But Scripture has locked up everything under the control of sin …
Summary: In a short few words, Paul tells us a story that explains much of what we experience in real life.
Paul is about to say that there is a reason not everyone believes in Jesus. The past few verses have been about the law and how the law delineates between sin and righteousness. In between these two ideas, he tells us that Scripture has locked up everything under the control of sin.
Hmmm…
What does this mean?
If this passage were a Western, Scripture would be the “Good Guy,” and sin would be the “Bad Guy.” Why would the Good Guy allow the Bad Guy to control everything?
Imagine, for a moment, a town where the Bad Guys have taken control. Over time, they managed to gain power and influence through devious means. They corrupted some of the town’s leaders by blackmail and threats. Others were corrupted by bribes or entrapment. Eventually, every position of authority in this town fell under the control of the Bad Guys or people they “own.”
The “common people” in the town still led their lives the best they could, but life was hard. The Bad Guys demanded a percentage of everything. They demanded money from the people at every opportunity. If someone complained, they threw them in jail or had them beaten or killed.
One day, a friend of the Good Guy showed up on the scene. There was something about him that was different. He wasn’t afraid of the Bad Guys. He was able to stand up to them and call them out. He had nothing they wanted except the idea that people should stand against corruption. The Bad Guys hated that!
The Bad Guys started to harass and threaten the Good Guy’s friend. People began to listen and pay attention. Soon, some people followed him around and listened to everything he said. Some of them began to change how they lived. People started to believe.
Do you see what is happening here? By allowing the Bad Guys to lock up everything under their control, people can see how bad things are. When the “friend of the Good Guy” comes along, he points the way to a life without corruption. To achieve this new life, people need to believe. The same is true for us. If we want to escape the control of sin, we have to believe.
Application: Read the Bible every day to learn about the Good Guy.
Food for Thought: What is it like to be under the “control of sin?”
Your question this morning made me pause a bit and walk down memory lane. I just remember alot of anger, pain, and destruction. Self-destruction and destruction of those around me. I am grateful that Christ opened my eyes to it. Christ gives us a spirit of self control. Not like some kind of super power, just more clearly defined choices. A recognition of the truth and the ability to choose it. The thing about being under the control of sin is that one doesn’t even know why they do what they do. They act out of fear. Its better to light a candle then curse the dark. It is better to live a life not of fear, but of power, love, and self control.
Chris,
Thank you! Your reflection on your past reminds me of my own. For me, being in Christ is like waking from a bad dream. In the dream I was trapped by forces I couldn’t see or control. Now I feel like I am free.
Thanks for the devotion. And thanks for your response CH.
I think Paul summed up pretty well what it is like to be under the control of sin and what it is like to be freed from that control in Romans 6. Then he described the battle we have as believers against the old sin nature in Romans 7.
Romans 6: 1 – 14: What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
5For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, a that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.
8Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
11In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. 13Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. 14For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.
Romans 7: 21 – 25: So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. 24What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? 25Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
Thank you, Rich!
Romans 7:24 is a great verse on this topic:
“What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?”
Then the next verse gives the answer:
“Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!“
What is it like to be under the “control of sin?”
Every sin, every wrongdoing, no matter what kind, whether acted out in behavior or nurtured secretly in some dark place of our heart, is born out of a belief that disobeying God, wrongdoing will produce a happier outcome than obeying God, right-doing.
It is an existence in increasing bondage to the grip of these sins, as the distance between the individual and life in God increases. Sin feeds the flesh of an individual as they deprive their spirit of all life.
But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Matthew 5:28
Each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin.
James 1:14–15
Ron,
Epic comment! Well said! Thank you! 🙂