FBC Gridley

Romans 6:6 says that when we become a Christian, that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—

​

Romans 6:11 tells us, In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.  

​

If a person becomes a Christian, and he discovers that the old self re-emerges, does that mean that he is not genuinely born again, he is not really a Christian?

 

That's a question that a lot of Christian people ask themselves. If it's true, that I am dead to sin and the old man has been buried, why is that old man still making its appeal to me?

​

Failure to receive a satisfactory answer to that question leads to guilt, uncertainty, depression, and even some nervous breakdowns among Christian people.

​

Romans 7 can be helpful to all of us at this point. This is Paul, the greatest Christian in history, saying, “the good I want to do I don't always want to do. The evil that I don't want to do I sometimes find myself doing.”

 

That's surprising, coming from Paul, it seems almost a contradiction to the previous chapter where he said we died to sin.

 

But once we understand this paradox, it's a source of encouragement to our imperfect lives.

​