enemy that resides in human nature and tyrannically controls the
person. As long as he struggles against it in his own strength he is constantly defeated. It
is not until he realizes that the Lord alone has the answer, that he wins the victory. Who
can rescue me from this terrible dilemma he cries? but then he turns to the Lord Jesus