therefore, perfectly pertinent to the Apostle's object that he should detail his own experience that sanctification could not be effected by the law.
2. But in the second place, he uses the first person singular throughout. He says, " I had not known sin," " I died," " The commandment which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death," " I consent unto the law that it is good," " I delight in the law of God after the inward man, but I see another law in my members," etc., etc. We are bound to understand the Apos- tle to speak of himself in the use of such language, unless there be something in the context, or in the nature of what is said, to render the reference to him impossible. It has been shown, how- ever, that the context favours, if it does not absolutely demand the reference of what is said to the Apostle himself. And that there is nothing in the experience here detailed inconsistent with the experience of the true children of God, is evident from the fact that the same humility, the same sense of guilt, the same consciousness of indwelling sin, the same conviction of helpless- ness, here expressed, are found in all the penitential portions of Scripture. Job, David, Isaiah, and Nehemiah, make the same confessions and lamentations that the Apostle here makes. The same is true of believers since the coming of Christ. There is no one of them, not even the holiest, who is not constrained to speak of himself as Paul here speaks, unless indeed he chooses to give the language of the Apostle a meaning which it was never intended to express.
3. While the passage contains nothing inconsistent with the experience of true believers, it is inconsistent with the experi- ence of unrenewed men. They are not the subjects of the in- ward conflict here depicted. There is in them indeed often a struggle protracted and painful, between reason and conscience on the one side, and evil passion on the other. But there is not in the unrenewed that utter renunciation of self, that looking for help to God in Christ alone, and that delight in the law of God, of which the Apostle here speaks.
What Romans vii. 7-25 teaches.
Assuming, then, that we have in this chapter an account of the experience of a true and even of an advanced Christian, we learn that in every Christian there is a mixture of good and evil ; that the original corruption of nature is not entirely removed by re- generation ; that although the believer is made a new creature,
224 PART in. Ch. XVIII. — SANCTIFIC ATION.
is translated from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God's dear Son, he is but partially sanctified ; that his selfishness, pride, discontent, worldliness, still cleave to, and torment him ; that they effectually prevent his " doing what he would," they prevent his living without sin, they prevent his intercourse with God being as intimate and uninterrupted as he could and does desire. He finds not only that he is often, even daily, overcome so as to sin in thought, word, and deed, but also that his faith, love, zeal, and devotion are never such as to satisfy his own con- science ; much less can they satisfy God. He therefore is daily called upon to confess, repent, and pray for forgiveness. The Apostle designates these conflicting principles which he found within himself, the one, indwelling sin; "sin that dwelleth in me ; " or the " law in my members ; " " the law of sin ; " the other, " the mind," " the law of my mind," " the inward man." His internal self, the Ego, was sometimes controlled by the one, and sometimes by the other.
We learn, further, that the control of the evil principle is re- sisted, that subjection to it is regarded as a hateful bondage, that the good principle is in the main victorious, and that through Christ it will ultimately be completely triumphant. Sanctifica- tion therefore, according to this representation, consists in the gradual triumph of the new nature implanted in regeneration over the evil that still remains after the heart is renewed. In other words, as elsewhere expressed, it is a dying unto sin and living unto righteousness. (1 Pet. ii. 24.)
Grdlatians v. 16—26.
Another passage of like import is Galatians v. 16-26, " Walk m the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh ; and these are contrary the one to the other : so that ye cannot do the things that ye would," etc., etc. The Scriptures teach that the Spirit of God dwells in his people, not only col- lectively as the Church, but individually in every believer, so that of every Christian it may be said, he is a temple of the Holy Ghost. God is said to dwell wherever He permanently manifests his presence, whether as of old in the temple, or in the hearts of his people, in the Church, or in heaven. And as the Spirit dwells in believers, He there manifests his life-giving, controlling power, and is in them the principle, or source, or con- trolling influence which determines their inward and outward life.