Sunday, June 1, 2008 
Scripture reading: Romans 17:14-25
14 For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am of the flesh, sold into slavery under sin.* 15I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. 17But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. 19For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. 20Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.
21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. 22For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, 23but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 25Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, with my mind I am a slave to the law of God, but with my flesh I am a slave to the law of sin.
Sermon Title: "SO CONFLICTED" Sunday, June 1, 2008
PASTOR HUDSON: From Romans the seventh
chapter, Paul shares a concept about the dilemma that
we face as human beings. It's a passage in which he
laments that, on the one hand, he desires to do that
which is good. He has a concept of what the higher
ideal would be, the best way to live, the best way to
function, God's way.
Yet, on the other hand, he acknowledges there is
a conflict within his inner-being that often times
betrays him and prevents him from doing it. Even as
he understands this is the way he would like to be in
his best moment, there is this nature or character
that works against him, a struggle that oftentimes,
more often than he likes, causes him to do exactly the
opposite of what he would wish to do.
There is a scholarly debate as to whether Paul is
describing his past life before knowing Jesus Christ,
or whether he's describing his current, present life.
I tend to believe that really it has implications for
both categories; for individuals that do not
know Christ is their Lord and savior, but also for
individuals who are attempting to live a Christian
life and sometimes feel like they are a failure when they make
mistakes.
I think it has a message for both, though I kind
of come down on the side of believing that he's really
describing his current life. All of his verb tenses
are present tenses. It's as though he's saying,
folks, this is the way I am, but then he ends that
passage by simply saying that in all of his
frustration, the sense of failure, the sense of not
getting it quite the way he wishes he could, he cries
out, "Who will deliver me from this body of death?"
His answer coming back to that rhetorical
question is simply this: Thanks be to God through
Jesus Christ I will be delivered. Now that means two
things. Number one, it means that on the level of our
eternal life, we are saved through faith in Jesus
Christ, that's the good news of the gospel. It's the
idea that you can go to heaven and not have it
altogether. You can make it into glory and not be a
perfect person because of Jesus Christ.
We are accepted into God's presence because of
faith in the work that Christ has done, thank
goodness. It's good news, to be honest with you,
probably because most of us if we had to get there by
our own best efforts would be in a world of hurt,
that's why we call it good news.
But secondly, we are also delivered because God
is not content to leave us in that condition. You
see, you may be able to get to heaven and be kind of a
cantankerous old, rotten person, but it's not a whole
lot of fun going that way, and God's desire is for you
and I to be transformed, to rub the rough edges off
and become more and more, through the transforming
grace of God, like Jesus himself.
So the message I think is two-fold. Our
salvation is secure, and we can rely on it, but also
know that in the words of that old contemporary song
from many years ago, he's still working on me, that
message of transformation goes forward today.
The danger is for so many of us because we are
human is that we'll carve out a comfort zone. On the
one hand we'll say, Lord, I thank you. Because of
your covering grace, I know that when I go to sleep
tonight I am rest-assured that if I wake up dead
tomorrow morning I'm going to be with you. Then on
the other hand, being comfortable with the idea that
because that's true, I'm not going to take seriously
the transformation, the sanctification of my own life.
We carve out comfort zones with our
less-than-perfect ways of being, and we say it's okay.
It's easier to stay with it than it is to change, and
God calls us to transform and to be changed in the
image of Christ by putting off the old stuff that we
know categorically is not consistent with who Jesus
is, saying no to that stuff and saying yes to the
presence of God in our life.
It's a spiritual exercise, but one that is worth
pursuing because of the abundance of joy that it
brings our way. So I would ask you this morning as we
come to the table of Christ for communion to come with
a heart that desires to say, Lord, let this be good
food for the journey and medicine for my soul.
Let's come to the table of Christ this morning,
and as we do so, I'm going to ask us to be in an
attitude of prayer.