For previous parts of Romans.
13 Therefore, has the good become death? May it not be! But Sin, so that it might appear as sin, was working death in me through the good, so that Sin might become incredibly sinful through the commandment. 14 For I know that the Law is spiritual, but I am fleshly, having been enslaved under Sin. 15 For I do not know what I am doing. 16 But if I am doing what I do not want [to do], I agree with the Law, that [it is] good. 17 But now I am no longer doing it, but the Sin that dwells in me. 18 For I know that good does not dwell in me--that is, in my flesh. For the will is present in me, but to do the good is not. 19 For I am not doing the good that I want [to do], but I am practicing that bad that I do not want [to do]. 20 But if I am not doing that which I want [to do], it is no longer I doing it but the Sin that dwells in me.
21 Then, I am finding the "law" in me--the one wanting to do the good--that the bad is present in me. For I delight in the law of God in my inner person, 23 but I am seeing a different "law" in my [body] parts, warring against the "law" of my mind and subjugating me with the "law" of Sin which is in my [body] parts. 24 A wretched person [am] I! Who will rescue me from the body of this death? 25 But thanks [be] to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
Therefore then, [to summarize the default state of the good-desiring Jew], I myself am serving the law of God with the mind, but the "law" of Sin with the flesh.
8:1 Then now [there is] no condemnation to those in Christ Jesus, 2 for the "law" of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has freed you from the "law" of Sin and death...
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11 comments:
This is why there can be no "Christian State"!
"If the state may force a man to risk death or hideous maiming and crippling [...] for a cause he may neither approve of nor even understand, if his consent is not required to send him into unspeakable martyrdom—then, in principle, all rights are negated in that state, and its government is not man’s protector any longer. What else is there left to protect?" | Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, 226
The State can not mandate what should come from a free choice of value. But, the Church has acted many times like a State in promoting "the holy"....and it doesn't depend on the kind of religion, either...
Tertullion believed that "the blood of the martyrs was the seed of the Church", while Constantine believed that one must convert under the "fear of the sword". Both are wrong.
The Church should never demand a man's martyrdom or conversion, even for it own purposes of "Church growth"...that is immoral!
You're hilarious Angie... did this come from the word "state" in the last line? You are the incarnation of equivocation ;-)
By the way, Angie, I hide behind my Arminianism as an excuse for what I consider to be a practical reality that the state should ideally be religiously neutral, although it is impossible to be morally neutral.
"the state should ideally be religiously neutral, although it is impossible to be morally neutral." Hey Ken, is it okay if I agree with you? ;-)
It should be okay as long as we don't do it too often ;-)
Do you agree with the view that this is more about Paul's pre-Christian life than a reflection about his "current" Christian life struggles?
Yes, I would go even a step further and say that it's not even much of a memory on Paul's part. I don't think Paul ever struggled much with a guilty conscience (e.g., Phil. 1:6).
"I would go even a step further and say that it's not even much of a memory on Paul's part. I don't think Paul ever struggled much with a guilty conscience"
That's interesting. Thanks.
The universals are not practical, but ideal. That is why social conformity and individual liberty is as "odds", in a free society. The individual lives in society, but how that "plays out" varies...
As to the "moral", that is defined according to one's values....the universal affirms, as our nation does, "life, liberty and the pursuit of property (happiness)", which is a "globalist" position...but the practical realities are written and defined by our "Constitutional Republic", which protect individual liberties. So, our nation is not a Statist nation (under political authoritarianism, but the "rule of law")...Nor is it a "Christian nation" in the absolute sense (under Church authority)... and such as it should be in a free society...
Rick,
You must have some definition of "Christian" to be so sure of your opinion! That is fine, as long as you recognize that it is only your opinion ;-)!
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