Struggling With Sin

The Believers Life Style Bible Study
Presents
Struggling with Sin
May 13, 2020
Scripture: Romans 7:7-25
Presented by Michael Webb

Open It

  1. As a child, how did you respond to the commands given to you by your parents?
  2. How do you tend to respond to authority?
  3. *What sort of bad habits are hardest to break?

Explore It

  1. What is the purpose of the Law? (7:7-8)
  2. What bad effect does knowing the Law have on a person? (7:7-8)
  3. When a person has no knowledge of the Law, what becomes of sin? (7:9)
  4. *How does knowing the Law bring the possibility of death to a person? (7:9-11)
  5. How does the Law put a person to death? (7:11)
  6. What are the characteristics of the Law and the commandment? (7:12)
  7. How does the awareness of the Law produce death in a person? (7:13)
  8. *What did Paul share about his own attempts to follow the Law? (7:14-16)
  9. *What did Paul blame for his continuing failure to do good? (7:17-20)
  10. How did Paul describe his own struggle to do what was right? (7:21-23)
  11. How did Paul describe himself and his situation? (7:24)
  12. To whom did Paul turn for rescue from his agonizing situation? (7:24)
  13. What division did Paul acknowledge in his own mind and nature? (7:24)

Get It

  1. What are some of the various ways people respond to God’s law?
  2. How can reading and understanding God’s law be discouraging to a person?
  3. How can a Christian continue to commit sins even though God is his or her master?
  4. *How have you experienced a struggle with sin similar to what Paul describes?
  5. *What hope do we have of deliverance from sin here on earth?
  6. How can we take hold of the power of Christ to overcome sin?
  7. What should we do when we become discouraged and confused in our Christian lives?
  8. How can knowing that God has achieved the ultimate victory over sin affect your prayers, thoughts, and attitudes?

Apply It

  1. *How can you remind yourself each day this week of God’s victory over sin?
  2. What recent struggle with sin do you need to hand over to God today?

 

Sin’s Advantage in the Law

7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead. 9 I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. 10 And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death. 11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me. 12 Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good.

Law Cannot Save from Sin

13 Has then what is good become death to me? Certainly not! But sin, that it might appear sin, was producing death in me through what is good, so that sin through the commandment might become exceedingly sinful. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin. 15 For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. 16 If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. 17 But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. 18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. 19 For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. 20 Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.

21 I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. 22 For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. 23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. 24 O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!

So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.