One of the most difficult things (at least for me) to accept about grace is this: There’s nothing we can do to deserve it, or be “worthy” of it. When I sin, it just makes me feel even more unworthy. This can quickly devolve into apathy — why even try? Every sin seems to compound, every prayer for strength seems ignored. If prayers for strength are ignored, surely prayers for forgiveness are, too!
This mentality is not a healthy one. But how does one go from an intellectual understanding of grace’s power to accepting the reality of human imperfection? How do we prevent defeat in the aftermath of mistakes? If there’s a fix-all answer to this, I haven’t found it.
Perhaps the answer is a lack of faith. At its core, faith is really confidence — that God exists, that he rewards people who try hard to have a relationship with him, that his grace is enough for us because his power is most effectively displayed through weakness.
Maybe it’s disbelief. Does Jesus really forgive us when we sin? Yeah, Paul says “I don’t understand why I act the way I do. I don’t do the good I want to do, and I do the evil I hate. … But I am not really the one doing the evil. It is sin living in me that does it” (Rom 7.15, 17, 20). But later he says, “You are not ruled by your sinful selves. You are ruled by spirit, if God’s spirit really lives in you” (8.9). What does he mean by “ruled”? If I can’t seem to avoid sin, am I not ruled by it? What about Rom 6.2? “So do you think we should continue sinning so that God will give us more and more grace? Of course not! Our old sinful life ended. It’s dead. So how can we continue living in sin?” Which is it? Are we ok because we sin even when we don’t want to? Or are we in trouble because we’re not immune to sin? Maybe this would be better classed under confidence, but it’s so hard to believe that God still wants a relationship with people who claim to love him while vulnerable to sin’s influence.
Scripture seems to clear this up, if we can only accept its significance: “We know that the law is spiritual, but I am not. I am so human. Sin rules me as if I were its slave. I don’t understand why I act the way I do. I don’t do the good I want to do, I do the evil I hate. And if I don’t want to do what I do, that means I agree that the law is good” (Rom 7.14-16).
The question each person seems to have to answer is, “Do I really hate sin’s influence in my life?” God knows the true answer to that question. Romans 6.12 says, “Don’t let sin control your life here. You must not be ruled by the things your sinful self makes you want to do.” A few verses later, “In the past you were slaves to sin and you did not even think about doing right.” Verse 23, in the context of these chapters, says that all people are going to die physically because every human has sinned. But all who despise sin (while still vulnerable to its influence) and follow God will be “no longer under death’s power” because Jesus defeated sin’s ultimate punishment.
We can’t avoid death, just like we can’t avoid sin. Where our heart really is makes the difference. “So I have learned this rule: When I want to do good, evil is there with me. In my mind I am happy with God’s law. But I see another law working in my body. That law makes war against the law that my mind accepts. That other law working in my body is the law of sin, and that law makes me its prisoner.”
God knows we’re human. God knows we’re weak and constantly fighting sin’s influence. We’re not God, we’re not impervious to its control. Even Paul said, “What a miserable person I am! Who will save me from this body that brings me death?” The answer is Jesus, the one who will rescue us from our current bodies if our “minds serve God’s law, even as our bodies serve the law of sin” (7.25).
Finally, “Now there is no more condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. This is because the law of the spirit of life that comes from Christ Jesus has freed us from the law of sin and death. … God used a human life to destroy sin.” What does this mean? This means if we live to do what God wants us to do, he will give our bodies life on the last day (8.11). We’re never going to be free of sin’s influence in our lives, but we choose our masters. Will we pursue sin with our hearts and actions, or will we serve God with our hearts while the weakness of sin only makes us anticipate freedom (8.18ff) even more? We aren’t doing this alone — we have Jesus defending us (I Jn 2.1-2) and we have God searching our intent (Rom 8.26-27).
“We know that everything God made has been waiting in pain like a woman ready to give birth to a child. Not just the created world, either — we’ve also been waiting with pain inside us. We have the spirit as the first part of God’s promise. So we are waiting for God to finish making us his children. I mean we are waiting for our bodies to be made free.”
The Preacher Pollard Blog 