Some will say, “If living free from sin is so easy, then what was the point of the cross? What was the point of grace? Why did Christ come to die for us?”
The answer is exactly that: to make it possible—and truly simple—to live free from sin (see The Old Self Is Dead).
Grace was not given to excuse ongoing sin. On the contrary, grace was given to teach us to say no to ungodliness and to live upright, self-controlled lives in this present age (Titus 2:11–12). Christ came in the flesh not to reinforce our weakness, but to crucify it altogether—to put the old body of sin to death so that we might walk in the newness of life (Romans 6:4).
Some point to Paul’s words at the end of Romans 7, claiming he described a daily struggle with sin. Then they use this as definitive proof that they are destined to struggle daily with sin as well. But this misunderstands the flow of his letter and his overall intent. Romans 6 boldly declares that we have been set free from sin and made slaves of righteousness (Romans 6:18). Paul did not contradict himself a few paragraphs later. In Romans 7, he describes the helpless state of a man in the flesh, under the law, bound by sin, longing for deliverance—a man still captive, still crying out for freedom (see The Romans 7 Man).
He pleads, “who will set me free from this body of death?!”
But he doesn’t end there. Romans 8 shouts the answer to that very problem:
”For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” – Romans 8:2 -4
Romans 8 is telling us what happened to that man who appears midway through Romans 7—the same man who had already been declared dead in Romans 6:6.
And he clarifies this further into Romans 8:
“You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you” (Romans 8:9).
Paul was not describing his present reality as a man in the flesh struggling against sin—he was painting the desperate reality of life apart from the Spirit, setting up for the ultimate victory over sin, to be declared in Romans 8 (see Freedom and Identity in Christ).
Romans 7: “I want to fulfill the righteous requirements of God’s law, but this sinful flesh won’t allow it!”
Romans 8: “Now God has done what I could not do in my flesh! More than that, he has condemned sin in that flesh, and has made me alive in the Spirit so I no longer think or walk according to the flesh, but I walk in the Spirit!”
When he wrote, “For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out” (Romans 7:18), he was setting the stage for the Spirit-filled life that follows: “Walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16). When he said, “I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing” (Romans 7:19), he had already written, “For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace” (Romans 6:14).
(For a deep unfolding of Romans 7—see The Romans 7 Man.)
The old man was crucified. The body of sin was done away with. In Christ, we are a new creation—not slaves, but sons.
“Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires” (Galatians 5:24).
We no longer present our members to sin as instruments of unrighteousness, but to God as instruments of righteousness (Romans 6:13). We are not lying to ourselves about this freedom, as some accuse us of doing. We are simply esteeming the Word of God above our experiences. His truth, not our past, defines us. The cross did not come to make defeat acceptable. The cross came to bring death to the old man—and life to the new.
Let the Word be true, even when our history protests. Let Christ be honored in the life we now live, even when our flesh tries to argue from the grave we left it in. We are not slaves to sin. We are alive to God in Christ Jesus (Romans 6:11).
The cross did not come to make defeat acceptable. The cross came to bring death to the old man—and life to the new.
