not hard enough

Good morning brothers and sisters,
Hopefully you all remembered to set your clocks ahead an hour for daylight savings time before going to bed. This morning we'll be worshiping in Christler Hall with a more relaxed feel than usual (even though we're pretty relaxed all the time). Our service will include music from Bob Dylan, Neil Young and our own Alan Murphy. I'm excited about this morning, and I hope you can be there. After worship several of us will head across the street to the Boulevard to discuss the introduction of I Refuse to Lead a Dying Church. Even if you haven't read the chapter, you're more than welcome to join in.

Our passage this morning features Paul wrestling with his desire to do the right thing while the power of sin pushes him in the opposite direction. Paul's words apply to our life in general and to addiction more specifically. He reminds us that trying harder won't work, we need to surrender and accept Christ's salvation. We can't do what we want to do and we cannot save ourselves from sin. Come seek Christ in worship today.

God bless,
Sam

Romans 7:15-24

I 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.

²¹So 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.