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THE Apostle Paul continues to work out and describe to us the nature of this amazing change that takes place in us when we become believers in Jesus Christ. I have given this sermon the title of ‘A New Way’ because this seems to me to highlight the main thing that is described for us by the Apostle. The way the Apostle deals with this is to give us a vivid description and appraisal of human condition before and after Christian conversion. Verse 5 is the description of what we are all like before we become Christians truly, and what our condition is naturally in this world, and this gives a very cogent answer to the problem of why we are what we are, and why the world is in such a mess, and has always been. In verse 6 we have the amazing change that has taken place in the life of the believer, which changes the whole tenure of our lives, and our whole make up. The reason why this change has taken place is because we have died to the law. The change has taken place through death, and as we saw last time this death was accomplished by Christ, and our being joined to Christ in his death by faith in him.

Again I think the best way to appreciate the wonder and completeness of this new thing in us is to look at the ‘before’ and ‘after’. It is by such a comparison that the greatness of the change can be better understood and appreciated. There is a double ‘newness’ that we shall be able to observe. There is the wholly new way of life that results from this change, which is brought about by a new freedom and a new life, for we are released from what bound us and kept us in prison.

What we are told here about the human condition as we are naturally born into our world is something that human wisdom would totally deny. For a very long time now, natural human thought has majored on the belief that we are evolving from a lower sort of life to a higher, and that humanity is getting better and better. In our modern age we tend to exalt ourselves above those of the past, and count our knowledge and wisdom greater than theirs. Whereas it is true there have been great advances in technology, and these are advancing faster and faster, there has been no advance in human behaviour, or any better concord between the nations of the world. Every nation reports that problems of crime, poverty, and decline in moral values is on the increase.

The nearest we get to it in human thinking is to say that it is human to be imperfect, or to say that we can’t be perfect. We accept the fact that the human factor always opens us to the possibility, or more likely the inevitability, of imperfections and mistakes, but the idea of human beings being bound and controlled is something human wisdom just cannot accept. We speak grandly of freedom, and human rights, and these are great values for us all; but the truth is that human beings are not free naturally. The trouble is that we think of freedom totally in terms of outward forces. We rightly feel that no human being should enslave or dominate another, and no government or authority should enslave their people, but this is looking at freedom entirely in terms of outward force. What human thinking is not able to accept is the inner slavery of which the Apostle is speaking. We just can’t accept that mankind is not master of his destiny. If only people would look at this understanding of the human condition which Paul gives us here, and believe it, then we would seek the remedy, the only remedy, which the Apostle describes to us, which is in Christ.

We talk grandly of the freedom of the will. We talk thoughtlessly about our right to choose and that we have freedom of choice. Any other idea is repugnant to our whole concept of human freedom, yet the Apostle speaks of our being controlled, and of our being controlled by our own nature, and that our nature is sinful. We are not controlled from outside ourselves, but from inside.

The truth is that every free choice we make is governed by the fact of the condition of our nature, which is sinful. This is the truth which is being presented to us here in verse 5. The truth is that if there is a choice between one course of action and another course of action, theoretically we can choose freely one or the other. The fact is that our choice is governed by what we desire, and not what we know. If there are two sorts of food presented to us, with one sort being just what we like, and the other being just what revolts us, then we will certainly chose the food we like and not the food we don’t like. We are only free to choose according to our nature. If that nature is evil in any way, then our choices will lean towards evil. We see this all the time in every walk of life. The realm of politics is one such. Politicians talk grandly in self-righteous terms, and promise grand things. When we look a little deeper we find that it is far from good motives that are motivating the policies that are chosen, and often the way these policies are pursued is far from good. There seems always to be a hidden agenda where self comes first.

The truth about our human condition is that we have natures that love evil and not good. This fact is in no way altered or overturned by the claim that human beings do many good things, and show many excellent qualities. These good things are just remnants of the lost image of God that we once possessed, and which is now lost, and the fact that God in his grace and mercy orders things that we are not as bad as we could or would be. From birth, from the moment we breathe, we show this sinful nature which controls us. A baby has no inhibitions, and as soon as they have life they show this sinful nature. A baby shows greed, selfishness, bad temper, hate, self will, etc. It is no good claiming that babies have so many lovable qualities. Of course they do, because this is just what babies want for a comfortable and happy existence. So babies will smile when things are good, and respond to love, because they need love themselves, etc. but if their desires are thwarted in any way, we will see the sinful nature show itself in opposition to that which is seen to deprive the child of the desire of the moment.

Where does this all come from. We never teach our children to be bad. This is something that shows itself naturally. Instead we have to bust ourselves to teach our children to be good, and it is a hard and uphill struggle. It is one of God’s loving and gracious provisions in this sinful world, that he places controls in the world to curtail the excesses of human sinfulness. There is good in the world because God in his mercy does not allow us to be as bad as our natures would be, given total freedom. Also God has left in us, since this catastrophe happened to humanity, something of his image that he created us to have, and so we are able still to know good and in some measure appreciate it.

Sinful passions are the product of the sinful nature that controls human beings. It is the sinful nature which is what we are that is the source of sinful passions. The word passion describes vividly the problem we are up against. Passion gives the picture of strong and uncontrolled desire. Here is the incomprehensible factor.

The law of God was given to show us what God’s good and holiness is, and the standards that are good, and the life that God requires of us. God has placed us under the authority of this law. We can resist all we like, but this law has total authority over us. We can disobey, but this does not allow us to escape the authority of the law, but rather binds us more strongly under the law’s authority. Immediately we sin, the law judges us, and condemns us as guilty and pronounces sentence. The more we resist by sinning more and more, the worse our condition becomes. We do not become free, but more and more guilty and more and more under condemnation, and so we are bound more and more under the penalty of the law against disobedience and sin.

However, the situation is far worse than this. Because of our sinful nature, far from helping us to be good, the law stimulates our sinful natures into resistance. The dominion of the law makes our sinful nature ‘see red’, that is excites our sinful passions so that we angrily resist, and want to do even more strongly what the law says we must not do. Again we see this in children. What is the reaction of the child when it is told it can’t have what it most desires. The child wants it more than ever, and opposes in every way possible the will that is seeking to deprive it from the desired pleasure. This happens because these sinful passions are in our bodies, in our very nature. This is what we are. We are truly ‘bound’ as Paul describes in verse 6. We can’t say that the case of the child is different, and that when we are adult we have got over this problem. Far from getting over the problem, we have simply found more clever ways of getting our way, and hiding the passions within us. Everyone of us would be exposed if it were possible for our minds, feelings and imaginations to be read.

The result in our living and our lives is simple. We bring forth fruit to death. We see this as glaringly obvious in the life of an alcoholic or a drug addict. They really do bring forth death in their lives - death to their physical life, death to their health, death to friendship, death to comfort, and so on. It is equally true in the life of us all. Our sinful passions may be cloaked, and kept inside or in private but they are their and they bring forth fruit to death.

The idea of fruit simply describes what is the product of our lives. Trees are supposed to bear fruit, and they bear fruit according to their nature. An apple tree bears apples as it fruit, and so on. We have sinful natures, and so our lives bear the fruit that brings forth death, and this is true of every single human being, until they are freed from the law by death.

How can this be true? Many, many people live exemplary lives as judged by human standards. Many people do works of charity and show love. Many good causes are engaged in, and much success is achieved in many directions which bring betterment in human society. However this is just the outward crust, which hides the inner heart. Everyone of us know that we show a bad side, which although may most of the time be hidden and in some sense controlled, it is still there. This breaks out from time to time. It is also true that even if we do not act out evil thoughts, the thoughts are there, and they do effect our attitudes, and effect our judgments, and the way we do things. Then there is the motives behind what we do. We may engage in some good work, but what is the motive behind our actions. Some may be good but there will always be less creditable motives, and the motive of self glory is rarely, if ever, absent.

What we fail to understand is that the Apostle is thinking in terms of eternity and the view of God of our lives and living, and the result of our living in relationship to God. The truth is that there is no act that we do, however good it may be in the eyes of the world, that is pure enough for the eye of God. Every good work that we do is tainted in some way by sin, so that it is evil according to the law of God which has dominion over us. Only a perfect work, the work which is entirely free from sin or imperfection, is a good work according to the law, and so worthy of life. Under these terms of the law, every work that we do, because it falls short of the glory of God, becomes a dead work, and brings forth fruit unto death, because it is deserving of death according to the law of God. Under the law we can never bring forth fruit for life. It is impossible. We live, therefore, under the sentence of death.

We have only had time this month to look at verse 5 and how we are controlled by our sinful nature, and so only bring forth fruit for death. It shows us that however much we may seek to serve God, such service will only produce fruit for death, and this old way of seeking to serve God by trying to keep the law is one of failure and loss. I hope that all who read this sermon will not just be depressed and so angry, but face the issue the Apostle brings before us, and so turn in despair to the glorious remedy that the Apostle shows us is in Christ. There is a new way in Christ. In the new way we can truly serve God acceptably. This blessing, which comes from dying to the law, we will look at next month.