Is There Really Any Hope?

At the end of Romans 7, Paul describes his personal struggle with sinfulness and holiness:

"For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.

"For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

"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.

"Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (v 15-25a).

Anyone who is struggling to live a holy life will be able to understand this. We know what God expects. We even delight in His Word. We want to do what is right and pleasing to God.

But the battle is constant. We want to do right, but we don't always do it.

Paul gives us the victory point: "Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!"

Victory in Jesus!

But then the verse ends, "So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin."

So there's victory, but the battle continues. Is there really any hope?

Look at the next verse: "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (8:1).

The real hope is in eternity.

We will fall into sin. We will live in victory. We will fall again. We will be victorious. Then we'll fall again.

But, for those who are in Christ Jesus, there will be no condemnation.

When we come into the throne room of God, He is not going to condemn us. He is not going to beat us for our sins. He is not going to send us to hell, because our times of sin were greater than our times of holiness.

Because we stand in Christ, we are cleansed, whole, holy, forgiven, justified, redeemed, complete, sanctified, and set free.

Even in this life of ups and downs, struggling between holiness and sinfulness, at the end of our lives on earth, we will stand before God without condemnation.

Jesus paid it all!
All to Him I owe.
Sin had left a crimson stain.
He washed it white as snow.