There’s a real tension in the Christian life that’s clearly illustrated with two passages of Scripture.
The first is in Romans 7, where Paul speaks honestly about the war going on inside him:
“I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.” – Romans 7:15
He does the very thing he hates! He delights in God’s law in his inner being, yet he feels another law waging war inside him. He seems so hopelessly bothered by this that it compels him to cry out, “What a wretched man I am!” (v.24). Does that sound like the voice of someone who loves sin? Absolutely not! It’s the voice of a born-again believer who hates it.
The second is 1 John 3, where John says that no one born of God keeps on sinning.
“No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God.” – 1 John 3:9
At first glance, it almost feels like Paul and John are at odds, but they’re not. Paul is describing the reality of the human struggle with sin, while John is describing a consistent pattern of a life shaped by repentance.
Being born again does not remove the fight against sin, but it does change the allegiance! Before Christ, we sinned freely and even defended it. But after Christ, we hate sin so much that we can’t continue living there comfortably. We may still fall, sometimes more than we want to admit, but God’s seed remains in us. His Spirit convicts us, unsettles us, and draws us back to Him.
So if you feel the tension of this battle, don’t assume you’re lost. The war being waged inside you isn’t proof that you don’t belong to Christ – it’s evidence that you do!
Dead hearts do not fight sin. But born-again hearts do, and the very presence of that fight is a quiet testimony that God is still at work and will finish what He has begun in you.
Former Blackout Artist 