Romans 7:13-25

3. The law’s inability 7:13-25

In Romans 7:13-25 Paul continued to describe his personal struggle with sin but with mounting intensity. The forces of external law and internal sin (i.e., his sinful nature) conflicted. He found no deliverance from this conflict except through the Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 7:25). Many students of this passage, including myself, believe what Paul was describing here was his own personal struggle as a Christian to obey the law and so overcome the promptings of his sinful nature (flesh) to disobey it. The present tenses in his testimony support this view. Without God’s help he could not succeed. I will say more in defense of this view later. However what he wrote here is not normal or necessary Christian experience. What is normal and necessary for a Christian is to obey God since the Holy Spirit leads, motivates, and enables us; disobedience is, in this sense, abnormal Christian conduct.