The Struggle Continues

Philippians 3:10

MATURE • MENTOR • MINISTER • MAINTAIN • INVESTING IN BLACK FUTURES THRU STRATEGIC LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT

I know that all God's commands are spiritual, but I'm not.
Isn't this also your experience?

Yes.  I'm full of myself—after all, I've spent a long time in sin's prison.
What I don't understand about myself is that I decide one way,
but then I act another, doing things I absolutely despise.
So if I can't be trusted to figure out what is best for myself and then do it,
it becomes obvious that God's command is necessary.

But I need something more!
For if I know the law but still can't keep it,
and if the power of sin within me keeps sabotaging my best intentions,
I obviously need help!
I realize that I don't have what it takes.
I can will it, but I can't do it.
I decide to do good, but I don't really do it;
I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway.
My decisions, such as they are, don't result in actions.
Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time.

It happens so regularly that it's predictable.
The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up.
I truly delight in God's commands, but it's pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight.
Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge.

I've tried everything and nothing helps.
I'm at the end of my rope.
Is there no one who can do anything for me?
Isn't that the real question?

The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does.
He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions
where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind,
but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different.

With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved.
Those who enter into Christ's being-here-for-us
no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud.
A new power is in operation.
 The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air,
freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death.

When God lives and breathes in you (and He does, as surely as He did in Jesus),
you are delivered from that dead life.
With His Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!

So don't you see that we don't owe this old do-it-yourself life one red cent.
There's nothing in it for us, nothing at all.
The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life.
God's Spirit beckons.
There are things to do and places to go!

This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life.
It's adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike "What's next, Papa?"
God's Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are.
We know who He is, and we know who we are: Father and children.
And we know we are going to get what's coming to us—an unbelievable inheritance!
We go through exactly what Christ goes through.
If we go through the hard times with Him,
then we're certainly going to go through the good times with Him!

Romans 7:15-8:17 from The Message by Eugene H. Peterson

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