Do you ever feel torn between doing what you know is right, and then succumbing to addiction anyway? Choosing to continue in a sin that you should be able to be free of, yet you keep making the same mistake. We have some comforting words for you, the apostle Paul had this same struggle in Romans 7-8 regarding the Law. The Message translation Bible is not intended to be an everyday Bible, but what it is great at is expressing things in a new light with the same Biblical meaning. This could not be more true of this passage! Here are the phrases Paul uses in his struggle with sin.
- I need something more!
- I know the law and yet I can not keep it
- Sin keeps sabotaging my best intentions
- I obviously need help!
- I have the will, but I can’t do it!
- The moment I decide to do good, sin trips me up
- I have tried everything and nothing helps, I am at the end of my rope
You should take time and read this entire chapter out loud and hear the urgency and distress in Paul’s voice. Go ahead, read it out loud.
Have you ever felt that way? When it comes to sin in your life like getting drunk, sex before marriage, drugs, lust, porn,and on and on? Have you been at the end of your rope with addiction? Do you feel like there is nothing anyone can do for you? Well, there is great news! Romans 7:25-8:1-4.
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. “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit.”
Struggle with your addictions and then surrender them all to God. Make a stand in your life for sin to be “Not an Option!” Have you reached the end of your rope with sin?
