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deed can be; chap. viii. 7. How then can he delight in it? After the inward man.-The inward man is a term used only by Paul, and in reference to those who are regenerated. It is the new or spiritual nature, not merely the reason and conscience. Than this nothing can be more obviously characteristic of the Christian. Notwithstanding the evil of his corrupt nature, he is conscious of delighting in the law of God in its full

extent.

V. 23.-But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in my members.

In the preceding verse, the Apostle had spoken of the law of God in the inward man; here he speaks of another law in his members, warring against the law of his mind. Thus, he denominates his new and spiritual nature his "inward man" and his "mind," and his old and carnal nature his "members." The bent of the Apostle's mind, according to his renewed nature, inclined him to delight in the law of God. But he found an opposite bent in his corrupt nature, which he calls a law in his members. This he represents as warring against the other. Is not this the experience of every Christian ? Is there not a constant struggle of the corruptions of the heart against the principle of holiness implanted by the Spirit of God in the new birth?

And bringing me into captivity to the law of sin and death. Mr Stuart endeavours to aggravate this description in such a manner as to render it unsuitable to the regenerate man. He supposes that this represents the person as brought entirely and completely into captivity, which cannot be supposed of the regenerate. He refers to captives taken in war, who are entirely in the

power of their conquerors, and are reduced to the most abject slavery. This is feeble reasoning. How far this captivity extends cannot be known from the figure. And as a matter of fact, if the evil principle of our nature prevails in exciting one evil thought, it has taken us captive. So far it has conquered, and so far we are defeated and made prisoners. But this is quite consistent with the supposition that on the whole we may have the victory over sin.

V. 24.-O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

O wretched man that I am.-' -This language is suitable only to the regenerate. An unregenerate man is indeed wretched, but he does not feel the wretchedness here expressed. He may be sensible of misery, and he may be filled with anxious fears and dreadful forebodings; but the person here described is wretched only from a sense of the evil principle which is in his members. Such a feeling no unregenerate man ever possessed. An unregenerate man may wish to be delivered from danger and punishment; but instead of wishing to be delivered from the law of his nature, he delights in that law. He has so much pleasure in indulging that law, that for its sake he risks all consequences.

The body of this death.-Some understand this of his natural body, and suppose the exclamation to be a wish to die. But this would be a sentiment totally at variance with the principles of the Apostle, and unsuitable to the scope of the passage. It is evidently an expression of a wish to be free from that corrupt principle which caused him so much affliction. This he calls a body, as before he had called it his members. And he calls it a body of death, because its demerit is

death. It causes death and everlasting ruin to the world; and had it not been for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, it must have had the same consequences with respect to all.

V. 25.—I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God: but with the flesh the law of sin. I thank God.-Some suppose that this expresses thanks for the victory as already obtained. But this cannot be the meaning; as in the same breath, the Apostle speaks of his wretchedness, because of the existence of the evil. Some, again, supposing that it refers to present deliverance, explain it to be the freedom from the law spoken of in the preceding part of the chapter. But this would make the Apostle speak entirely away from the purpose. He is discoursing of that corruption which he still experiences. Besides, the form of the expression requires that the deliverance should be supposed future, who SHALL deliver me? I thank God through Jesus Christ.—The natural supplement is, he will deliver me. At death Paul was to be entirely freed from the evil of his nature. The consolation of the Christian against the corruption of his nature is, that although he shall not get free from it in this world, he shall hereafter be entirely delivered.

So then. This is the consequence which Paul draws, and the sum of all that he had said from the 14th verse. In one point of view he served the law of God, and in another the law of sin. Happy is the man who can thus, like Paul, with conscious sincerity say to himself,-" With the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.” Here he divides himself, as it were, into two parts, the mind, by which he means his inward man, his renewed self; and the

flesh, by which he designs his carnal nature, or the old man that was sold under sin; and thus he accounts for his serving two different laws-the law of God written on his mind, and in the service of which he delighted as a regenerate man; and the law of sin by which he was sometimes carried captive. Beyond this no child of God can go while in this world; it will ever remain the character of the regenerate man. But this fully ascertains that Paul himself, in his predominant disposition and fixed purpose, serves God, although he is compelled to acknowledge that the power of the old man within him still subsists, and exerts itself; while it is his earnest desire daily to put him off, Eph. iv. 22, and to be transformed by the renewing of his mind.

In every believer, and in no one else, there are these two principles, sin and grace, flesh and spirit, the law of the members and the law of the mind. This may be perverted by the opposer of divine truth into a handle against the gospel, and by the hypocrite to excuse his sin. But it gives ground to neither. It is the truth of God, and the experience of every Christian. If any man will pervert it to a wicked purpose, he shall bear his sin. We are not at liberty to pervert the word of God in order to preserve it from a contrary perversion. Many, no doubt, wrest the Scriptures to their own destruction. I serve.-Employing as he does through the whole of this passage the present tense, Paul does not say, I have served, as referring to his state of unregeneracy, but "I serve," as respecting his present state as a believer in Christ, composed of flesh and spirit, which, as they are different principles, regard two different laws. It is further to be observed, that

this last account which he gives of himself, and which agrees with all he had said before and confirms the whole, is delivered by him, after he had with so much faith and fervency given thanks to God in view of his future and complete deliverance from sin. This, as Gill well remarks, is a conclusive argument and proof that he speaks of himself in this whole discourse concerning indwelling sin as a regenerated person.

As if to render it altogether impossible to imagine that the Apostle was personating another man, he here in conclusion uses the expression, I myself, which cannot, if language has a meaning, be applied to another person. It is a phrase which again and again he employs. Rom. ix. 3; 2 Cor. x. 1, and xii. 13.

On the whole, then, we here learn that the Apostle Paul, notwithstanding all the grace with which he was favoured, found a principle of evil operating so strongly in his heart that he denominates it a law always present and always active to retard him in his course. He was not, however, under its dominion. He was in Christ Jesus a new creature, born of God, renewed in the spirit of his mind. He delighted in the holy law of God in all its extent and spirituality, while at the same time he felt the influence of the other hateful principle, that tendency to evil which characterises the old man,—which waged perpetual war against the work of grace in his soul, impelling him to the commission of sin, and constantly striving, to bring him under its power. Nothing can more clearly demonstrate the fallen state of man, and the entire corruption of his nature, than the perpetual and irreconcilable warfare which that corruption maintains in the hearts of all believers against "the divine nature" of which they

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