Close Menu X
Navigate

From the Pastors at Joy

Why Do Free People Continue in Sin?

In a blog post last week, we considered from Romans 8:2 that in Christ, believers have been set free from the law of sin and death. I ended that post by asking: what exactly is this freedom? If we are free, why do we still find such a struggle with sin inside of us? Does that ongoing struggle mean that I am not really free, and maybe even, not in Christ? These are the questions I want to consider in this blog post.

First, let’s understand that there is a struggle with sin in the Christian life. Our transformation into the image of Jesus is progressive, and incomplete until the time when we see Christ. Until that time, there is a war that rages between the Spirit and the flesh:

"And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit" (2 Corinthians 3:18)

"And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ" (Philippians 1:6)

"But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do" (Galatians 5:16-17).

So there is, most certainly a struggle with sin that exists in the life of Christians; whatever this freedom that belongs to those in Christ Jesus, it is not the total absence of sin in this life.

Nevertheless, we must not let the reality of struggle with sin obscure the fact that there is real freedom from sin now. That is what Paul is saying in Romans 8:2, "For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death." This freedom from the law of sin is in contrast to the captivity to the law of sin that Paul speaks of at the end of Romans 7:

"So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members." (Romans 7:21-23)

The contrast between the captivity to the law of sin in Romans 7 and the freedom from that law of sin in Romans 8 is one of the main reasons why I am not persuaded that the “divided man” (“I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out,” 7:18) Paul is describing in Romans 7 is a Christian.

Romans 7 is a beloved passage for those who intimately know the painful struggle that exists between the Spirit and the flesh, the desire to walk in obedience to God’s commands but our frequent failures to do so. While I earlier mentioned some passages which confirm why I do believe Christians experience struggle with sin, I don’t think it’s helpful for Christians to appeal to Romans 7 to support that conviction. And the primary (but not only) reason I believe that is because Paul clearly says in Romans 8:2 that those who are in Christ have been set free from the law of sin of which this divided man of Romans 7 is a captive.

(A detailed explanation of this difficult and controversial passage is beyond the scope of this blog post. For those who are interested, a helpful summary of the two competing interpretations of this passage can be found on pages 379-392 of Tom Schreiner’s commentary on Romans.)

Romans 8 is describing a real, true, decisive freedom that has happened from “the law of sin”. We are free from that law (principle, impulse, etc.) that existed within our members to prevent us from the doing good. In Christ, we “experience substantial, significant and observable victory over sin, and yet perfection is not [ours]” (Schreiner, p.391). In Christ, we are really free from sin’s enslaving rule, and that will be evident in the life of a believer.

Yet that freedom does not exclude a real struggle to live out the freedom that is ours. Here’s a favorite illustration of mine that captures the point I am trying to make. In The Shawshank Redemption, Red is an old, savvy prisoner in a rough jail who finally, after decades of incarceration, is freed on parole. As he reenters society, he gets a job at a little mom & pop grocery store, and there’s a moment in the store where he asks his new employer if he can take a quick break to use the restroom. His supervisor says, with mild irritation, “You don't need to ask me every time you have to go to the bathroom; just go!”

What is going on here? At the time of his parole, Red had been set free from imprisonment. He was really free. But in asking to use the restroom, he was not living like the free man that he was; he had become so accustomed to living like a prisoner that his old habits and old way of thinking were hard to break, though he was really, truly, decisively, free. He did not need to live like a prisoner anymore, but in that moment he was choosing to live like the prisoner that he no longer was. The manager at the grocery store essentially was saying, “Red, you’re free! Don’t go on living like a prisoner anymore!”

The process of transformation into the image of Jesus is like this. In Christ, by the Spirit, we are really free. But because of how long we’ve lived as a prisoner to sin, we can easily forget who we are now, and make choices that are more compatible with our life of slavery than what is now true of us in Jesus. The key exhortation that the Christian needs, then, is, “Be who you are!”

In Christ, Christian, you are really free. Don’t go on living like a slave of sin today. Be who you are!